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THE AMERICAN
SCHOLAR

The American Scholar

BY

THEODORE PARKER

EDITED WITH NOTES
BY
GEORGE WILLIS COOKE

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BOSTON
AMERICAN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION
25 Beacon Street

copyright, 1907
American Unitarian Association

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EDITOR'S PREFACE
Into this volume have been collected a number of
Theodore Parker's more scholarly and critical essays,
originally published in the various reviews with which
he was connected in one or another capacity. To these
have been added three or four studies of great preachers.
The title of the initial essay, at -first used as a college
address, has been thought an appropriate one for the
whole volume.
The essays on Follen, Beecher, and Macaulay have
not before been reprinted from the reviews in which they
first appeared. That on Dr. Follen was printed in The
Dial, and was the first of Parker's remarkable series of
character studies. As the work of a young man it will
be found worthy to lead the way to the studies of
Adams and Webster. The essay on Macaulay appeared
in the Massachusetts Quarterly Review, and by what
oversight Miss Cobbe failed to include it in her edition,
it is impossible now to say. Parker's only contribution
to The Atlantic Monthly, in its first volume, was the essay
on Henry Ward Beecher. It was his last work of this
kind, and probably concluded his many contributions to
magazine literature. It shows how highly he appreciated
the great Brooklyn preacher.
All of these essays show forth Parker's humanity, and
his great admiration for real men. They also indicate
his keen critical insight into social causes, as well as his
fearless regard for the truth. He did not write to

vi EDITOR'S PREFACE
flatter, nor to make the worse appear the better reason.
Literary charm and perfection of style did not satisfy
him ; but he demanded that justice should be upheld
and right sought for with singleness of aim.
G. W. C.

CONTENTS Page
I. The American Scholar  1
II. Ralph Waldo Emerson  54
III. William Ellery Channing  126
IV. Prescott as an Historian  172
V. Prescott's Conquest of Mexico . . . 220
VI. Hlldreth's United States  268
VII. Macaulay's History of England . . . 323
VIII. Buckle's History of Civilization . . . 364
IX. Henry Ward Beecher  419
X. Life and Character of Dr. Follen . . 439
XI. German Literature  463
Notes  497

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Men of a superior culture get it at the cost of the
whole community, and therefore at first owe for their
education. They must pay back an equivalent or else
remain debtors to mankind, debtors for ever; that is,
beggars or thieves, such being the only class that are
thus perpetually in debt and a burden to the race.
It is true that every man, the rudest Prussian boor as
well as von Humboldt, is indebted to mankind for his
culture, to their past history and their existing in
stitutions, to their daily toil. Taking the whole cul
ture into the account, the debt bears about the same
ratio to the receipt in all men. I speak not of genius,
the inborn faculty which costs mankind nothing, only
of the education thereof, which the man obtains. The
Irishman who can only handle his spade, wear his gar
ments, talk his wild brogue, and bid his beads, has four
or five hundred generations of ancestors behind him,
and is as long descended and from as old a stock as the
accomplished patrician scholar at Oxford and Berlin.
The Irishman depends on them all, and on the present
generation, for his culture. But he has obtained his
development with no special outlay and cost of the hu
man race. In getting that rude culture he has ap
propriated nothing to himself which is taken from
another man's share. He has paid as he went along,
so he owes nothing in particular for his education ; and
mankind has no claim on him as for value received.
But the Oxford graduate has been a long time at school
II-l 1

2 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and college, not earning but learning ; living therefore
at the cost of mankind, with an obligation and an im
plied promise to pay back when he comes of age and
takes possession of his educated faculties. He there
fore has not only the general debt which he shares with
all men, but an obligation quite special and peculiar for
his support while at study.
This rule is general, and applies to the class of edu
cated men, with some apparent exceptions, and a very
few real ones. Some men are born of poor but strong-
bodied parents, and endowed with great abilities ; they
inherit nothing except their share of the general civili
zation of mankind, and the onward impulse which that
has given. These men devote themselves to study ;
and having behind them an ancestry of broad-shoul
dered, hard-handed, stalwart, temperate men, and deep-
bpsomed, red-armed, and industrious mothers, they are
able to do the work of two or three men at the time.
Such men work while they study ; they teach while they
learn ; they hew their own way through the wood by
superior strength and skill born in their bones, with
an axe themselves have chipped out from the stone, or
forged of metal, or paid for with the result of their first
hewings. They are specially indebted to nobody for
their culture. They pay as they go, owing the acad
emic ferryman nothing for setting them over into the
elysium of the scholar.
Only few men ever make this heroic and crucial ex
periment. None but poor men's sons essay the trial.
Nothing but poverty has whips sharp enough to sting
indolent men, even of genius, to such exertion of the
manly part. But even this proud race often runs into
another debt; they run up long scores with the body,
which must one day be paid " with aching head and

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 3
squeamish heart-burnings." The credit on account of
the hardy fathers is not without limit. It is soon ex
hausted ; especially in a land where the atmosphere, the
institutions, and the youth of the people all excite to
premature and excessive prodigality of effort. The
body takes a mortgage on the spendthrift spirit, de
mands certain regular periodic payments, and will one
day foreclose for breach of condition, impede the
spirit's action in the premises, putting a very dis
agreeable keeper there, and finally expel the prodigal
mortgager. So it often happens that a man who in
his youth scorned a pecuniary debt to mankind and
would receive no favor, even to buy culture with, has
yet unconsciously and against his will, contracted debts
which trouble him in manhood, and impede his action
all his hfe ; with swollen feet and blear eyes famous
Griesbach pays for the austere heroism of his penurious
and needy youth. The rosy bud of genius on the
poor man's tree, too often opens into a lean and ghastly
flower. Could not Burns tell us this?
With the rare exceptions just hinted at, any man of
a superior culture owes for it when obtained. Some
times the debt is obvious ; a farmer with small means
and a large family sends the most hopeful of his sons to
college. Look at the cost of the boy's culture. His
hands are kept from work that his mind may be free.
He fares on daintier food, wears more and more costly
garments. Other members of the family must feed
and clothe him, earn his tuition-fees, buy his books,
pay for his fuel and room-rent. For this the father
rises earlier than of old, yoking the oxen a great while
before day of a winter's morning, and toils till long
after dark of a winter's night, enduring cold and
hardship. For this the mother stints her frugal fare,

4 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
her humble dress ; for this the brothers must forego
sleep and pastime, must toil harder, late and early
both ; for this the sisters must seek new modes of profit
able work, must wear their old finery long after it is
finery no more. The spare wealth of the family,
stinted to spare it, is spent on this one youth. From
the father to the daughters, all lay their bones to ex
traordinary work for him ; the whole family is pinched
in body that this one youth may go brave and full.
Even the family horse pays his tax to raise the educa
tion fee.
Men see the hopeful scholar, graceful and accom
plished, receiving his academic honors, but they see
not the hard-featured father standing unheeded in the
aisle, nor the older sister in an obscure corner of the
gallery, who had toiled in the factory for the favored
brother, tending his vineyard, her own not kept; who
had perhaps learned the letters of Greek to hear him
recite the grammar at home. Father and sister know
not a word of the language in* which his diploma is
writ and delivered. At what cost of the family tree is
this one flower produced? How many leaves, possible
blossoms, yea, possible branches, have been absorbed to
create this one flower, which shall perpetuate the kind,
after being beautiful and fragrant in its own season?
Yet, while these leaves are growing for the blossom's
sake, and the life of the tree is directed thither with
special and urgent emphasis, the difference between
branch and blossom, leaf and petal, is getting more
and more. By and by the two cannot comprehend each
other ; the acorn has forgotten the leaf which reared it,
and thinks itself of another kin. Grotius, who speaks
a host of languages, talking with the learned of all
countries and of every age, has forgot his mother

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 5
tongue, and speech is at end with her that bore him.
The son, accomplished with many a science, many an
art, ceases to understand the simple consciousness of
his father and mother. They are proud of him, that
he has outgrown them ; he ashamed of them when they
visit him amid his scholarly company. To them he is
a philosopher, they only clowns in his eyes. He learns
to neglect, perhaps to despise them, and forgets his
obligation and his debt. Yet by their rudeness is it
that he is refined. His science and literary skill are
purchased by their ignorance and uncouthness of man
ner and of speech. Had the educational cost been
equally divided all had still continued on a level ; he
had known no Latin, but the whole family might have
spoken good English. For all the difference which
education made betwixt him and his kinsfolk he is a
debtor. In New England you sometimes see extremes of so
cial condition brought together. The blue-frocked
father, well advanced, but hale as an October morn
ing, jostles into Boston in a milk-cart, his red-cheeked
grand-daughter beside him, also coming for some use
ful daily work, while the youngest son, cultured at the
cost of that grand-daughter's sire and by that father's
toil, is already a famous man; perhaps also a proud
one, eloquent at the bar, or powerful in the pulpit, or
mighty in the senate. The family was not rich enough
to educate all the children after this costly sort; one
becomes famous, the rest are neglected, obscure, and
perhaps ignorant; the cultivated son has little sympa
thy with them. So the men that built up the cathe
drals of Strasbourg and Milan slept in mean hutches
of mud and straw, dirty, cold, and wet; the finished
tower looks proudly down upon the lowly thatch, all

6 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
heedless of the cost at which itself arose. It is plain
that this man owes for his education, it is plain whom he
owes. But all men of a superior culture, though born
to wealth, get their education in the same wayi only
there is this additional mischief to complicate the mat
ter ; the burden of self-denial is not borne by the man's
own family, but by other fathers and mothers, other
brothers and sisters. They also pay the cost of his
culture, bear the burden for no special end, and have
no personal or family joy in the success; they do not
even know the scholar they help to train. They who
hewed the topstone of society are far away when it is
hoisted up with shouting. Most of the youths now-a-
days trained at Harvard College are the sons of rich
men, yet they also, not less, are educated at the public
charge ; beneficiaries not of the " Hopkins' Fund," l
but of the whole community. Society is not yet rich
enough to afford so generous a culture to all who ask,
who deserve, or who would pay for it a hundred-fold.
The accomplished man who sits in his well-endowed
scholarship at Oxford, or rejoices to be " Master of
Trinity," though he have the estate of the Westmin
sters and Sutherlands behind him, is still the beneficiary
of the public and owes for his schooling.
In the general way, among the industrious classes of
New England, a boy earns his living after he is twelve
years old. If he gets the superior education of the
scholar solely by the pecuniary aid of his father or
others, when he is twenty-five and enters on his pro
fession, — law, medicine, or divinity, politics, school-
keeping, or trade, he has not earned his Latin gram
mar; has rendered no appreciable service to mankind;
others have worked that he might study, and taught
that he might learn. He has not paid the first cent

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 7
towards his own schooling ; he is indebted for it to the
whole community. The ox-driver in the fields, the
paver in the city streets, the laborer on the railroad,
the lumberer in the woods, the girl in the factory, each
has a claim on him. If he despises these persons or
cuts himself off from sympathy with them, if he refuses
to perform his function for them after they have done
their possible to fit him for it, he is not only the per
petual and ungrateful debtor, but is more guilty than
the poor man's son who forgets the family that sent
him to college; for that family consciously and will
ingly made the sacrifice, and got some satisfaction for
it in the visible success of their scheme, nay, are some
times proud of the pride which scorns them, while with
the mass of men thus slighted there is no return for
their sacrifice. They did their part, faithfully did it ;
their beneficiary forgets his function.
The democratic party in New England does not
much favor the higher seminaries of education. There
has long been a suspicion against them in the mass of
the community, and among the friends of the public
education of the people a serious distrust. This is the
philosophy of that discontent: public money spent on
the higher seminaries is so much taken from the hum
bler schools, so much taken from the colleges of all for
the college of the few; men educated at such cost have
not adequately repaid the public for the sacrifice made
on their account; men of superior education have not
been eminently the friends of mankind, they do not
eminently represent truth, justice, philanthropy, and
piety ; they do not point men to lofty human life and
go thitherward in advance of mankind; their superior
^ education has narrowed their sympathies, instead of
widening; they use their opportunities against man-

8 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
kind, and not in its behalf; think, write, legislate, and
live not for the interest of mankind, but only for a
class; instead of eminent wisdom, justice, piety, they
have eminent cunning, selfishness and want of faith.
These charges are matters of allegation, judge you if
they be not also matters of fact.
Now, there is a common feeling amongst men that
the scholar is their debtor, and in virtue of this that
they have a right to various services from him. No
honest man asks the aid of a farmer or a blacksmith
without intending to> repay him in money; no assembly
of mechanics would ask another to come two hundred
miles and give them a month's work, or a day's work.
Yet they will ask a scholar to do so. What gratuitous
services are demanded of the physician, of the minister,
of the man of science and letters in general ! No poor
man in Boston but thinks he has a good claim on any
doctor; no culprit in danger of liberty or life but will
ask the services of a lawyer wholly without recompense
to plead his cause. The poorest and most neglected
class of men look on every good clergyman as their
missionary and minister and friend ; the better edu
cated and more powerful he is, the juster and greater
do they feel their claim on him. A pirate in gaol may
command the services of any Christian minister in the
land. Most of the high achievements in science, let
ters, and art, have had no apparent pay. The pay
came beforehand; in general and from God, in the
greater ability, " the vision and the faculty divine,"
but in particular also and from men, in the opportunity
afforded them by others for the use and culture there
of. Divinely and humanly they are well paid. Men
feel that they have this right to the services of the
scholar, in part because they dimly know that his su-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 9
perior education is purchased at the general cost.
Hence, too, they are proud of the few able and ac
complished men, feeling that all have a certain prop
erty therein, as having contributed their mite to the
accumulation, by their divine nature related to the
men of genius, by their human toil partners in the
acquirements of the scholar. This feeling is not con
fined to men who intellectually can appreciate intellec
tual excellence. The httle parish in the mountains,
and the great parish in the city, are alike proud of the
able-headed and accomplished scholar who ministers to
them ; though neither the poor clowns of the village
nor the wealthy clowns of the metropolis could enter
into his consciousness and understand his favorite pur
suits or loftiest thought. Both would think it insult
ing to pay such a man in full proportion to his work
or their receipt. Nobody offers a salary to the House
of Lords ; their lordship is their pay, and they must
give back, in the form of justice and sound govern
ment, an equivalent for all they take in high social
rank. They must pay for their nobility by being noble
lords. How shall the scholar pay for his education ? He is
to give a service for the service received. Thus the
miller and the farmer pay one another, each paying
with service in his own kind. The scholar cannot pay
back bread for bread, and cloth for cloth. He must
pay in the scholar's kind, not the woodman's or the
weaver's. He is to represent the higher modes of
human consciousness ; his culture and opportunities of
position fit him for that. So he is not merely to go
through the routine of his profession as minister, doc
tor, lawyer, merchant, school-master, politician, or

10 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
maker of almanacs, and for his own advantage ;/ he is
also able to represent truth, justice, beauty, philan
thropy, and religion, the highest facts of human ex
perience ; he must be common, but not vulgar, and, as a
star, must dwell apart from the vulgarity of the sel
fish and low./ He may win money without doing this,
get fame and power, and thereby seem to pay mankind
for their advance to him, while he rides upon their
neck; but as he has not paid back the scholar's cost,
and in the scholar's way, he is a debtor still, and owes
for his past culture and present condition.
Such is the position of the scholar everywhere, and
such his consequent obligation. But in America there
are some circumstances which make the position and
the duty still more important. Beside the natural
aristocracy of genius, talent, and educated skill, in
most countries there is also a conventional and perma
nent nobility based on royal or patrician descent and
immoveable aristocracy. Its members monopolize the
high places of society, and if not strong by nature are
so by position. Those men check the natural power
of the class of scholars. The descendant of some fa
mous chief of old time takes rank before the Bacons,
the Shakespeares, and the Miltons of new families, —
born yesterday, to-day gladdened and gladdening with
the joy of their genius, — usurps their place, and for
a time " shoves away the worthy bidden guest " from
the honors of the public board. Here there is no such
class : a man born at all is well born ; with a great na
ture, nobly born ; the career opens to all that can run,
to all men that wish to try ; our aristocracy is movable,
and the scholar has scope and verge enough.
Germany has the largest class of scholars; men of

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR . 11
talent, sometimes of genius, of great working power,
exceedingly well furnished for their work, with a
knowledge of the past and the present. On the whole,
they seem to have a greater power of thought than the
scholars of any other land. They live in a country
where intellectual worth is rated at its highest value.
As England is the paradise of the patrician and the
millionaire, so is Germany for the man of thought;
Goethe and Schiller and the Humboldts took prece
dence of the mere conventional aristocracy. The em
pire of money is for England, that of mind is for Ger
many. But there the scholar is positively hindered in
his function by the power of the government, which
allows freedom of thought, and by education tends to
promote it, yet not its correlative freedom of speech,
and still less the consequent of that, freedom of act.
Revelations of new thought are indeed looked for, and
encouraged in certain forms, but the corresponding
revolution of old things is forbidden. An idea must
remain an idea; the government will not allow it to
become a deed, an institution, an idea organized in men.
The children of the mind must be exposed to die, or if
left alive their feet are cramped so that they cannot
go alone ; useless, joyless, and unwed, they remain in
their father's house. The government seeks to estab
lish national unity of action by the sacrifice of individ
ual variety of action, personal freedom; every man
must be a soldier and a Christian, wearing the livery of
the government on the body and in the soul, and going
through the spiritual exercises of the church as through
the manual exercise of the camp. In a nation so en
lightened, personal freedom cannot be wholly sacrificed,
so thought is left free, but speech restricted by censor
ship, speech with the human mouth or the iron lips

12 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
of the press. Now, as of old, is there a controversy be
tween the temporal and the spiritual powers about the
investiture of the children of the soul.
Then, on the other side, the scholar is negatively im
peded by the comparative ignorance of the people, by
their consequent lack of administrative power and self-
help, and their distrust of themselves. There a great
illumination has gone on in the upper heavens of the
learned, meteors coruscating into extraordinary glory;
it has hardly dawned on the low valleys of the common
people. If it shines there at all, it is but as the North
ern Aurora, with a little crackling noise, lending a
feeble and uncertain light, not enough to walk with,
and no warmth at all; a light which disturbs the dip
and alters the variation of the old historical compass,
bewilders the eye, hides the stars, and yet is not bright
enough to walk by without stumbling. There is a
learned class, very learned and very large, with whom
the scholar thinks, and for whom he writes, most un-
couthly, in the language only of the schools ; and if
not kept in awe by the government, they are contented
that a thought should remain always a thought; while
in their own heart they disdain all authority but that
of truth, justice, and love, they leave the people sub
ject to no rule but the priest, the magistrate, and old
custom, which usurp the place of reason, conscience,
and affections. There is a very enlightened pulpit,
and a very dull audience. In America, it is said, for
every dough-faced 2 representative there is a dough-
faced constituency ; but in Germany there is not an in
telligent people for each intelligent scholar. So on
condition a great thought be true and revolutionary, it
is hard to get it made a thing. Ideas go. into a nun
nery, not a family. Phidias must keep his awful Jove

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 13
only in his head; there is no marble to carve it on.
Eichhorn and Strauss, and Kant and Hegel, with all
their pother among the learned, have kept no boor from
the communion-table, nor made him discontented with
the despotism of the state. They wrote for scholars,
perhaps for gentlemen, for the enlightened, not for the
great mass of the people, in whom they had no confi
dence. There is no class of hucksters of thought who
retail philosophy to the million. The million have as
yet no appetite for it. So the German scholar is hin
dered from his function on either land by the power of
the government, or the ignorance of the people. He
talks to scholars and not men ; his great ideas are often
as idle as shells in a lady's cabinet.
In America all is quite different. There are no
royal or patrician patrons, no plebeian clients in litera
ture, no immoveable aristocracy to withstand or even
retard the new genius, talent, or skill of the scholar.
There is no class organized, accredited, and confided in,
to resist a new idea; only the unorganized inertia of
mankind retards the circulation of thought and the
march of men. Our historical men do not found his
torical families ; our famous names of to-day are all
new names in the state. American aristocracy is bot
tomed on money which no unnatural laws make stead
fast and immoveable. To exclude a scholar from the
company of rich men is not to exclude him from an au
dience that will welcome and appreciate.
Then the government does not interfere to prohibit
the free exercise of thought. Speaking is free, preach
ing is free, printing free. No administration in Amer
ica could put down a newspaper or suppress the dis
cussion of an unwelcome theme. The attempt would
be folly and madness. There is no " tonnage _ and

14 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
poundage " on thought. It is seldom that lawless vio
lence usurps the place of despotic government. The
chief opponent of the new philosophy is the old phi
losophy. The old has only the advantage of a few
years, the advantage of possession of the ground. It
has no weapons of defense which the new has not for
attack. What hinders the growth of the new democ
racy of to-day ? — only the old democracy of yester
day, once green, and then full-blown, but now going
to seed. Everywhere else walled gardens have been
built for it to go quietly to seed in, and men appointed,
in God's name or the state's, to exterminate as a weed
every new plant of democratic thought which may
spring up and suck the soil or keep off the sun, so that
the old may quietly occupy the ground and undisturbed
continue to decay and contaminate the air. Here it
has nothing but its own stalk to hold up its head, and
is armed with only such spines as it has grown out of
its own substance.
Here the only power which continually impedes the
progress of mankind, and is conservative in the bad
sense, is wealth, which represents life lived, not now a
living, and labor accumulated, not now a doing. Thus
the obstacle to free trade is not the notion that our
meat must be home-grown and our coat home-spun, but
the money invested in manufactures. Slavery is sus
tained by no prestige of antiquity, no abstract fond
ness for a patriarchal institution, no special zeal for
" Christianity " which the churches often tell us de
mands it, but solely because the Americans have in
vested some twelve hundred millions of dollars in the
bodies and souls of their countrymen, and fear they
shall lose their capital. Whitney's gin for separating
the cotton from its blue seed, making its culture and

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 15
the labor of the slave profitable, did more to perpetuate
slavery than all the " Compromises of the Constitu
tion." The last argument in its favor is always this :
" It brings money, and we would not lose our invest
ment." Weapon a man with iron, he will stand and
fight ; with gold, he will shrink and run. The class of
capitalists are always cowardly ; here they are the only
cowardly class that has much political or social in
fluence. Here gold is the imperial metal, nothing but
wealth is consecrated for life ; the tonsure gets covered *
up or grown over ; vows of celibacy are no more bind
ing than dicers' oaths; allegiance to the state is as
transferable as a cent, and may be alienated by going
over the border ; church-communion may be changed or
neglected ; as men will, they sign off from church s and
state ; only the dollar holds its own continually, and is
the same under all administrations, " safe from the bar,
the pulpit, and the throne." Obstinate money contin
ues in office spite of the proscriptive policy of Polk and
Taylor;4 the laws may change, South Carolina move
out of the nation, the Constitution be broken, the Union
dissolved, still money holds its own. That is the only
peculiar weapon which the old has wherewith to repel
the new.
Here, too, the scholar has as much freedom as he
will take; himself alone stands in his own light, noth
ing else between him and the infinite majesty of truth.
He is free to think, to speak, to print his word and
organize his thought. No class of men monopolize
public attention or high place. He comes up to the
Genius of America, and she asks : " What would you
have, my Httle man ? " " More liberty," lisps he.
" Just as much as you can carry," is the answer.
" Pay for it and take it, as much as you like, there it

16 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
is." " But it is guarded ! " " Only by gilded flies in
the day-time ; they look like hornets, but can only buzz,
not bite with their beak, nor sting with their tail. At
night it is defended by daws and beetles, noisy, but
harmless. Here is marble, my son, not classic and fa
mous as yet, but good as the parian stone; quarry as
much as you will, enough for a nymph or a temple.
Say your wisest and do your best thing, nobody will
hurt you ! "
Not much more is the scholar impeded by the igno
rance of the people, not at all in respect to the sub
stance of his thought. There is no danger that he
will shoot over the heads of the people by thinking too
high for the multitude. We have many authors be
low the market, scarce one above it. The people are
continually looking for something better than our au
thors give. No American author has yet been too high
for the comprehension of the people, and compelled
to leave his writings " to posterity, after some cen
turies shall have passed by." If he has thought with
the thinkers, and has something to say, and can speak
it in plain speech, he is sure to be widely understood.
There is no learned class to whom he may talk Latin
or Sanscrit, and who will understand him if he write
as ill as Immanuel Kant; there is not a large class to
buy costly editions of ancient classics, however beau
tiful, or magnificent works on India, Egypt, Mexico —
the class of scholars is too poor for that, the rich men
have not the taste for such beauty ; but there is an in
telligent class of men who will hear a man if he has
what is worth listening to and says it plain. It will
be understood and appreciated, and soon reduced to
practice. Let him think as much in advance of men as
he will, as far removed from the popular opinion as he

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 17
may, if he arrives at a great truth he is sure of an
audience, not an audience of fellow-scholars, as in Ger
many, but of fellow-men; not of the children of dis
tinguished or rich men, rather of the young parents of
such, an audience of earnest, practical people, who if
his thought be a truth will soon make it a thing. They
will appreciate the substance of his thought, though
not the artistic form which clothes it.
This peculiar relation of the man of genius to the
people comes from American institutions. Here the
greatest man stands nearest to the people, and without
a mediator speaks to them face to face. This is a
new thing : in the classic nations oratory was for the
people, so was the drama and the ballad ; that was all
their literature. But this came to the people only in
cities ; the tongue travels slow and addresses only the
ear, while swiftly hurries on the printed word and
speaks at once to a million eyes. Thucydides and Tac
itus wrote for a few; Virgil sang the labors of the
shepherd in old Ascrsan verse, but only to the wealthy
wits of Rome. " I hate the impious crowd, and stave
them off," was the scholar's maxim then. All writing
was for the few. The best English literature of the
sixteenth and seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is
amenable to the same criticism, except the dramatic and
the religious. It is so with all the permanent litera
ture of Europe of that time. The same must be said
even of much of the religious literature of the scholars
then. The writings of Taylor, of Barrow and South,
of Bossuet, Massillon, and Bourdaloue, clergymen
though they were, speaking with a religious and there
fore a universal aim, always presuppose a narrow au
dience of men of nice culture. So they drew their
figures from the schoolmen from the Greek anthology,
II— 2

18 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
from heathen classics and the Christian Fathers. Their
illustrations were embellishments to the scholar, but only
palpable darkness to the people. This fact of writing
for a few nice judges was of great advantage to the
form of the literature thus produced, but a disadvan
tage to the substance thereof; a misfortune to the
scholar himself, for it belittled his sympathies and kept
him within a narrow range. Even the religious litera
ture of the men just named betrays a lack of freedom,
a thinking for the learned and not for mankind ; it has
breathed the air of the cloister, not the sky, and is
tainted with academic and monastic diseases. So the
best of it is over-sentimental, timid, and does not point
to hardy, manly life. Only Luther and Latimer
preached to the million hearts of their contemporaries.
The dramatic literature, on the other hand, was for
box, pit, and gallery ; hence the width of poetry in its
great masters, hence many of its faults of form; and
hence the wild and wanton luxuriance of beauty which
flowers out all over the marvellous field of art where
Shakespeare walked and sung. In the pulpit excel
lence was painted as a priest, or monk, or nun, loving
nothing but God ; on the stage as a soldier, magistrate,
a gentleman or simpleman, a wife and mother, loving
also child and friend. Only the literature of the player
and the singer of ballads was for the people.
Here all is changed, everything that is written is for
the hands of the million. In three months Mr. Ma
caulay has more readers in America than Thucydides
and Tacitus in twelve centuries. Literature, which
was once the sacrament of the few, only a shew-bread
to the people, is now the daily meat of the multitude.
The best works get reprinted with great speed, the
highest poetry is soon in all the newspapers. Authors

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 19
know this and write accordingly. It is only scientific
works which ask for a special public. But even science,
the proudest of the day, must come down from the
clouds of the academy, lay off its scholastic garb, and
appear before the eyes of the multitude in common
work-day clothes. To large and mainly unlearned au
diences Agassiz and Walker set forth the highest teach
ings of physics and metaphysics, not sparing difficult
things, but putting them in plain speech. Emerson
takes his majestic intuitions of truth and justice, which
transcend the experience of the ages, and expounds
them to the mechanics' apprentices, to the factory girls
at Lowell and Chicopee, and to the merchants' clerks
at Boston.5 The more original the speaker, and the
more profound, the better is he relished; the beauty
of the form is not appreciated, but the original sub
stance welcomed into new life over the bench, the loom,
and even the desk of the counting-house. Of a deep
man the people ask clearness also, thinking he does not
see a thing wholly till he sees it plain.
From this new relation of the scholar to the people,
and the direct intimacy of his intercourse with men,
there comes a new modification of his duty; he is to
represent the higher facts of human consciousness to
the people, and express them in the speech of the peo
ple; to think with the sage and saint, but talk with
common men. It is easy to discourse with scholars,
and in the old academic carriage drive through the
broad gateway of the cultivated class ; but here the man
of genius is to take the new thought on his shoulders
and climb up the stiff, steep hill, and find his way where
the wild asses quench their thirst, and the untamed
eagle builds his nest. Hence our American scholar
must cultivate the dialectics of speech as well as

20 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
thought. Power of speech without thought, a long
tongue in an empty head, calls the people together
once or twice, but soon its only echo is from an audience
of empty pews. Thought without power of speech
finds little welcome here, there are not scholars enough
to keep it in countenance. This popularity of intelli
gence gives a great advantage to the man of letters,
who is also a man. He can occupy the whole space be
tween the extremes of mankind, can be at once philoso
pher in his thought and people in his speech, deliver
his word without an interpreter to mediate, and, like
King Mithridates in the story, talk with the four
score nations of his camp each in his own tongue.
Further still, there are some peculiarities of the
American mind in which we differ from our English
brothers. They are more inclined to the matter of
fact, and appeal to history ; we to the matter of ideas,
and having no national history but of a revolution, may
appeal at once to human nature. So while they are
more historical, fond of names and precedents,
enamored of limited facts and coy towards abstract
and universal ideas, with the maxim, " Stand by the
'fixed," we are more metaphysical, ideal; do not think
a thing right because actual, nor impossible because it
has never been. The Americans are more metaphys
ical than the English, have departed more from the old
sensational philosophy, have welcomed more warmly
the transcendental philosophy of Germany and France.
The Declaration of Independence, and all the State
Constitutions of the North, begin with a universal and
abstract idea.6 Even preaching is abstract and of
ideas. Calvinism bears metaphysical fruit in New
England.7 This fact modifies still more the function of the duty

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 21
of the scholar. It determines him to ideas, to facts
for the ideas they cover, not so much to the past as the
future, to the past only that he may guide the present
and construct the future. He is to take his run in
the past to acquire the momentum of history, his stand
in the present, and leap into the future.
In this manner the position and duty of the scholar
in America are modified and made peculiar ; and thus is
the mode determined for him in which to pay for his
education in the manner most profitable to the public
that has been at the cost of his training.
There is a test by which we measure the force of a
horse or a steam-engine ; the raising of so many pounds
through so many feet in a given time. The test of
the scholar's power is his ability to raise men in their
development. In America there are three chief modes of acting
upon the public, omitting others of small account.
The first is the power which comes of national wealth;
the next, that of political station ; the third, power of
spiritual wealth, so to say, eminent wisdom, justice,
love, piety, the power of sentiments and ideas, and the
faculty of communicating them to other men, and or
ganizing them therein. For the sake of shortness, let
each mode pf power be symbolized by its instrument,
and we have the power of the purse, of the office, and of
the pen.
The purse represents the favorite mode of power
with us. This is natural in our present stage of na
tional existence and human development; it is likely
to continue for a long time. In all civilized countries
which have outgrown the period when the sword was
the favorite emblem, the purse represents the favorite
mode of power with the mass of men ; but here it is so

22 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
with the men of superior education. This power is
not wholly personal, but extra-personal, and the man's
centre of gravity lies out of himself, less or more,
somewhere between the man and his last cent, the dis
tance being greater or less as the man is less or greater
than the estate. This is wielded chiefly by men of little
education, except the practical culture which they have
gained in the process of accumulation. Their riches
they get purposely, their training by the way, and ac
cidentally. It is a singular misfortune of the country
that while the majority of the people are better culti
vated and more enlightened than any other population
in the world, the greater part of the wealth of the na
tion is owned by men of less education and consequently
of less enlightenment than the rich men of any leading
nation in Europe. In England and France the wealth
of this generation is chiefly inherited, and has generally
fallen to men carefully trained, with minds disciplined
by academic culture. Here wealth is new, and mainly
in the hands of men who have scrambled for it adroitly
and with vigor. They have energy, vigor, forecast,
and a certain generosity, but as a class are narrow, vul
gar, and conceited. Nine-tenths of the property of
the people is owned by one-tenth of the persons; and
these capitalists are men of little culture, little moral
elevation. This is an accident of our position unavoid
able, perhaps transient; but it is certainly a misfor
tune that the great estates of the country, and the
social and political power of such wealth, should be
mainly in the hands of such men. The melancholy re
sult appears in many a disastrous shape, in the tone of
the pulpit, of the press, and of the national politics;
much of the vulgarity of the nation is to be ascribed
to this fact, that wealth belongs to men who know
nothing better.

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 23
The office represents the next most popular mode of
power. This also is extra-personal, the man's center of
gravity is out of himself, somewhere between him and
the lowest man in the state ; the distance depending on
the proportion of manhood in him and the multitude, if
the office is much greater than the man, then the offi
cer's center of gravity is further removed from his per
son. This is sought for by the ablest and best edu
cated men in the land. But there is a large class of
educated persons who do not aspire to it from lack of
ability, for in our form of government it commonly
takes some saliency of character to win the high places
of office and use respectably this mode of power,
while it demands no great or lofty talents to accumu
late the largest fortune in America. It is true the
whirlwind of an election, by the pressure of votes, may
now and then take a very heavy body up to a great
height. Yet it does not keep him from growing giddy
and ridiculous while there, and after a few years lets
him fall again into complete insignificance, whence no
Hercules can ever lif t him up. A corrupt administra
tion may do the same, but with the same result. This
consideration keeps many educated men from the po
litical arena; others are unwilling to endure the un
savory atmosphere of politics, and take part in a
scramble so vulgar; but still a large portion of the
educated and scholarly talent of the nation goes to that
-work. The power of the pen is wholly personal. It is the
appropriate instrument of the scholar, but it is least of
all desired and sought for. The rich man sends his
sons to trade, to make too much of inheritance yet
more by fresh acquisitions of superfluity. He does
not send them to literature, art, or science. You find

24 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the scholar slipping in to other modes of action, not
the merchants and politicians migrating into this. He
longs to act by the gravity of his money or station,
not draw merely by his head. The office carries the
day before the pen ; the purse takes precedence of both.
Educated men do not so much seek places that demand
great powers as those which bring much gold. Self-
denial for money or office is common, for scholarship
rare and unpopular. To act by money, not mind, is
the ill-concealed ambition of many a well-bred man ;
the desire of this colors his day-dream, which is less of
wisdom and more of wealth, or of political station ; so
a first-rate clergyman desires to be razeed to a second-
rate politician, and some " tall admiral " of a politician
consents to be cut down and turned into a mere sloop
of trade. The representative in Congress becomes a
president of an insurance office or a bank or the agent
of a cotton-mill; the judge deserts his station on the
bench and presides over a railroad; the governor or
senator wants a place in the post-office; the historian
longs for a " chance in the custom-house." The pen
stoops to the office, that to- the purse. The scholar
would rather make a fortune by a balsam of wild
cherry than write Hamlet or Paradise Lost for noth
ing; rather than help mankind by making a Paradise
Regained. The well-endowed minister thinks how
much more money he might have made had he specu
lated in stocks and not theology, and mourns that the
kingdom of heaven does not pay in this present life
fourfold. The professor of Greek is sorry he was not
a surveyor and superintendent of a railroad, he should
have so much more money ; that is what he has learned
from Plato and Diogenes. We estimate the skill of
an artist like that of a pedler, not by the pictures he

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 25
has made, but by the money. There is a mercantile
way of determining literary merit, not by the author's
books, but by his balance with the publisher. No
church is yet called after a man who is merely rich,
something in the New Testament might hinder that;
but the ministers estimate their brother minister by the
greatness of his position, not of his character ; not by
his piety and goodness, not even by his reason and
understanding, the culture he has attained thereby, and
the use he makes thereof, but by the wealth of his
church and the largeness of his salary ; so that he is
not thought the fortunate and great minister who has
a large outgo of spiritual riches, rebukes the sins of
the nation and turns many to righteousness, but he
who has a large material income, ministers, though
poorly, to rich men, and is richly paid for that func
tion. The well-paid clergymen of a city tell the pro
fessor of theology that he must teach " such doctrines
as the merchants approve " or they will not give money
to the college, and he, it, and the " cause of the Lord,"
will all come to the ground at the same time and in
kindred confusion. So blind money would put out the
heavenly eyes of science, and lead her also to his own
ditch. It must not be forgotten that there are men
in the midst of us, — rich, respectable, and highly
honored with social rank and political power, who prac
tically and in strict conformity with their theory honor
Judas, who made money by his treachery, far more
than Jesus who laid down his life for men whose money
is deemed better than manhood. It must indeed be so.
Any outrage that is profitable to the controlling por
tion of society is sure to be welcome to the leaders of
the state, and is soon pronounced divine by the leaders
of the church.

26 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
It would seem as if the pen ought to represent the
favorite mode of power at a college ; but even there the
waters of Pactolus are thought fairer than the Casta-
lian, Heliconian spring, or " Slloa's brook that flowed
fast by the oracle of God." The college is named
after the men of wealth, not genius. How few pro
fessorships in America bear the names of men of sci
ence or letters, and not of mere rich men! Which is
thought the greatest benefactor of a college, he who
endows it with money or with mind? Even there it is
the purse, not the pen, that is the symbol of honor,
and the University is " up for California," 8 not Par
nassus. Even in politics the purse turns the scale. Let a
party wrestle never so hard, it cannot throw the dollar.
Money controls and commands talent, not talent money.
The successful shopkeeper frowns on and browbeats the
accomplished politician, who has too much justice for
the wharf and the board of brokers ; he notices that
the rich men avert their eye, or keep their beaver down,
trembles and is sad, fearing that his daughter will
never find a fitting spouse. The purse buys up able
men of superior education, corrupts and keeps them as
its retained attorneys, in congress or the church, not
as counsel but advocate, bribed to make the worse ap
pear the better reason, and so help money to control
the state and wield its power against the interest of
mankind. This is perfectly well known ; but no politi
cian or minister, bribed to silence or to speech, ever
loses his respectability because he is bought by re
spectable men, — if he get his pay. In all countries
but this the office is before the purse ; here the state is
chiefly an accessory of the exchange, and our politics
only mercantile. This appears sometimes against our

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 27
will, in symbols not meant to tell the tale. Thus in
the House of Representatives in Massachusetts, a cod
fish stares the speaker in the face 9 — not a very intel
lectual looking fish. When it was put there it was a
symbol of the riches of the state, and so of the Com
monwealth. With singular and unconscious satire it
tells the legislature to have an eye " to the main
chance," and, but for its fidelity to its highest instincts
and its obstinate silence, might be a symbol good
enough for the place.
Now, after the office and the purse have taken their
votaries from the educated class, the ablest men are
certainly not left behind. Three roads open before
our young Hercules as he leaves college, having re
spectively as finger-post the pen, the office, and the
purse. Few f oUow the road of letters. This need not "
be much complained of; nay, it might be rejoiced in, if
the purse and the office in their modes of power did
represent the higher consciousness of mankind. But
no one contends it is so.
Still there are men who devote themselves to some
Hterary calhngs which have no connection with politi
cal office, and which are not pursued for the sake of
great wealth. Such men produce the greater part of
the permanent Hterature of the country. They are
eminently scholars, permanent scholars who act by their
scholar-craft, not by the state-craft of the politician,
or the purse-craft of the capitalist. How are these
men paying their debt and performing their function?
The answer must be found in the science and the litera
ture of the land.
American science is something of which we may well
be proud. Mr. Liebig, in Germany, has found it neces
sary to defend himself from the charge of following

28 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
science for the loaves and fishes thereof; and he de
clares that he espoused chemistry not for her wealthy
dower, not even for the services her possible children
might render to mankind, but solely for her own sweet
sake. Amongst the English race, on both sides of the
ocean, science is loved rather for the fruit than the
blossom ; its service to the body is thought of more
value than its service to the mind. A man's respecta
bility would be in danger in America, if he loved any
science better than the money or fame it might bring.
It is characteristic of us that a scholar should write
for reputation and gold. Here, as elsewhere, the un
profitable parts of science fall to the lot of poor men.
When the rich man's son has the natural calling that
way public opinion would dissuade him from the study
of nature. The greatest scientific attainments do not
give a man so high social consideration as a political
office or a successful speculation, unless it be the science
which makes money. Scientific schools we call after
merely rich men, not men of wealthy minds. It is true
we name streets and squares, towns and counties, after
Franklin, but it is because he keeps the lightning from
factories, churches, and barns ; tells us not " to give
too much for the whistle," and teaches " the way to
make money plenty in every man's pocket." We
should not name them after Cuvier and Laplace.
Notwithstanding this, the scientific scholars of
America, both the home-born and the adopted sons,
have manfully paid for their culture, and done honor
to the land. This is true of men in all departments of
science, — from that which searches the deeps of the
sky to .that which explores the shallows of the sea. In
dividuals, states, and the nation, have all done them
selves honor by the scientific researches and discoveries

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 29
that have been made. The outlay of money and of
genius for things which only pay the head and not the
mouth of man is beautiful and a little surprising in
such a utilitarian land as this. Time would fail me
to attend to particular cases.
Look at the literature of America. Reserving the
exceptional portion thereof to be examined in a mo
ment, let us study the instantial portion of it, Ameri
can literature as a whole. This may be distributed
into two main divisions: First comes the permanent
literature, consisting of books not designed merely
for a single and transient occasion, but elaborately
wrought for a general purpose. This is literature
proper. Next follows the transient literature, which
is brought out for a particular occasion, and designed
to serve a special purpose. Let us look at each.
The permanent Hterature of America is poor and
meager; it does not bear the mark of manly hands, of
original, creative minds. Most of it is rather milk for
babes than meat for men, though much of it is neither
fresh meat nor new milk, but the old dish often served
up before. In respect to its form, this portion of our
literature is an imitation. That is natural enough,
considering the youth of the country. Every nation,
like every man, even one born to genius, begins by
imitation. Raphael, with servile pencil, followed his
masters in his youth ; but at length his artistic eye at
tracted new-born angels from the calm stillness of their
upper heaven, and with liberal, free hand, with mas
terly and original touch, the painter of the newness
amazed the world.
The early Christian literature is an imitation of the
Hebrew or the classic type; even after centuries had
passed by, Sidonius, though a bishop of the church,

30 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and destined to become a saint, uses the old heathen
imagery, referring to Triptolemus as a model for
Christian work, and talks about Triton and Galatea to
the Christian Queen of the Goths. Saint Ambrose is a
notorious imitator of pagan Cicero. The Christians
were all anointed with Jewish nard ; and the sour grapes
they ate in sacrament have set on edge their children's
teeth till now. The modern nations of Europe be
gan their literature by the driest copies of Livy and
Virgil. The Germans have the most original litera
ture of the last hundred years. But till the middle of
the past century their permanent literature was chiefly
in Latin and French, with as Httle originality as our
own. The real poetic life of the nation found vent in
other forms. It is natural, therefore, and according
to the course of history, that we should begin in this
way. The best political institutions of England are
cherished here, so her best literature ; and it is not sur
prising that we are content with this rich inheritance
of artistic toil. In many things we are independent,
but in much that relates to the higher works of man
we are still colonies of England. This appears not
only in the vulgar fondness for English fashions, man
ners, and the like, which is chiefly an affectation, but
in the servile style with which we copy the great or
little models of English literature. Sometimes this is
done consciously, oftener without knowing it.
But the substance of our permanent Hterature is as
faulty as its form. It does not bear marks of a new,
free, vigorous mind at work, looking at things from the
American point of view, and, though it put its thought
in antique forms, yet thinking originaUy and for itself.
It represents the average thought of respectable men,
directed to some particular subject, and their average

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 31
morality. It represents nothing more; how could it,
while the ablest men have gone off to politics or trade?
It is such literature as almost anybody might get up
if you would give him a Httle time to make the pre
liminary studies. There is Httle in it that is national,
little individual and of the writer's own mind; it is
ground out in the pubHc literary mill. It has no noble
sentiments, no great ideas; nothing which makes you
burn, nothing which makes you much worse or much
better. You may feed on this literature all your days,
and whatsoever you may gain in girth, you shall not
take in thought enough to add half an inch to your
stature. Out of every hundred American literary works
printed since the century began, about eighty wiU be
of -this character. Compare the four most conspicu
ous periodicals of America with the four great
Quarterlies of England, and you see how inferior our
literature is to theirs — in aU things, in form and in
substance too.10 The European has the freedom of a
well-bred man — it appears in the movement of his
thought, his use of words, in the easy grace of his sen
tences, and the general manner of his work ; the Amer
ican has the stiffness and limitations of a big, raw
boy, in the presence of his schoolmaster. They are
proud of being EngHsh, and so have a certain lofty
nationality which appears in their thought and the
form thereof, even in the freedom to use and invent
new words. Our authors of this class seem ashamed
that they are Americans, and accordingly are timid,
ungraceful, and weak. They dare not be original
when they could. Hence this sort of literature is dull.
A man of the average mind and conscience, heart and
soul, studies a particular subject a short time — for

32 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
this is the land of brief processes — and writes a book
thereof, or thereon ; a critic of the same average makes
his special study of the book, not its theme, " reviews "
the work; is as ready and able to pass judgment on
Bowditch's translation of Laplace in ten days after
its appearance as ten years, and distributes praise and
blame, not according to the author's knowledge, but
the critic's ignorant caprice; and then average men
read the book and the critique with no immoderate joy
or unmeasured grief. They learn some new facts, no
new ideas, and get no lofty impulse. The book was
written without inspiration, without philosophy, and
is read with small profit. Yet it is curious to observe
the praise which such men receive, how soon they are
raised to the House of Lords in English literature. I
have known three American Sir Walter Scotts, half a
dozen Addisons, one or two Macaulays, a historian that
was Hume and Gibbon both in one, several Burnses,
and Miltons by the quantity, not " mute," the more is
the pity, but " inglorious " enough ; nay, even vain
glorious at the praise which some penny-a-liner or
dollar-a-pager foolishly gave their cheap extemporary
stuff. In sacred literature it is the same ; in a single
winter at Boston we had two American Saint Johns in
full blast for several months. Though no Felix trem
bles, there are now extant in the United States not less
than six American Saint Pauls, in no manner of peril
except the most dangerous, of idle praise.
A living, natural, and full-grown literature contains
two elements. One is of mankind in general; that is
human and universal. The other is of the tribe in
special, and of the writer in particular. This is na
tional and even personal; you see the idiosyncrasy of
the nation and the individual author in the work. The

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 33
universal human substance accepts the author's form,
and the public wine of mankind runs into the private
bottle of the author. Thus the Hebrew literature of
the Old Testament is fresh and original in substance
and in form; the two elements are plain enough, the
universal and the particular. The staple of the Psalms
of David is human, of mankind, it is trust in God ; but
the twist, the die, the texture, the pattern, all that is
Hebrew — of the tribe, and personal — of David,
shepherd, warrior, poet, king. You see the pastoral
hiH-sides of Judam in his holy hymns ; nay, " Uriah's
beauteous wife " now and then sidles into his sweetest
psalm. The Old Testament books smell of Palestine,
of its air and its soil. The Rose of Sharon has Hebrew
earth about its roots. The geography of the Holy
Land, its fauna and its flora both, even its wind and
sky, its early and its latter rain, all appear in the
literature of historian and bard. It is so in the Iliad.
You see how the sea looked from Homer's point of view,
and know how he felt the west wind, cold and raw.
The human element has an Ionian form and a Homeric
hue. The baUads of the people in Scotland and Eng
land are national in the same way; the staple of hu
man life is wrought into the Scottish form. Before
the Germans had any permanent national literature of
this character their fertile mind found vent in legends,
popular stories, now the admiration of the learned.
These had at home the German dress, but as the stories
traveled into other lands, they kept their human flesh
and blood, but took a different garb, and acquired a
different complexion from every country which they
visited; and, like the streams of their native Swabia,
took the color of the soil they traveled through.
The permanent and instantial literature of Amer-
II— 3

34 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ica is not national in this sense. It has little that is
American; it might as well be written by some book-
wright in Leipsic or London, and then imported. The
individuality of the nation is not there, except in the
cheap, gaudy binding of the work. The nationality
of America is only stamped on the lids, and vulgarly
blazoned on the back.
Is the book a history ? — it is written with no such
freedom as you should expect of a writer looking at
the breadth of the world from the lofty stand-point of
America. There is no new philosophy of history in it.
You would not think it was written in a democracy that
keeps the peace without armies or a national gaol.
Mr. Macaulay writes the history of England as none
but a North Briton could do. Astonishingly well-read,
equipped with literary skill at least equal to the mas
terly art of Voltaire, mapping out his subject like an
engineer, and adorning it like a painter, you yet see,
all along, that the author is a Scotchman and a Whig.
Nobody else could have written so. It is of Mr. Ma
caulay. But our American writer thinks about mat
ters just as everybody else does; that is, he does not
think at all, but only writes what he reads, and then,
like the good-natured bear in the nursery story,
" thinks he has been thinking." It is no such thing,
he has been writing the common opinion of common
men, to get the applause of men as common as him
self. Is the book of poetry ? — the substance is chiefly old,
the form old, the allusions are old. It is poetry of
society, not of nature. You meet in it the same ever
lasting mythology, the same geography, botany, zool
ogy, the same symbols; a new figure of speech sug
gested by the sight of nature, not the reading of

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 35
books, you could no more find than a fresh shad in the
Dead Sea. You take at random eight or ten " Amer
ican poets " of this stamp, you see at once what was
the favorite author with each new bard ; you often see
what particular work of Shelley, or Tennyson, or Mil
ton, or George Herbert, or, if the man has culture
enough, of Goethe or Uhland, Jean Paul or Schiller,
suggested the " American original." His inspiration
comes from Hterature, not from the great universe of
nature or of human life. You see that this writer has
read Percy's Reliques, and the German Wunderhorn;
but you would not know that he wrote in a republic —
in a land full of new life, with great rivers and taU
mountains, with maple and oak trees that turn red in
the autumn ; amongst a people who hold town-meetings,
have free schools for everybody, read newspapers
voraciously, who have lightning rods on their steeples,
ride in railroads, are daguerreotyped by the sun, and
who talk by lightning from Halifax to New Orleans ;
who Hsten to the whippoorwill and the bobolink, who
beheve in slavery and the Declaration of Independ
ence, in the devil and the five points of Calvinism.
You would not know where our poet lived, or that he
lived anywhere. Reading the Iliad you doubt that
Homer was born blind; but our bard seems to have
been deaf also, and for expressing what was national in
his time might Hkewise have been dumb.
Is it a volume of sermons ? — they might have been
written at Edinburgh, Madrid, or Constantinople, as
well as in New England; as well preached to the
" Homo Sapiens " of Linnaeus or the man in the moon,
as to the special audience that heard or heard them
not, but only paid for having the things preached.
There is nothing individual about them; the author

36 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
seems as impersonal as Spinoza's conception of God.
The sermons are Hke an almanac calculated for the
meridian of no place in particular, for no time in spe
cial. There is no allusion to anything American.
The author never mentions a river this side of the
Jordan; knows no mountain but Lebanon, Zion, and
Carmel, and would think it profane to talk of the
Alleghanies and the Mississippi, of Monadnoc and the
Androscoggin. He mentions Babylon and Jerusalem,
not New York and Baltimore; you would never dream
that he lived in a church without a bishop, and a state
without a king, in a democratic nation that held three
million slaves, with ministers chosen by the people.
He is surrounded, clouded over, and hid by the tradi
tions of the " ages of faith " behind him. He never
thanks God for the dew and snow, only for " the early
and the latter rain " of a classic sacred land ; a temper
ance man, he blesses God for the wine because the great
Psalmist did so thousands of years ago. He speaks
of the oHve and the fig-tree which he never saw, not
of the apple-tree and the peach before his eyes all day
long, their fruit the joy of his children's heart. If
you guessed at his time and place, you would think he
lived, not under General Taylor, but under King
Ahab, or Jeroboam; that his audience rode on camels
or in chariots, not in steam-cars ; that they fought with
bows and arrows against the children of Moab; that
their favorite sin was the worship of some graven
image, and that they made their children pass through
the fire unto Moloch, not through the counting-house
unto Mammon. You would not know whether the
preacher was married or a bachelor, rich or poor, saint
or sinner; you would probably conclude he was not
much of a saint, nor even much of a sinner.

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 37
The authors of this portion of our literature seem
ashamed of America. One day she will take her re
venge. They are the parasites of letters, and live on
what other men have made classic. They would study
the Holy Land, Greece, Etruria, Egypt, Nineveh,
spots made famous by great and holy men, and let
the native races of Amerioa fade out, taking no pains
to study the monuments which so swiftly pass away
from our own continent. It is curious that most of the
accounts of the Indians of North America come from
men not natives here, from French and Germans ; and
characteristic that we should send an expedition to the
Dead Sea,11 while wide tracts of this continent lie all
untouched by the white man's foot; and, also, that
while we make such generous and noble efforts to
christianize and bless the red, yellow, and black heath
ens at the world's end, we should leave the American
Indian and Negro to die in savage darkness, the South
making it penal to teach a black man to write or
read. Yet, there is one portion of our permanent literature,
if literature it may be called, which is wholly in
digenous and original. The lives of the early martyrs
and confessors are purely Christian, so are the legends
of saints and other pious men; there was nothing like
this in the Hebrew or heathen literature, cause and
occasion were aHke wanting for it. So we have one
series of literary productions that could be written
by none but Americans, and only here; I mean the
Lives of Fugitive Slaves.12 But as these are not the
work of the men of superior culture they hardly
help to pay the scholar's debt. Yet all the origi
nal romance of Americans is in them, not in the white
man's novel.

38 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Next is the transient literature, composed chiefly of
speeches, orations, state papers, political and other
occasional pamphlets, business reports, articles in the
journals, and other productions designed to serve some
present purpose. These are commonly the work of
educated men, though not of such as make literature
a profession. Taking this department as a whole, it
differs much from the permanent literature ; here is
freshness of thought and newness of form. If Amer
ican books are mainly an imitation of old models, it
would be difficult to find the prototype of some Amer
ican speeches. They " would have made Quintilian
stare and gasp." Take the state papers of the Ameri
can government during the administration of Mr. Polk,
the speeches made in Congress at the same time, the
state papers of the several states — you have a much
better and more favorable idea of the vigor and orig
inality of the American mind than you would get from
all the bound books printed in that period. The diplo
matic writings of American politicians compare favor
ably with those of any nation in the world. In elo
quence no modern nation is before us, perhaps none
is our equal. Here you see the inborn strength and
manly vigor of the American mind. You meet the
same spirit which fells the forest, girdles the land with
railroads, annexes Texas, and covets Cuba, Nicaragua,
aU the world.13 You see that the authors of this litera
ture are workers also. Others have read of wild beasts ;
here are the men that have seen the wolf.
A portion of this literature represents the past, and
has the vices already named. It comes from human
history and not human nature; as you read it, you
think of the inertia and the cowardliness of mankind;
nothing is progressive, nothing noble, generous, or

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 39
just, only respectable. The past is preferred before
the present; money is put before men, a vested right
before a natural right. Such literature appears in all
countries. The ally of despotism, and the foe of man
kind, it is yet a- legitimate exponent of a large class
of men. The leading journals of America, political
and commercial, or literary, are poor and feeble; our
reviews of books afford matter for grave consideration.
You would often suppose them written by the same
hand which manufactures the advertisements of the
grand caravan, or some patent medicine; or, when un
favorable, by some of the men who write defamatory
articles on the eve of an election.
But a large part of this transient literature is very
different in its character. Its authors have broken
with the traditions of the past ; they have new ideas,
and plans for putting them in execution ; they are full
of hope, are national to the extreme, bragging and
defiant. They put the majority before institutions,
the rights of the majority before the privilege of a
few ; they represent the onward tendency and material
prophecy of the nation. The new activity of the
American mind here expresses its purpose and its
prayer. Here is strength, hope, confidence, even au
dacity; all is American. But the great idea of the
absolute right does not appear, all is more national
than human; and in what concerns the nation, it is
not justice, the point where all interests are balanced,
and the welfare of each harmonizes with that of all,
which is sought ; but the " greatest good of the great
est number," that is, only a privilege had at the cost
of the smaller number. Here is little respect for uni
versal humanity; little for the eternal laws of God,
which override all the traditions and contrivances of

40 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
men; more reverence for a statute or constitution,
which is indeed the fundamental law of the political
state, but is often only an attempt to compromise be
tween the fleeting passions of the day and the immut
able morality of God.
Amid all the public documents of the nation and the
several states, in the speeches and writings of favorite
men, who represent and so control the public mind, for
fifty years there is little that " stirs the feelings in
finite " within you ; much to make us more American,
not more manly. There is more head than heart; na
tive intellect enough, culture that is competent, but
little conscience or real religion. How many news
papers, how many politicians in the land go at all be
yond the Whig idea of protecting the property now
accumulated, or the Democratic idea of insuring the
greatest material good of the greatest number? Where
are we to look for the representative of justice, of the
' unalienable rights of all the people and all the nations?
In the triple host of article-makers, speech-makers, lay
and clerical, and makers of laws, you find but few who
can be trusted tojstand up for the unaHenable rights
of men; who will never write, speak, nor vote in the
interests of a party, but always in the interest of man
kind, and wiU represent the justice of God in the
forum of the world.
This literature, like the other, fails of the high end
of writing and of speech; with more vigor, more free
dom, more breadth of vision, and an intense nationality,
the authors thereof are just as far from representing
the higher consciousness of mankind, just as vulgar as
the tame and well-licked writers of the permanent liter
ature. Here are the men who have cut their own way
through the woods, men with more than the average in-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 41
telligence, daring, and strength ; but with less than the
average justice which is honesty in the abstract, less
than the average honesty which is justice concentrated
upon small particulars.
Examine both these portions of American literature,
the permanent and the fleeting — you see their edu
cated authors are no higher than the rest of men.
They are the slaves of public opinion as much as the
gossip in her little village. It may not be the public
opinion of a coterie of crones, but of a great party;
that makes Httle odds, they are worshippers of the same
rank, idolaters of the same wealth; the gossiping
granny shows her littleness the size of life, while their
deformity is magnified by the solar microscope of high
office. Many a popular man exhibits his pigmy .soul
to the multitude of a whole continent, idly mistaking
it for greatness. They are swayed by vulgar pas
sions, seek vulgar ends, address vulgar motives, use
vulgar means ; they may command by their strength,
they cannot refine by their beauty or instruct by their
guidance, and still less inspire by any eminence of man
hood which they were born to or have won. They
build on the surface-sand for to-day, not on the rock
of ages for ever. With so Httle conscience, they heed
not the solemn voice of history, and respect no more
the prophetic instincts of mankind.
To most men, the approbation of their fellows is
one of the most desirable things. This approbation
appears in the various forms of admiration, respect, es
teem, confidence, veneration, and love. The great man
obtains this after a time, and in its highest forms,
without seeking it, simply by faithfulness to his na
ture. He gets it by rising and doing his work, in the
course of nature, as easily and as irresistibly as the

42 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
sun gathers to the clouds the evaporation of land and
sea, and, like the sun, to shed it down in blessings on
mankind. Little men seek this, consciously or not
knowing it, by stooping, cringing, flattering the pride,
the passion or the prejudice of others. So they get
the approbation of men, but never of man. Some
times this is sought for by the attainment of some ac
cidental quality, which low-minded men hold in more
honor than the genius of sage or poet or the brave
manhood of some great hero of the soul. In Eng
land, though money is power, it is patrician birth
which is nobility, and valued most; and there, accord
ingly, birth takes precedence of all — of genius, and
even of gold. Men seek the companionship or the
patronage of titled lords, and social rank depends upon
nobility of blood. The few bishops in the upper house
do more to give conventional respectability to the
clerical profession there than all the solid intellect of
Hooker, Barrow, and of South, the varied and exact
learning of philosophic Cudworth, the eloquence and
affluent piety of Taylor, and Butler's vast and manly
mind. In America, social rank depends substantially
on wealth, an accident as much as noble birth, but
movable. Here gold takes precedence of all, — of
genius, and even of noble birth. " Though your sire
Had royal blood within him, and though you
Possess the intellect of angels too,
'Tis all in vain; the world will ne'er inquire
On such a score; — Why should it take the pains?
'Tis easier to weigh purses, sure, than brains."
Wealth is sought, not merely as a means of power,
but of nobility. When obtained, it has the power of
nobility ; ^p poor men of superior intellect and educa-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 43
tion, powerful by nature, not by position, fear to dis
turb the opinion of wealthy men, to instruct their ig
norance or rebuke their sin. Hence the aristocracy of
wealth, illiterate and vulgar, goes unrebuked, and de-,
bases the natural aristocracy of mind, and culture which \
bows down to it. The artist prostitutes his pencil and
his skill, and takes his law of beauty from the fat
clown, whose barns and pigs and wife he paints for
daily bread. The preacher does the same ; and though
the stench of the rum-shop infests the pulpit, and
death hews down the leaders of his flock, the preacher
must cry, " Peace, peace," or else be still, for rum is
power ! But this power of wealth has its antagonistic
force, the power of numbers. Much depends on the
doHar. Nine-tenths of the property is owned by one-
tenth of all these men — but much also on the votes of
the million. The few are strong by money, the many
by their votes. Each is worshipped by its votaries,
and its approbation sought. He that can get the men
controls the money too. So while one portion of edu-v
cated men bows to the rich, and consecrates their pas
sion and their prejudice, another portion bows, equally
prostrate, to the passions_of the multitude of men.
The many and the rich have each a public opinion of y
their own, and both are tyrants. Here the tyranny of
public opinion is not absolutely greater than in Eng
land, Germany, or France, but is far greater in com
parison with other modes of oppression. It seems in
herent in a republic; it is not in a republic of noble
men. But here this sirocco blows flat to the ground
full many an aspiring blade. Wealth can establish
banks or factories ; votes can lift the meanest man
into the highest political place, can dignify any pas
sion with the name and force of human law; so it is

44 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
' thought by the worshippers of both, seeking the ap
probation of the two, that public opinion can make
truth of lies, and right even out of foulest wrong.
Politicians begin to say, there is no law of God above
the ephemeral laws of men.
There are few American works of Hterature which
appeal to what is best in men ; few that one could wish
should go abroad and live. America has grown be
yond hope in population, the free and bond, in riches,
in land, in public material prosperity; but in a litera
ture that represents the higher elements of manliness
far less than wise men thought. They looked for the
fresh new child; it is born with wrinkles, and dread
fully like his grandmother, only looking older and
more effete. Our muse does not come down from an
American Parnassus, with a new heaven in her eye, men
not daring to look on the face of anointed beauty,
coming to tell of noble thought, to kindle godlike feel
ings with her celestial spark, and stir mankind to noble
deeds. She finds Parnassus steep and high, and hard
to climb ; the air austere and cold, the light severe, too
stern for her effeminate nerves. So she has a little
dwelling in the flat and close pent town, hard by the
public street ; breathes its Boeotian breath ; walks with
the money-lenders at high change; has her account at
the bank, her pew in the most fashionable church and
least austere; she gets approving nods in the street,
flattery in the penny prints, sweetmeats and sparkling
wine in the proper places. What were the inspira
tions of all God's truth to her ? He " taunts the lofty
land with little men."
There stiU remains the exceptional literature; some
of it is only^ fugitive, some meant for permanent dura-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 45
tion. Here is a new and different spirit ; a respect for
human nature above human history, for man above all
the accidents of man, for God above all the alleged ac
cidents of God ; a veneration for the eternal laws which
he only makes and man but finds; a law before all
statutes, above all constitutions, and holier than all
the writings of human hands. Here you find most
fully the sentiments and ideas of America, not such as
rule the nation now, but which, unconsciously to the
people, have caused the noble deeds of our history,
and now prophesy a splendid future for this young
giant here. These sentiments and ideas are brought to
consciousness in this literature. Here a precedent is
not a Hmitation; a fact of history does not eclipse an
idea of nature ; an investment is not thought more
sacred than a right. Here is more hope than memory ;
little deference to wealth and rank, but a constant
aspiration for truth, justice, love, and piety; little fear
of the public opinion of the many or the few, rather a
scorn thereof, almost a defiance of it. It appears in
books, in pamphlets, in journals, and in sermons, sorely
scant in quantity as yet. New and fresh, it is often
greatly deficient in form ; rough, rude, and uncouth, it
yet has in it a soul that will Hve. Its authors are often
men of a wide and fine culture, though mainly tending
to underrate the past achievements of mankind. They
have little reverence for great names. They value the
Greek and Hebrew mind for no more than it is worth.
With them a wrong is no more respected because well
descended, and supported by all the riches, all the
votes ; a right, not less a right because unjustly kept
out of its own. These men are American all through ;
so intensely national that they do not fear to tell the
nation of the wrong it does.

46 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
The form of this literature is American. It is indi
genous to our soil, and could come up in no other land.
It is unlike the classic literature of any other nation.
It is American as the Bible is Hebrew, and the Odyssey
is Greek. It is wild and fantastic, like all fresh origi
nal Hterature at first. You see in it the image of re
publican institutions — the free school, free state, free
church; it reflects the countenance of free men. So
the letters of old France, of modern England, of Italy
and Spain, reflect the monarchic, oligarchic, and ec
clesiastic institutions of those lands. Here appears
the civilization of the nineteenth century, the treasures
of human toil for many a thousand years. More than
that, you see the result of a fresh contact with nature,
and original intuitions of divine things. Acknowledg
ing inspiration of old, these writers of the newness
believe in it now not less, not miraculous, but normal.
Here is humanity that overleaps the bounds of class
and of nation, and sees a brother in the beggar, pirate,
slave, one family of men variously dressed in cuticles of
white or yellow, black or red. Here, too, is a new
loveliness, somewhat akin to the savage beauty of our
own wild woods, seen in their glorious splendor an hour
before autumnal suns go down and leave a trail of
glory lingering in the sky. Here, too, is a piety some
what heedless of scriptures, liturgies, and forms and
creeds ; it finds its law written in nature, its glorious
everlasting gospel in the soul of man ; careless of cir
cumcision and baptismal rites, it finds the world a
temple, and rejoices everywhere to hold communion
with the Infinite Father of us all, and keep a sacra
ment in daily life, conscious of immortality, and feed
ing continually on angels' bread.
The writers of this new literature are full of faults ;

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 47
yet they are often strong, though more by their direc
tion than by native force of mind; more by their in
tuitions of the first good, first perfect, and first fair,
than through their historical knowledge or dialectic
power. Their ship sails swift, not because it is sharper
built, or carries broader sails than other craft, but
because it steers where the current of the ocean coin
cides with the current of the sky, and so is borne along
by nature's wind and nature's wave. Uninvited, its
ideas steal into parlor and pulpit, its kingdom coming
within men and without observation. The shoemaker
feels it as he toils in his narrow shop ; it cheers the
maiden weaving in the mill, whose wheels the Merrimac
is made to turn ; the young man at college bids it wel
come to his ingenuous soul. So at the breath of spring
new life starts up in every plant; the sloping hills are
green with corn, and sunny banks are blue and fra
grant with the wealth of violets, which only slept till
the enchanter came. The sentiments of this literature
burn in the bosom of holy-hearted girls, of matrons,
and of men. Ever and anon its great ideas are heard
even in Congress, and in the speech of old and young,
which comes tingling into most unwiUing ears.
This literature has a work to do, and is about its
work. Let the old man crow loud as he may, the
young one will crow another strain; for it is written
of God that our march is continually onward, and age
shaU advance over age for ever and for ever.
Already America has a few fair specimens from
this new field to show. Is the work history? The
author writes from the stand-point of American democ
racy, — I mean philanthropy, the celestial democracy,
not the satanic; writes with a sense of justice and in
the interest of men; writes to tell a nation's purpose

48 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
in its deeds, and so reveal the universal law of God,
which overrules the affairs of states as of a single man.
You wonder that history was not before so writ that
its facts told the nation's ideas, and its labors were
lessons, and so its hard-won Hfe became philosophy.
Is it poetry the man writes? It is not poetry like
the old. The poet has seen nature with his own eyes,
heard her with his own mortal, bodily ears, and felt
her presence, not vicariously through Milton, Uhland,
Ariosto, but personally, her heart against his heart.
He sings of what he knows, sees, feels, not merely of
what he reads in others' song. Common things are
not therefore unclean. In plain New England life he
finds his poetry, as magnets iron in the blacksmith's
dust, and as the bee finds dew-bright cups of honey
in the common woods and common weeds. It is not for
him to rave of Parnassus, while he knows it not, for
the soul of song has a seat upon Monadnoc, Wachu-
sett, or Katahdin, quite as high. So Scottish Burns
was overtaken by the muse of poetry, who met him on
his own bleak hills, and showed him beauty in the daisy
and the thistle and the tiny mouse, till to his eye the
hills ran o'er with loveliness, and Caledonia became a
classic land.
Is it religion the author treats of? It is not wor
ship by fear, but through absolute faith, a never-end
ing love; for it is not worship of a howling and im
perfect God, — grim, jealous, and revengeful, loving
but a few, and them not well ; but of the Infinite Father
of all mankind, whose universal providence will sure
achieve the highest good of all that are.
These men are few; in no land are they numerous,
or were or wfll be. There were few Hebrew prophets,
but a tribe of priests ; there are but few mighty bards

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 49
that hover o'er the world; but here and there a sage,
looking deep and living high, who feels the heart of
things, and utters oracles which pass for proverbs,
psalms and prayers, and stimulate a world of men.
They draw the nations, as conjoining moon and sun
draw waters shore-ward from the ocean springs ; and as
electrifying heat they elevate the life of men. Under
their influence you cannot be as before. They stimu
late the sound, and intoxicate the silly; but in the
heart of noble youths their idea becomes a fact, and
their prayer a daily Hfe.
Scholars of such a stamp are few and rare, not
without great faults. For every one of them there will
be many imitators, as for each lion a hundred lion-
flies, thinking their buzz as valiant as his roar, and
wondering the forest does not quake thereat, and while
they feed on him fancy they suck the breasts of
heaven. Such is the scholars' position in America ; such their
duty, and such the way in which they pay the debt
they owe. Will men of superior culture not all act by
scholar-craft and by the pen? It were a pity if they
did. If a man work nobly, the office is as worthy, and
the purse as blessed in its work. The pen is power,
the office is power, the purse is power ; and if the purse
and office be nobly held, then in a high mode the cul
tivated man pays for his bringing up, and honors
with wide sympathies the mass of men who give him
chance to ride and rule. If not; if these be meanly
held, for self and not for man, then the scholar is a
debtor and a traitor too.
The scholar never had so fair a chance before; here
is the noblest opportunity for one that wields the pen ;
II— 4

50 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
it is mightier than the sword, the office, or the purse.
All things concede at last to beauty, justice, truth and
love, and these he is to represent. He has what free
dom he will pay for and take. Let him talk never so
heroic, he will find fit audience, nor will it long be few.
Men will rise up and welcome his quickening words as
vernal grass at the first rains of spring. A great na
tion which cannot live by bread alone asks for the bread
of life ; while the state is young a single great and.Jio=
ble man can deeply influence the nation's mind. There
are great wrongs which demand redress ; the present
men who represent the office and the purse will not end
these wrongs. They linger for the pen, with magic
touch, to abolish and destroy this ancient serpent-
brood. Shall it be only rude men and unlettered who
confront the dragons of our time which prowl about
the folds by day and night, while the scholar, the •
appointed guardian of mankind, but " sports with
Amaryllis in the shade, or with the tangles of Nerera's
hair? " The nation asks of her scholar better things
than ancient letters ever brought; asks his wonders for
'the million, not the few alone. Great sentiments burn
now in half -unconscious hearts, and great ideas kindle
their glories round the heads of men. Unconscious
electricity, truth and right, flashes out of the earth,
, out of the air. It is for the scholar to attract this
ground-lightning and this lightning of the sky, con
dense it into useful thunder to destroy the wrong, then
Vspread it forth a beauteous and a cheering light, shed
ding sweet influence and kindling Hfe anew. A few
great men of other times tell us what may be now.
Nothing will be done without toil — talent is only
power of work, and genius greater power for higher
forms of work — nothing without self-denial ; nothing

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 51
great and good save by putting your idea before your
self, and counting it dearer than your flesh and blood.
Let it hide you, not your obesity conceal the truth God
gave you to reveal. The quality of intellectual work
is more than the quantity. Out of the cloudy world
Homer has drawn a spark that lasts three thousand
years. " One, but a lion," should be the scholar's
maxim; let him do many things for daily need; one
great thing for the eternal beauty of his art. A sin
gle poem of Dante, a book for the bosom, lives through
the ages, surrounding its author with the glory of
genius in the night of time. One sermon on the
mount, compact of truths brought down from God, all
molten by such pious trust in him, wiU still men's
hearts by myriads, while words dilute with other words
are a shame to the speaker, and a dishonor to men who
have ears to hear.
It is a great charity to give beauty to mankind,
part of the scholar's function. How we honor such
as create mere sensuous loveliness ! Mozart carves it
on the unseen air; Phidias sculptures it out from the
marble stone; Raphael fixes ideal angels, maidens,
matrons, men, and his triple God upon the canvas ;
and the lofty Angelo, with more than Amphionic skill,
bids the hills rise into a temple which constrains the
crowd to pray. Look, see how grateful man repays
these architects of beauty with never-ending fame !
Such as create a more than sensuous loveliness, the
Homers, Miltons, Shakespeares, who sing of man in
never-dying and creative song — see what honors we
have in store for such, what honor given for what serv
ice paid ! But there is a beauty higher than that of
art, above philosophy and merely intellectual grace; I
mean the loveliness of noble life ; that is a beauty in the

52 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
sight of man and God. This is a new country, the
great ideas of a noble man are easily spread abroad;
soon they will appear in the life of the people, and be
a blessing in our future history to ages yet unborn.
A few great souls can correct the licentiousness of the
American press, which is now but the type of covetous-
ness and low ambition; correct the mean economy
of the state, and amend the vulgarity of the Ameri
can church, now the poor prostitute of every wealthy,
sin. Oh, ingenuous young maid or man, if such you are,
— if not, then let me dream you such, — seek you this
beauty, complete perfection of a man, and having this
go hold the purse, the office, or the pen, as suits you
best; but out of that life, writing, voting, acting, liv
ing in all forms, you shall pay men back for your
culture, and in the scholar's noble kind, and represent
the higher facts of human thought. Will men still
say, " This wrong is consecrated ; it has stood for
ages, and shall stand for ever ! " Tell them, " No. A
wrong, though old as sin, is not now sacred, nor shall
it stand! " Will they say, " This right can never be;
that excellence is lovely, but impossible ! " Show them
the fact, who will not hear the speech; the deed goes
where the word fails, and life enchants where rhetoric
cannot persuade.
Past ages offer their instruction, much warning, and
a little guidance, many a wreck along the shore of
time, a beacon here and there. Far off in the dim dis-
stance, present as possibilities, not actual as yet, future
generations with broad and wishful eyes look at the son
of genius, talent, educated skill, and seem to say " A
word for us, it will not be forgot ! " Truth and
Beauty, God's twin daughters, eternal both yet ever

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR 53
young, wait there to offer each faithful man a bud
ding branch, — in their hands budding, in his to blos
som and mature its fruit, — wherewith he sows the
field of time, gladdening the millions yet to come.

II
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
When a hen lays an egg in the farmer's mow she
cackles quite loud and long. " See," says the compla
cent bird, " see what an egg I have laid ! " all the other
hens cackle in sympathy, and seem to say, " what a
nice egg has got laid! was there ever such a family
of hens as our family? " But the cackling is heard
only a short distance in the neighboring barnyards;
a few yards above the blue sky is silent. By and by the
rest will drop their daily burden, and she wiH cackle
with them in sympathy; but ere long the cackling is
still, the egg has done its service, been addled, or eaten,
or perhaps proved fertile of a chick, and it is forgotten,
as well as the cackler who laid the ephemeral thing.
But when an acorn in June first uncloses its shell, and
the young oak puts out its earliest shoot, there is no
noise ; none attending its growth, yet it is destined to
last some half a thousand years as a living tree, and
serve as long after that for sound timber. Slowly and
in silence, unseen in the dim recesses of the earth, the
diamond gets formed by small accretions, age after
age. There is no cackling in the caverns of the deep,
as atom journeys to its fellow atom and the crystal is
slowly getting made, to shine on the bosom of loveh
ness or glitter in the diadem of an emperor, a thing
of beauty and a joy forever.
As with eggs, so is it with little books ; when one of
them is laid in some bookseller's mow the parent and
the literary barnyard are often full of the foohshest
54

EMERSON 55
cackle, and seem as happy as the ambiguous offspring
of frogs in some shallow pool in early summer. But
by and by it is again with the books as with the eggs ;
the old noise is aU hushed, and the little books all
gone, while new authors are at the same work again.
Gentle reader, we will not find fault with such books,
they are useful as eggs ; yea, they are indispensible ;
the cackle of authors, and that of hens, why should
they not be allowed? Is it not written that all things
shall work after their kind, and so produce ; and does
not this rule extend from the hen-roost to the Amer
ican Academy and all the Royal Societies of literature
in the world? Most certainly. But when a great
book gets written it is published with no fine flourish
of trumpets, the world does not speedily congratulate
itself on the accession made to its riches ; the book must
wait awhile for its readers. Literary gentlemen of
the tribe of Bavius and Marvius are popular in their
time, and get more praise than bards afterwards fa
mous. What audience did Athens and Florence give
to their Socrates and their Dante? What price did
Milton get for the Paradise Lost? How soon did men
appreciate Shakespeare? Not many years ago George
Steevens,1 who " edited " the works of that bard,
thought an " Act of Parliament was not strong
enough " to make men read his sonnets, though they
bore the author up to a great height of fame, and he
sat where Steevens " durst not soar." In 1686, there
had been four editions of Flatman's Poems, five of
Waller's, eight of Cowley's ; but in eleven years of the
Paradise Lost only three thousand copies were sold,
yet the edition was cheap, and Norris of Bemerton went
through eight or nine editions in a quite short time.
For forty-one years, from 1623 to 1664, England

56 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
was satisfied with two editions of Shakespeare, mak
ing, perhaps, one thousand copies in all. Says Mr.
Wordsworth of these facts : " There were readers in
multitudes ; but their money went for other purposes,
as their admiration was fixed elsewhere." Mr. Words
worth himself furnishes another example. Which
found the readiest welcome, the Excursion and the
Lyrical Poems of that writer, or Mr. Macaulay's Lays
of Ancient Rome? How many a little philosophist
in Germany went up in his rocket-like ascension, while
the bookseller at Konigsberg despaired over the un
saleable sheets of Immanuel Kant !
Says an Eastern proverb, " the sage is the instruc
tor of a hundred ages," so he can afford to wait till
one or two be past away, abiding with the few, waiting
for the fit and the many. Says a writer:
"There is somewhat touching in the madness with which the
passing age mischooses the object on which all candles shine,
and all eyes are turned; the care with which it registers every
trifle touching Queen Elizabeth, and King James, and the Es-
sexes, Leicesters, Burleighs, and Buckinghams; and lets pass,
without a single valuable note, the founder of another dynasty,
which alone will cause the Tudor dynasty to be remembered, —
the man who carries the Saxon race in him by the inspiration
which feeds him, and on whose thoughts the foremost people
of the world are now for some ages to be nourished, and minds
to receive this and not another bias. A popular player, — no
body suspected he was the poet of the human race; and the
secret was kept as faithfully from poets and intellectual men,
as from courtiers and frivolous people. Bacon, who took the
inventory of the human understanding for his times, never men
tioned his name. Ben Jonson had no suspicion of the elastic
fame whose first vibrations he was attempting. He no doubt
thought the praise he has conceded to him generous, and es
teemed himself, out of all question, the better poet of the
two. " If it need wit to know wit, according to the proverb, Shak-
speare's time should be capable of recognizing it. . . . Since
the constellation of great men who appeared in Greece in the.

EMERSON 57
time of Pericles, there was never any such society, yet their
genius failed them to find out the best head in the universe.
Our poet's mask was impenetrable. You cannot see the moun
tain near. It took a century to make it suspected; and not
until two centuries had passed, after his death, did any criticism
which we think adequate begin to appear. It was not possible
to write the history of Shakspeare till now."
It is now almost fourteen years since Mr. Emerson
pubhshed his first book, Nature. A beautiful work it
was, and will be deemed for many a year to come. In
this old world of literature, with more memory than
wit, with much tradition and little invention, with more
fear than love, and a great deal of criticism upon very
Httle poetry, there came forward this young David,
a shepherd, but to be a king, " with his garlands and
singing robes about him ; " one note upon his new and
fresh-strung lyre was " worth a thousand men." Men
were looking for something original, they always are;
when it came some said it thundered, others that an
angel had spoke. How men wondered at the little
book! It took nearly twelve years to sell the five hun
dred copies of Nature. Since that time Mr. Emerson
has said much, and if he has not printed many books,
at least has printed much; some things far surpass
ing the first essay, in richness of material, in per
fection of form, in continuity of thought ; but nothing
which has the same youthful freshness, and the same
tender beauty as this early violet, blooming out of Uni
tarian and Calvinistic sand or snow. Poems and
Essays of a later date are there, which show that he has
had more time and woven it into life ; works which pre
sent us with thought deeper, wider, richer, and more
complete, but not surpassing the simplicity and love
liness of that maiden flower of his poetic spring.
We know how true it is that a man cannot criticise

58 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
what he cannot comprehend, nor comprehend either a
man or a work greater than himself. Let him get on
a Quarterly never so high, it avails him nothing;
" pyramids are pyramids in vales," and emmets are
emmets even in a Review. Critics often afford an in
voluntary proof of this adage, yet grow no wiser by
the experience. Few of our tribe can make the sim
ple shrift of the old Hebrew poet, and say, " we have
not exercised ourselves in great matters, nor in things
too high for us." Sundry Icarian critics have we seen
wending their wearying way on waxen wing to overtake
the eagle flight of Emerson ; some of them have we
known getting near enough to see a fault, to over
take a feather falling from his wing, and with that
tumbling to give name to a sea, if one cared to notice
to what depth they fell.
Some of the criticisms on Mr. Emerson, transatlantic
and cisatlantic, have been very remarkable, not to speak
more definitely. "What of this new book?" said
Mr. Public to the reviewer, who was not " seized and
tied down to judge," but of his own free will stood
up and answered : " Oh ! 'tis out of all plumb, my
lord, quite an irregular thing! not one of the angles
at the four corners is a right angle. I had my rule
and compasses, my lord, in my pocket. And for the
poem (your lordship bid me look at it), upon taking
the length, breadth, height, and depth of it, and try
ing them at home upon an exact scale of Bossu's, they
are out, my lord, in every one of their dimensions."
Oh, gentle reader, we have looked on these efforts of
our brother critics not without pity. There is an ex
cellent bird, terrene, marine, and semi-aerial; a broad-
footed bird, broad-beaked, broad-backed, broad-tailed;
a notable bird she is, and a long-lived; a useful bird,

EMERSON 59
once indispensible to writers, as furnishing the pen,
now fruitful in many a hint. But when she under
takes to criticise the music of the thrush or the move
ment of the humming-bird, why, she oversteps the mod
esty of her nature, and if she essays the flight of the
eagle she is fortunate if she falls only upon the water.
" No man," says the law, may " stultify himself."
Does not this canon apply to critics? No, the critic
may do so. Suicide is a felony, but if a critic only
slay himself critically, dooming himself to " hoise with
his own petard," why, 'tis to be forgiven
" That in our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o'erleap our mortal state."
In a place where there were no Quarterly Journals
the veracious historian, Sir Walter Scott, relates that
Claud Halcro, ambitious of fame, asked his fortune of
an Orcadian soothsayer :
" Tell me, shall my lays be sung,
Like Hacon's of the golden tongue,
Long after Halcro's dead and gone?
Or shall Hialtland's minstrel own
One note to rival glorious John ? "
She answers, that as things work after their kind
the result is after the same kind:
" The eagle mounts the polar sky,
The Imber-goose, unskill'd to fly,
Must be content to glide along
When seal and sea-dog list his song."
We are warned by the fate of our predecessors,
when their example does not guide us ; we confess not
only our inferiority to Mr. Emerson, but our conscious
ness of the fact, and believe that they should " judge
others who themselves excel," and that authors, like

60 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
others on trial, should be judged by their peers. So
we will not call this a criticism which we are about to
write on Mr. Emerson, only an attempt at a contribu
tion towards a criticism, hoping that, in due time, some
one will come and do faithfully and completely what it
is not yet time to accomplish, still less within our
power to do.
All of Mr. Emerson's literary works, with the ex
ception of the Poems, were published before they were
printed ; delivered by word of mouth to audiences. In
frequently reading his pieces he had an opportunity
to see any defect of form to amend it. Mr. Emerson
has won by his writings a more desirable reputation
than any other man of letters in America has yet at
tained. It is not the reputation which bring him
money or academic honors, or membership of learned
societies ; nor does it appear conspicuously in the liter
ary journals as yet. But he has a high place among
thinking men on both sides of the water; we think no
man who writes the English tongue has now so much
influence in forming the opinions and character of
young men and women. His audience steadily in
creases, at home and abroad, more rapidly in England
than America. It is now with him as it was, at first,
with Dr. Channing, the fairest criticism has come
from the other side of the water ; the reason is that he,
like his predecessor, offended the sectarian and party
spirit, the personal prejudices of the men about him;
his life was a reproach to them, his words an offense,
or his doctrines alarmed their sectarian, their party,
or their personal pride, and they accordingly con
demned the man. A writer who should bear the same
relation to the English mind as Emerson to ours, for
the same reason would be more acceptable here than

EMERSON 61
at home. Emerson is neither a sectarian nor a parti
san, no man less so ; yet few men in America have been
visited with more hatred, — private personal hatred,
which the authors poorly endeavored to conceal, and
perhaps did hide from themselves. The spite we have
heard expressed against him by men of the common
morality would strike a stranger with amazement, es
pecially when it is remembered that his personal char
acter and daily life are of such extraordinary loveli
ness. This hatred has not proceeded merely from ig
norant men, in whom it could easily be excused; but
more often from men who have had opportunities of ob
taining as good a culture as men commonly get in this
country. Yet while he has been the theme of vulgar
abuse, of sneers and ridicule in public and in private ;
while critics, more remarkable for the venom of their
poison than the strength of their bow, have shot at him
their little shafts, barbed more than pointed, he has
also drawn about him some of what old Drayton called
" the idle smoke of praise." Let us see what he has
thrown into the public fire to cause this incense, what
he has done to provoke the immedicable rage of certain
other men ; let us see what there is in his works, of old
or new, true or false,, what American and what cosmo
politan ; let us weigh his works with such imperfect
scales as we have, weigh them by the universal stand
ard of beauty, truth and love, and make an attempt to
see what he is worth.
American literature may be distributed into two
grand divisions, namely, the permanent Hterature, con
sisting of books not written for a special occasion,
books which are bound between hard covers ; and the
transient literature, written for some special occasion
and not designed to last beyond that. Our permanent

V

62 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
literature is almost wholly an imitation of old models.
The substance is old, and the form old. There is noth
ing American about it. But as our writers are com
monly quite deficient in literary culture and scientific
discipline, their productions seem poor when compared
with the imitative portion of the permanent literature
in older countries, where the writers start with a better
discipline and a better acquaintance with letters and
art. This inferiority of culture is one of the misfor
tunes incident to a new country, especially to one
where practical talent is so much and so justly pre
ferred to merely literary accomplishment and skill.
This lack of culture is yet more apparent, in general,
in the transient literature which is produced mainly
by men who have had few advantages for intellectual
discipline in early life, and few to make acquaintance
with books at a later period. That portion of our lit
erature is commonly stronger and more American, but
it is often coarse and rude. The permanent literature
is imitative, the other is rowdy. But we have now no
time to dwell upon this theme, which demands a sepa
rate paper.
Mr. Emerson is the most American of our writers.
The idea of America, which lies at the bottom of our
original institutions, appears in him with great prom
inence. We mean the idea of personal freedom, of the
dignity and value of human nature, the superiority of
a man to the accidents of a man. Emerson is the most
republican of republicans, the most protestant of the
dissenters. Serene as a July sun, he is equally fear
less. He looks everything in the face modestly, but
with earnest scrutiny, and passes judgment upon its
merits. Nothing is too high for his examination, noth
ing too sacred. On earth only one thing he finds

EMERSON 63
which is thoroughly venerable, and that is the nature
of man; not the accidents, which make a man rich or
famous, but the substance, which makes him a man.
The man is before the institutions of man, his nature
superior to his history. All finite things are only
appendages of man, useful, convenient, or beautiful.
Man is master, and nature his slave, serving for many
a varied use. The results of human experience — the -
state, the church, society, the family, business, litera
ture, science, art — all of these are subordinate to man ;
if they serve the individual, he is to foster them, if
not, to abandon them and seek better things. He
looks at aU things, the past and the present, the
state and the church, Christianity and the market-
house, in the daylight of the intellect. Nothing is al
lowed to stand between him and his manhood. Hence
there is an apparent irreverence; he does not bow to
any hat which Gessler has set up for public adoration,
but to every man, canonical or profane, who bears the
mark of native manliness. He eats show-bread, if he
is hungry. While he is the most American, he is al
most the most cosmopolitan of our writers, the least re
strained and behttled by the popular foHies of the na
tion or the age.
In America writers are commonly kept in awe and
subdued by fear of the richer class, or that of the mass
of men. Mr. Emerson has small respect for either ;
would bow as low to a lackey as a lord, to a clown as
a scholar, to one man as a million. He spurns all con
stitutions but the law of his own nature, rejecting them
with manly scorn. The traditions of the churches are
no hindrances to his thought ; Jesus or Judas were the
same to him, if either stood in his way and hindered
the proportionate development of his individual life.

64 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
The forms of society and the ritual of scholarship
are no more effectual restraints. His thought of to
day is no barrier to freedom of thought to-morrow,
for his own nature is not to be subordinated, either
to the history of man or his own history. " To-mor
row to fresh fields and pastures new," is his motto.
Yet, with all this freedom, there is no wilful display
of it. He is so confident of his freedom, so perfectly
possessed of his rights, that he does not talk of them.
They appear, but are not spoken of. With the hope
fulness and buoyant liberty of America, he has none of
our ill-mannered boasting. He criticises America
often, he always appreciates it; he seldom praises, and
never brags of our country. The most democratic of
democrats, no disciple of the old regime is better man
nered, for it is only the vulgar democrat or aristocrat
who flings his follies in your face. While it would
be difficult to find a writer so uncompromising in his
adhesion to just principles, there is not in all his works
a single jeer or ill-natured sarcasm. None is less ad
dicted to the common forms of reverence, but who is
more truly reverential?
While his idea is American, the form of his literature
is not less so. It is a form which suits the substance,
and is modified by the institutions and natural objects
about him. You see that the author lives in a land
with free institutions, with town-meetings and ballot-
boxes, in the vicinity of a decaying church, amongst
men whose terrible devils are poverty and social neg
lect, the only devils whose damnation is much cared for.
His geography is American. KatskiU and the Alle
ghanies, Monadnoc, Wachusett, and the uplands of
New Hampshire appear in poetry or prose; Contocook
and Agiochook are better than the Ilyssus, or Pacto-

EMERSON 65
lus, or " smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal
reeds." New York, Fall River, and Lowell have a
place in his writings where a vulgar Yankee would put
Thebes or Passtum. His men and women are Amer
ican, John and Jane, not Coriolanus and Persephone.
He tells of the rhodora, the club-moss, the blooming
clover, not of the hibiscus and the asphodel. He knows
the humblebee, the blackbird, the bat and the wren,
and is not ashamed to say or sing of the things under
his own eyes. He illustrates his high thought by com
mon things out of our plain New-England life — the
meeting in the church, the Sunday school, the dancing-
school, a huckleberry party, the boys and girls hasten
ing home from school, the youth in the shop, begin
ning an unconscious courtship with his unheeding
customer, the farmers about their work in the fields,
the bustling trader in the city, the cattle, the new hay,
the voters at a town-meeting, the village brawler in a
tavern fuU of tipsy riot, the conservative who thinks
the nation is lost if his ticket chance to miscarry, the
bigot worshipping the knot hole through which a dusty
beam of light has looked in upon his darkness, the
radical who declares that nothing is good if established,
and the patent reformer who screams in your ears that
he can finish the world with a single touch, — and out
of aU these he makes his poetry or illustrates his phi
losophy. Now and then he wanders off to other lands,
reports what he has seen, but it is always an American
report of what an American eye saw. Even Mr.
Emerson's recent exaggerated praise of England is
such a panegyric as none but an American could be
stow. We know an American artist who is full of Amer
ican scenery. He makes good drawings of TivoH and
II— 5

66 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Subiaco, but, to color them, he dips his pencil in the
tints of the American heaven, and over his olive trees
and sempervives, his asses and his priests, he sheds the
Hght only of his native sky.2 So it is with Mr. Emer
son. Give him the range of the globe, it is stfll an
American who travels.
Yet with this indomitable nationality he has a cul
ture quite cosmopolitan and extraordinary in a young
nation like our own. Here is a man familiar with
books, not with many but the best books, which he
knows intimately. He has kept good company. Two
things impress you powerfully and continually — the
man has seen nature, and been familiar with books.
His literary culture is not a varnish on the surface,
not a mere polish of the outside ; it has penetrated deep
into his consciousness. The salutary effect of literary
culture is more perceptible in Emerson than in any
American that we know, save one, a far younger man,
and of great promise, of whom we shall speak at some
other time.3
We just now mentioned that our writers were sorely
deficient in literary culture. Most of them have only
a smattering of learning, but some have read enough,
read and remembered, with ability to quote. Here is
one who has evidently read much, his subject required
it, or his disposition, or some accident in his history
furnished the occasion ; but his reading appears only in
his quotations or references in the margin. His litera
ture has not penetrated his soul and got incorporated
with his whole consciousness. You see that he| has been
on Parnassus by the huge bouquet, pedantic in its com
plexity, that he affronts you with; not by the odor of
the flowers he has trampled or gathered in his pilgri
mage, not by Parnassian dust clinging to his shoes or

EMERSON 67
mountain vigor in his eye. The rose gatherer smells
of his sweets, and needs not prick you with the thorn
to apprise you of what he has dealt in.
Here is another writer who has studied much in the
various literatures of the world, but has lost himself
therein. Books supercede things, art stands between
him and nature, his figures are from Hterature not from
the green world. Nationality is gone. A traveller
on the ocean of letters, he has a mistress in every port,
and a lodging-place where the night overtakes him ;
all flags are the same to him, all climes ; he, has no wife,
no home, no country. He has dropped nationality,
and in becoming a cosmopolitan has lost his citizen
ship everywhere. So, with all Christendom and hea
thendom for his metropolis, he is an alien everywhere
in the wide world. He has no literary inhabitiveness.
Now he studies one author, and is the penumbra there
of for a time; now another, with the same result.
Trojan or Tyrian is the same to him, and he is Trojan
or Tyrian as occasion demands. A thin vapory comet,
with small momentum of his own, he is. continually de
flected from his natural course by the attraction of
other and more substantial bodies, till he has for
gotten that he ever had any orbit of his own, and
dangles in the literary sky, now this way drawn, now
that, his only certain movement an oscillation. With
a chameleon variabiHty, he attaches himself to this or
the other writer, and for the time his own color disap
pears and he along with it.4
With Emerson all is very different; his literary cul
ture is of him, and not merely on him. His learning
appears not in his quotations, but in his talk. It is
the wine itself, and not the vintner's brand on the cask,
which shows its quality. In his reading and his study

68 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
he is still his own master. He has not purchased his
education with the loss of his identity, not of his man
hood ; nay, he has not forgotten his kindred in getting
his culture. He is still the master of himself, no man
provokes him even into a momentary imitation. He
keeps his individuality with maidenly asceticism, and
with a conscience rarely found amongst literary men.
Virgil Homerizes, Hesiodizes, and plays Theocritus
now and then. Emerson plays Emerson, always Emer
son. He honors Greece and is not a stranger with
her noblest sons, he pauses as a learner before the lovely
muse of Germany, he bows low with exaggerating rev
erence before the practical skill of England; but no
one, nor all of these, have power to subdue that serene
and upright intellect. He rises from the oracle he
stooped to consult just as erect as before. His read
ing gives a certain richness to his style, which is more
literary than that of any American writer that we re
member ; as much so as that of Jeremy Taylor. He
takes much for granted in his reader, as if he were
addressing men who had read everything, and wished
to be reminded of what they had read. In classic
times there was no reading public, only a select audi
ence of highly cultivated men. It was so in England
once, the literature of that period indicates the fact.
Only religious and dramatic works were designed for
pit, box, and gallery. Nobody can speak more clearly
and more plainly than Emerson, but take any one of
his essays or orations and you see that he does not
write in the language of the mass of men more than
Thucydides or Tacitus. His style is allusive as an ode
of Horace or Pindar, and the allusions are to litera
ture which is known to but few. Hence, while his
thought is human in substance and American in its

EMERSON 69
modifications, and therefore easily grasped, compre
hended, and welcomed by men of the commonest cul
ture, it is but few who understand the entire meaning
of the sentences which he writes. His style reflects
American scenery, and is dimpled into rare beauty as
it flows by, and so has a pleasing fascination ; but it
reflects also the literary scenery of his own mind, and
sojialf of his thought is lost on half Jus readers.  Ac
cordingly no writer or lecturer finds a readier access
for his thoughts to the mind of the people at large,
but no American author is less intelligible to the peo
ple in aU his manifold meaning and beauty of allu
sion. He has not completely learned to think with
the sagest sages and then put his thoughts into the
plain speech of plain men. Every word is intelligible
in the massive speech of Mr. Webster and has its effect,
while Emerson has still something of the imbecility of
the scholar as compared to the power of the man of ac
tion, whose words fall like the notes of the wood-
thrush, each in its time and place, yet without pick
ing and choosing. " Blacksmiths and teamsters do not
trip in their speech," says he, " it is a shower of bul
lets. It is Cambridge men who correct themselves,
and begin again at every half sentence ; and moreover,
wiH pun and refine too much, and swerve from the
matter to the expression." But of the peculiarities of
his style we shaU speak again.
Emerson's works do not betray any exact scholar
ship, which has a certain totality as well as method
about it. It is plain to see that his favorite authors
have been Plutarch, especially that outpouring of his
immense common-place book, his " Moral Writings,"
Montaigne, Shakespeare, George Herbert, Milton,
Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Carlyle. Of late years

frO THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
his works contain allusions to the ancient oriental liter
ature from which he has borrowed some hard names
and some valuable thoughts, but is occasionally led
astray by its influence, for it is plain that he does not
understand that curious philosophy he quotes from.
Hence his oriental allies are brought up to take a
stand which no man dreamed of in their time, and made
to defend ideas not known to men till long after these
antediluvian sages were at rest in their graves.5
In Emerson's writings you do not see indications of
exact mental discipline, so remarkable in Bacon, Mil
ton, Taylor, and South, in Schiller, Lessing and
Schleiermacher ; neither has he the wide range of mere
literature noticeable in all other men. He works up
scientific facts in his writings with great skill, often
penetrating beyond the fact, and discussing the idea
out of which it and many other kindred facts seem to
have proceeded ; this indicates not only a nice eye for
facts, but a mind singularly powerful to detect latent
analogies, and see the one in the many. Yet there is
nothing to show any regular and systematic discipline
in science which appears so eminently in Schiller and
Hegel. He seems to learn his science from occasional
conversation with men of science, or from state
ments of remarkable discoveries in the common Jour
nals, not from a careful and regular study of facts or
treatises. With all his literary culture he has an intense love
of nature, a true sight and appreciation thereof; not
the analytic eye of the naturalist, but the synthetic
vision of the poet. A book never clouds his sky. His
figures are drawn from nature, he sees the fact. No
chart of nature hangs up in his windows to shut out
nature herself. How well he says:

EMERSON 71
"If a man would be alone, let him look at the stars. The
rays that come from those heavenly worlds will separate be
tween him and vulgar things. One might think the atmosphere
was made transparent with this design, to give man in the
heavenly bodies the perpetual presence of the sublime. Seen in
the streets of cities, how great they are! If the stars should
appear one night in a, thousand years, how would men believe
and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance
of the city of God which had been shown! But every night
come out these preachers of beauty and light the universe with
their admonishing smile. ... To speak truly, few adult
persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At
least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates
only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart
of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and
outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other, who has
retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood.
His intercourse with heaven and earth becomes part of his daily
food. In the presence of nature, a wild delight runs through
the man, in spite of real sorrows. Nature says, he is my
creature, and maugre all his impertinent griefs, he shall be glad
with me. Not the sun or the summer alone, but every hour and
season yields its tribute of delight; for every hour and change
corresponds to and authorizes a different state of mind, from
breathless noon to grimmest midnight. Nature is a setting that
fits equally well a comic or a mourning piece. In good health,
the air is a cordial of incredible virtue. Crossing a bare com
mon, in snow puddles, at twilight, under a clouded sky, without
having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune,
I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. Almost I fear to think
how glad I am.6 In the woods too, a man casts off his years, as
the snake his slough, and at what period soever of life, is al
ways a child. In the woods is perpetual youth. Within these
plantations of God a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial
festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of
them in a thousand years. In the woods we return to reason
and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life, —
no disgrace, no calamity (leaving me my eyes), which nature
cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground, — my head bathed
by the blithe air, and uplited into infinite space, — all mean
egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eyebalL I am noth
ing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate
through me, I am part or particle of God. The name of the
nearest friend sounds then foreign and accidental. To be
brothers, to be acquaintances, master or servant, is then a trifle

72 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and a disturbance. I am the lover of uncontained and immor
tal beauty. In the wilderness I find something more dear and
connate than in streets or villages. In the tranquil landscape,
and especially in the distant line of the horizon, man beholds
somewhat as beautiful as his own nature.* . . .
" The tradesman, the attorney, comes out of the din and craft
of the street, and sees the sky and the woods, and is a man
again. In their eternal calm he finds himself. The health of
the eye seems to demand a horizon. We are never tired, so
long as we can see far enough.
" But in other hours nature satisfies the soul purely by its
loveliness, and without any mixture of corporeal benefit. I have
seen the spectacle of morning from the hill-top over against my
house, from daybreak to sun-rise, with emotions which an angel
might share. The long slender bars of cloud float like fishes
in the sea of crimson light. From the earth as a shore I look
out into that silent sea. I seem to partake its rapid trans
formations; the active enchantment reaches my dust, and I
dilate and conspire with the morning wind. How does nature
deify us with a few and cheap elements! Give me health and
-a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous. The
dawn is my Assyria; the sunset and moon-rise my Paphos,
and unimaginable realms of faerie; broad noon shall be my
England of the senses and the understanding; the night shall
be my Germany of mystic philosophy and dreams.t
Most writers are demonized or possessed by some one
truth, or perhaps some one whim. Look where they
will, they see nothing but that. Mr. Emerson holds
himself erect, and no one thing engrosses his attention,
no one idea ; no one intellectual faculty domineers over
the rest. Sensation does not dim reflection, nor does
his thought lend its sickly hue to the things about him.
Even Goethe, with all his boasted equilibrium, held
his intellectual faculties less perfectly in hand than
Emerson. He has no hobbies to ride; even his fond
ness for the ideal and the beautiful, does not hinder
him from obstinately looking real and ugly things in
the face. He carries the American idea of freedom in-
* Centenary ed., Vol. I. pp. 7-10.
t The same, pp. 16, 17.

EMERSON 73
to his most intimate personality, and keeps his individ
uality safe and sacred. He cautions young men
against stooping their minds to other men. He knows
no master. Sometimes this is carried to an apparent
excess, and he underrates the real value of literature,
afraid lest the youth become a bookworm and not a
man thinking. But how well he says :
"Meek young men grow up in libraries, believing it their
duty to accept the views which Cicero, which Locke, which
Bacon have given, forgetful that Cicero, Locke, and Bacon were
only young men in libraries when they wrote these books.
Hence, instead of man thinking, we have the bookworm.
"Books are the best of things, well used; abused, among the
worst. What is the right use? What is the one end, which all
means go to effect? They are for nothing but to inspire. I
had better never see a book than to be warped by its attraction
clean out of my own orbit, and made a satellite instead of a
system. The one thing in the world of value is the active soul.
This every man is entitled to; this every man contains within
him, although, in almost all men, obstructed, and as yet unborn.
The soul active sees absolute truth, and utters truth or cre
ates. . . . The book, the college, the school of art, the in
stitution of any kind stop with some past utterance of genius.
This is good, say they; let us hold by this. They pin me down.
They look backward and not forward. But genius looks for
ward; the eyes of man are set in his forehead, not in his hind-
head; man hopes, genius creates. Whatever talents may be, if
the man creates not, the pure efflux of the Deity is not his;
cinders and smoke there may be, but not yet flame 
" The world of any moment is the merest appearance. Some
great decorum, some fetish of a government, some ephemeral
trade, or war or man is cried up by half mankind and cried
down by the other half, as if all depended on this particular
up or down. The odds are that the whole question is not worth
the poorest thought which the scholar has lost in listening to
the controversy. Let him not quit his belief that a popgun is
a popgun, though the ancient and honorable of the earth affirm
it to be the crack of doom. In silence, in steadiness, in severe
abstraction, let him hold by himself; add observation to observa
tion, patient of neglect, patient of reproach, and bide his own
time, — happy enough if he can satisfy himself alone that this
day he has seen something truly. Success treads on every right

74 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
step. For the instinct is sure that prompts him to tell his
brother what he thinks. He then learns that in going down
into the secrets of his own mind he has descended into the se
crets of all minds. He learns that he who has mastered any
law in his private thoughts is master to that extent of all men
whose language he speaks, and of all into whose language his
own can be translated. The poet, in utter solitude remember
ing his spontaneous thoughts and recording them, is found to
have recorded that which men in crowded cities find true for
them also." *
To us the effect of Emerson's writings is profoundly
religious; they stimulate to piety, the love of God, to
goodness as the love of man. We know no living
writer in any language who exercises so powerful a
religious influence as he. Most young persons, not
ecclesiastical, wiU confess this. We know he is often
called hard names on pretence that he is not religious.
We remember once being present at a meeting of gen
tlemen, scholarly men some of them, after the New-
England standard of scholarship, who spent the even
ing in debating " Whether Ralph Waldo Emerson was
a Christian." 7 The opinion was quite generally en
tertained that he was not, for " discipleship was neces
sary to Christianity." " And the essence of Christian
discipleship " was thought to consist in " sitting at the
feet of our blessed Lord (pronounced Laawd!) and
calling him Master, which Emerson certainly does not
do." We value Christianity as much as most men, and
the name Christian to us is very dear ; but when we re
membered the character, the general tone and conduct
of the men who arrogate to themselves the name Chris
tian, and seem to think they have a right to monopo
lize the Holy Spirit of Religion, and " shove away the
worthy bidden guest," the whole thing reminded us of
a funny story related by an old writer : " It was once
* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, pp. 89, 90, 102, 103.

EMERSON 75
proposed in the British House of Commons that James
Usher, afterward the celebrated Archbishop of Ar
magh, but then a young man, should be admitted to
the assembly of the ' King's Divines.' " The proposi
tion, if we remember rightly, gave rise to some debate
upon which John Selden, a younger man than Usher,
but highly distinguished and much respected, rose and
said, " that it reminded him of a proposition which
might be made, that Inigo Jones, the famous architect,
should be admitted to the worshipful company of
Mousetrap Makers ! " 8
Mr. Emerson's writings are eminently religious ;
Christian in the best sense of that word. This has
often been denied for two reasons : because Mr. Emer
son sets little value on the mythology of the Christian
sects, no more perhaps than on the mythology of the
Greeks and the Scandinavians, and also because his
writings far transcend the mechanical morality and
formal pietism commonly recommended by gentlemen
in pulpits. Highly religious, he is not at all eccle
siastical or bigoted. He has small reverence for forms
and traditions ; a manly life is the only form of relig
ion which he recognizes, and hence we do not wonder at
aU that he also has been deemed an infidel. It would
be very surprising if it were not so. Still it is not re
ligion that is most conspicuous in these volumes; that
is not to be looked for except in the special religious lit
erature, yet we must confess that any one of Emerson's
works seems far more rehgious than what are commonly
called " good books," including the class of sermons.
To show what is in Mr. Emerson's books and what
is not, let us make a little more detailed examination
thereof. He is not a logical writer, not systematic,
not what is commonly called philosophical ; didactic to

76 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
a great degree, but never demonstrative. So we are
not to look for a scientific plan, or for a system of
which the author is himself conscious. Still, in all sane
men there must be a system, though the man does not
know it. There are two ways of reporting upon an
author : one is to represent him by specimens, the other
to describe him by analysis ; one to show off a finger
or foot of the Venus de Medici, the other to give the
dimensions thereof. We will attempt both, and will
speak of Mr. Emerson's starting point, his terminus a
quo; then of his method of procedure, his via in qua;
then of the conclusion he arrives at, his terminus ad
quern. In giving the dimensions of his statue we shaU
exhibit also some of the parts described.
Most writers, knowingly or unconsciously, take as
their point of departure some special and finite thing.
This man starts from a tradition, the philosophical
tradition of Aristotle, Plato, Leibnitz, or Locke; this
from the theological tradition of the Protestants or
the Catholics and never will dare get out of sight of
his authorities, he takes the bearing of everything from
his tradition. Such a man may sail the sea for ages,
he arrives nowhere at the last. Our traditionist must
not outgo his tradition ; the Catholic must not get be
yond his church, nor the Protestant out-travel his Bi
ble. Others start from some fixed fact, a sacrament,
a constitution, the public opinion, the public morality,
or the popular religion. This they are to defend at
all hazards ; of course they will retain all falsehood and
injustice which favor this institution, and reject all jus
tice and truth which oppose the same. Others pre
tend to start from God, but in reahty do take their de
parture from a limited conception of God, from the
Hebrew notion of him, or the Catholic notion, from the

EMERSON 77
Calvinistic or the Unitarian notion of God. By and
by they are hindered and stopped in their progress.
The philosophy of these three clases of men is always
vitiated by the prejudices they start with.
Mr. Emerson takes man for his point of departure,
he means to take the whole of man ; man with his his
tory, man with his nature, his sensational, intellectual,
moral, affectional and religious instincts and faculties.
With him man is the measure of all things, of ideas
and of facts ; if they fit man they are accepted, if not
thrown aside. This appears in his first book and in
his last:
" The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to
face^ we through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an
original relation to the universe? Why should not we have a
poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a
religion by a revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?
Embosomed for a season in nature, whose floods of life stream
around and through us, and invite us by the powers they supply
to action proportioned to nature, why should we grope among
the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into
masquerade out of its faded wardrobe? The sun shines to-day
also. There is more wool and flax in the fields. There are new
lands, new men, new thoughts. Let us demand our own works
and laws and worship." *
Again he speaks in a higher mood of the same theme :
" That is always best which gives me to myself. The sublime
is excited in me by the great stoical doctrine, Obey thyself.
That which shows God in me fortifies me. That which shows
God out of me, makes me a wart and a wen. There is no
longer a necessary reason for my being. Already the long
shadows of untimely oblivion creep over me, and I shall decease
for ever."
"Wherever a man comes, there comes revolution. The old is
for slaves. When a man comes, all books are legible, all things
transparent, all religions are forms. He is religious. Man is
the wonder-worker. He is seen amid miracles. All men bless
* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, p. 3.

78 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and curse. He saith yea and nay only. The stationariness of
religion, the assumption that the age of inspiration is past, that
the Bible is closed, the fear of* degrading the character of Jesus
by representing him as a man, indicate with sufficient clearness
the falsehood of our theology. It is the office of a true teacher
to show us that God is, not was; that he speaketh, not spake."
"Let me admonish you, first of all, to go alone; to refuse the
good models, even those which are sacred in the imagination of
men, and dare to love God without mediator or veil. Friends
enough you shall find who will hold up to your emulation Wesleys
and Oberlins, saints and prophets. Thank God for these good
men, but say, ' I also am a man.' Imitation cannot go above its
model. The imitator dooms himself to hopeless mediocrity. The
inventor did it because it was natural to him, and so in him it
has a charm. In the imitator, something else is natural, and he
bereaves himself of his own beauty to come short of another
man's. "Yourself a new-born bard of the Holy Ghost, — cast behind
you all conformity, and acquaint men at the first hand with
Deity. Look to it first and only that fashion, custom, author
ity, pleasure, and money are nothing to you, are not bandages
over your eyes that you cannot see, — but live the privilege of
the immeasurable mind."
"Let man then learn the revelation of all nature, and all
thought to his heart; this, namely; that the Highest dwells with
him; that the sources of nature are in his own mind if the sen
timent of duty is there. But if he would know what the great
God' speaketh, he must ' go into his closet and shut the door,'
as Jesus said. God will not make himself manifest to cowards.
He must greatly listen to himself, withdrawing himself from
all the accents of other men's devotion. Their prayers even
are hurtful to him, until he have made his own. The soul
makes no appeal from itself. Our religion vulgarly stands on
numbers of believers. Whenever the appeal is made, — no mat
ter how indirectly, — to numbers, proclamation is then and
there made, that religion is not. He that finds God a sweet,
enveloping thought to him never counts his company. When I
sit in that presence, who shall dare to come in? When I rest
in perfect humility, when I burn with pure love, what can
Calvin or Swedenborg say ? " *
And again in his latest publication:
"The gods of fable are the shining moments of great men.
We run all our vessels into one mould. Our colossal theologies
* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, pp. 131, 144, 146; vol. 2, pp. 294, 295.

EMERSON 79
of Judaism, Christism, Buddhism, Mahometism, are the neces
sary and structural action of the human mind."
"Man is that noble endogenous plant which grows, like the
palm, from within, outward. ... I count him a great man
who inhabits a higher sphere of thought, into which other men
rise with labor and difficulty; he has but to open his eyes to see
things in a true light, and in large relations; whilst they must
make painful corrections, and keep a vigilant eye on many
sources of error."
" The genius of humanity is the right point of view of his
tory. . . . For a time our teachers serve us personally, as
metres or milestones of progress. Once they were angels of
knowledge and their figures touched the sky. Then we drew
near, saw their means, culture, and limits; and they yielded
their place to other geniuses. Happy, if a few names remain
so high, that we have not been able to read them nearer, and
age and comparison have not robbed them of a ray. But, at
last, we shall cease to look in men for completeness, and shall
content ourselves with their social and delegated quality.
"Yet, within the limits of human education and agency, we
may say, great men exist that there may be greater men. The
destiny of organized nature is amelioration, and who can tell its
limits? It is for man to tame the chaos; on every side, whilst
he lives, to scatter the seeds of science and of song, that cli
mate, corn, animals, men may be milder, and the germs of love
and benefit may be multiplied."
"The world is young? the former great men call to us af
fectionately. We too must write Bibles, to unite again the
heavens and the earthly world. The secret of genius is to suf
fer no fiction to exist for us, to realize all that we know; in
the high refinement of modern life, in arts, in sciences, in
books, in men, to exact good faith, reality, and a purpose; and
first, last, midst, and without end, to honor every truth by
use." *
In this, Emerson is more American than America her
self, and is himself the highest exponent in literature
of this idea of human freedom and the value of man.
Channing talks of the dignity of human nature, his
great and brilliant theme; but he commonly, perhaps
always subordinates the nature of man to some of the
accidents of his history. This Emerson never does;
* Centenary ed., Vol. 4, pp. 4, 6, 33-35, 290.

80 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
no, not once in all his works, nor in all his life. Still
we think it is not the whole of man from which he
starts, that he undervalues the logical, demonstrative,
and historical understanding, with the results thereof,
and also undervalues the affections. Hence his man,
who is the measure of all things, is not the complete
man. This defect appears in his ethics, which are a
little cold, the ethics of marble men ; and in his religious
teachings, the highest which this age has furnished,
full of reverence, full of faith, but not proportion
ately rich in affection.
Mr. Emerson has a method of his own as plainly
marked as that of Lord Bacon or Descartes, and as
rigidly adhered to. It is not the inductive method,
by which you arrive at a general fact from many par
ticular facts, but never reach a universal law ; it is not
the deductive method, whereby a minor law is derived
from a major, a special from a general law; it is
neither inductive nor deductive demonstration. But
Emerson proceeds by the way of intuition, sensational
or spiritual. Go to the fact and look for yourself, is
his command ; a material fact you cannot always ver
ify and so for that must depend on evidence, a spiritual
fact you can always legitimate for yourself. Thus he

" That which seems faintly possible it is so refined, is often
faint and dim because it is deepest seated in the mind among
the eternal verities. Empirical science is apt to cloud the sight,
and, by the very knowledge of functions and processes, to be
reave the student of the manly contemplation of the whole.
The savant becomes unpoetic. But the best read naturalist,
who lends an entire and devout attention to truth, will see that
there remains much to learn of his relation to the world, and
that it is not to be learned by any addition or subtraction or
other comparison of known quantities, but is arrived at by
untaught sallies of the spirit, by continual self-recovery, and

EMERSON 81
by entire humility. He will perceive that there are far more
excellent qualities in the student than preciseness and infalli
bility, that a guess is often more fruitful than an indisputable
affirmation, and that a dream may let us deeper into the secret
of nature than a hundred concerted experiments."
" Every surmise and vaticination of the mind is entitled to a
certain respect, and we learn to prefer imperfect theories, and
sentences which contain glimpses of truth, to digested systems
which have no one valuable suggestion. A wise writer will feel
that the ends of study and composition are best answered by
announcing undiscovered regions of thought, and so communi
cating through hope new activity to the torpid spirit." *
And again:
"Jesus astonishes and overpowers sensual people. They can
not unite him to history or reconcile him with themselves. As
they come to revere their intuitions and aspire to live holily,
their own piety explains every fact, every word."
"The inquiry leads us to that source, at once the essence of
genius, the essence of virtue, and the essence of life, which we
call spontaneity or instinct. We denote this primary wisdom
as intuition, whilst all later teachings are tuitions. In that deep
force, the last fact behind which analysis cannot go, all things
find their common origin. For the sense of being which in
calm hours rises, we know not how, in the soul, is not diverse
from things, from space, from light, from time, from man,
but one with them, and proceedeth obviously from the same
source whence their life and being also proceedeth. We first
share the life by which things exist, and afterwards see them
as appearances in nature, and forget that we have shared their
cause. Here is the fountain of action and the fountain of
thought. Here are the lungs of that inspiration which giveth
man wisdom, of that inspiration of man which cannot be denied
without impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap of immense
intelligence, which makes us organs of its activity and receivers
of its truth. When we discern justice, when we discern truth,
we do nothing of ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams.
If we ask whence this comes, if we seek to pry into the soul
that causes, — all metaphysics, all philosophy is at fault. Its
presence or its absence is all we can affirm. . . . Perception
is not whimsical, but fatal. If I see a trait, my children will
see it after me, and in course of time, all mankind, — although
it may chance that no one has seen it before me. For my per
ception of it is as much a fact as the sun."
* Centenary ed., Vol. I. pp. 66-7, 70.
II— 6

82 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" The relations of the soul to the Divine Spirit are so pure
that it is profane to seek to interpose helps. It must be that
when God speaketh, he should communicate not one thing, but
all things; should fill the world with his voice; should scatter
forth light, nature, time, souls, from the centre of the present
thought; and new-date and new-create the whole. Whenever
a mind is simple, and receives a divine wisdom, then old things
pass away, — means, teachers, texts, temples fall; it lives now
and absorbs past and future into the present hour."
" The soul is the perceiver and revealer of truth. We know
truth when we see it, let sceptic and scoffer say what they
choose. Foolish people ask you, when you have spoken what
they do not wish to hear, 'how do you know it is the truth,
and not an error of your own ? ' We know truth, when we see
it, from opinion, as we know when we are awake that we are
awake." "The great distinction between teachers, sacred or literary;
between poets like Herbert and poets like Pope; between phi
losophers like Spinoza, Kant, and Coleridge, and philosophers
like Locke, Paley, Mackintosh, and Stewart; between men of
the world who are reckoned accomplished talkers, and here and
there a fervent mystic, prophesying half-insane under the in
finitude of his thought, is that one class speak from within, or
from experience, as parties and possessors of the fact; and the
other class, from without, as spectators merely, or perhaps as
acquainted with the fact, on the evidence of third persons. It
is of no use to preach to me from without. I can do that too
easily myself."
" The soul gives itself alone, original, and pure, to the
Lonely, Original, and Pure, who, on that condition, gladly in
habits, leads, and speaks through it. Then it is glad, young,
and nimble. It is not wise, but it sees through all things. It
is not called religious, but it is innocent. It calls the light its
own, and feels that the grass grows and the stone falls by a
law inferior to, and dependent on, its nature. Behold, it saith,
I am born into the great, the universal mind. I, the imperfect,
adore my own Perfect. I am somehow receptive of the Great
Soul, and thereby I do overlook the sun and the stars, and feel
them to be but the fair accidents and effects which change and
pass. More and more the surges of everlasting nature enter
into me, and I become public and human in my regards and
actions. So come I to live in thoughts and act with energies
which are immortal." *
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, pp. 27-8, 63-66, 279, 287, 296.

EMERSON 83
" All your learning of all literatures would never enable you
to anticipate one of its thoughts or expressions, and yet each
is natural and familiar as household words." *
The same method in his last work is ascribed to
Plato: " Add to this, he believes that poetry, prophecy, and the high
insight are from » wisdom of which man is not master, that the
gods never philosophize; but, by a celestial mania, these miracles
are accomplished." t
Sometimes he exaggerates the value of this, and puts
the unconscious before the self-conscious state:
" It is pitiful to be an artist, when, by forbearing to be
artists, we might be vessels filled with the divine overflowings,
enriched by the circulations of omniscience and omnipresence.
Are there not moments in the history of heaven when the hu
man race was not counted by individuals, but was only the In
fluenced, was God in distribution, God rushing into multiform
benefit? It is sublime to receive, sublime to love, but this lust
of imparting as from us, this desire to be loved, the wish to
be recognized as individuals, is finite, comes of a lower strain." t
He is sometimes extravagent in the claims made for
his own method, and maintains that ecstacy is the nat
ural and exclusive mode of arriving at new truths, while
it is only one mode. Ecstacy is the state of intuition in
which the man loses his individual self-consciousness.
Moments of this character are few and rare even with
men Hke the St. Victors, Hke Tauler, and Bohme and
Swedenborg. The writings of aU these men, especially
of the two last, who most completely surrendered them
selves to this mode of action, show how poor and in
sufficient it is. All that mankind has learned in this
way is little compared with the results of reflection,
•Centenary ed., Vol. I. p. 218.
t The same, Vol. 4, p. 58.
t The same, Vol. I. p. 210.

84 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
of meditation, and careful, conscientious looking after
truth ; aU the great benefactors of the world have been
patient and continuous in their work :
"Not from a vain and shallow thought
His awful Jove young Phidias brought."
Mr. Emerson says books are only for one's idle
hours; he discourages hard and continuous thought,
conscious modes of argument, of discipline. Here he
exaggerates his idiosyncracy into a universal law. The
methed of nature is not ecstasy, but patient attention.
Human nature avenges herself for the slight he puts
on her, by the irregular and rambling character of his
own productions. The vice appears more glaring in
the Emersonidai, who have all the agony without the
inspiration, who affect the unconscious, write even more
ridiculous nonsense than th&ir " genuis " requires ; are
sometimes so child-like as to become mere babies, and
seem to forget that the unconscious state is oftener
below the conscious than above it, and that there is an
ecstasy of folly as well as of good sense.
Some of these imbeciles have been led astray by this
extravagant and one-sided statement. What if books
have hurt Mr. Oldbuck, and many fine wits He
" sheathed to the hilt in ponderous tomes," sheathed
and rusted in so that no Orson could draw the blade,
— we need not deny the real value of books, still less
the value of the serious and patient study of thoughts
and things. Michael Angelo and Newton had some
genius; Socrates is thought not destitute of philoso
phical power; but no dauber of canvas, no sportsman
with marble, ever worked like Angelo ; the two philos
ophers wrought by their genius, but with an attention,
an order, a diligence, and a terrible industry and

EMERSON 85
method of thought, without which their genius would
have ended in nothing but guess-work. Much comes
by spontaneous intuition, which is to be got in no other
way; but much is to precede that, and much to follow
it. There are two things to be considered in the mat
ter of inspiration, one is the Infinite God from whom
it comes, the other the finite capacity which is to receive
it. If Newton had never studied, it would be as easy
for God to reveal the calculus to his dog Diamond as
to Newton. We once heard of a man who thought
everything was in his soul, and so gave up all reading,
all continuous thought. Said another, " if all is in the
soul, it takes a man to find it."
Here are some of the most important conclusions
Mr. Emerson has hitherto arrived at.
Man is above nature, the material world. Last win
ter, in his lectures,9 he was understood to affirm " the
identity of man with nature ; " a doctrine which seems
to have come from his oriental reading before named,
a doctrine false as well as inconsistent with the first
principles of his philosophy. But in his printed works
he sees clearly the distinction between the two, a fact
not seen by the Hindoo philosophers, but first by the
Hebrew and Greek writers. Emerson puts man far
before nature:
"We are taught by great actions that the universe is the
property of every individual in it. Every rational creature has
all nature for his dowry and estate. It is his if he will. He
may divest himself of it; he may creep into a corner, and ab
dicate his kingdom, as most men do, but he is entitled to the
world by his constitution. In proportion to the energy of his
thought and will, he takes up the world into himself."
"Thus in art does nature work through the will of «, man
filled with the beauty of her first works."
" Nature is thoroughly mediate. It is made to serve. It
receives the dominion of man as meekly as the ass on which

86 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the Saviour rode. It offers all its kingdoms to man as the raw
material which he may mould into what is useful." *
Nature is " an appendix to the soul." Then the
man is superior to the accidents of his past history or
present condition:
" No man ever prayed heartily without learning something." t
"The highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton,
is that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not
what men said but what they thought. A man should learn to
detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his
mind from within, more than the luster of the firmament of
bards and sages."
" Kingdom and lordship, power and estate, are a gaudier
vocabulary than private John and Edward in a small house and
common day's work; but the things of life are the same to
both, the sum total of both is the same. Why all this deference
to Alfred and Scanderbeg, and Gustavus? Suppose they
were virtuous; did they wear out virtue? As great a stake
depends on your private act to-day, as followed their public
and renowned steps. When private men shall act with vast
views, the luster will be transferred from the actions of kings
to those gentlemen." J
Hence a man must be true to his present convic
tion, careless of consistency :
" A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,
adored by little statesmen, and philosophers and divines. With
consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may
as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon
your guarded lips ! Sew them up with packthread, do. Else,
if you would be a man, speak what you think to-day in words
as hard as cannon-balls, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow
thinks in hard words again, though it contradict everything
you said to-day." **
The man must not be a slave to a single form of
thought :
* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, pp. 20, 24, 40.
t The same, Vol. 1, p. 74.
j The same, Vol. 2, pp. 45, 62-63.
** The same, Vol. 2, p. 57.

EMERSON 87
" How wearisome the grammarian, the phrenologist, the po
litical or religious fanatic, or indeed any possessed mortal,
whose balance is lost by the exaggeration of a single topic. It
is incipient insanity." *
Man is inferior to the great law of God, which over
rides the world ; " His wealth and greatness consist
in his being the channel through which heaven flows
to earth ; " " the word of a poet is only the mouth of
divine wisdom ; " " the man on whom the soul descends,
alone can teach ; " all nature " from the sponge up to
Hercules is to hint or to thunder man the laws of right
and wrong." This ethical character seems the end of
nature : " the moral law lies at the centre of nature and
radiates to the circumference. It is the pith and mar
row of every substance, every relation, every process.
All things with which we deal point to us. What is a
farm but a mute gospel? " Yet he sometimes tells us
that man is identical with God under certain circum
stances, an old Hindoo notion, a little favored by some
passages in the New Testament, and revived by Hegel
in modern times, in whom it seems less inconsistent than
in Emerson.
This moral law continually gives men their compen
sation. " You cannot do wrong without suffering
wrong." "And this law of laws which the pulpit, the senate, and the
college deny, is hourly preached in all markets and all lan
guages, by flights of proverbs, whose teaching is as true and as
omnipresent as that of birds and flies.
"All things are double, one against another: Tit for tat, an
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, blood for blood, measure
for measure, love for love. Give and it shall be given you.
He that watereth shall be watered himself. What will you
haver quoth God; pay for it and take it. Nothing venture,
nothing have. Thou shalt be paid exactly for what thou hast
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, p. 339.

88 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
done, no more, no less. Who doth not work shall not eat.
Harm watch, harm catch. Curses always recoil on the head
of him who imprecates them. If you put a chain around the
neck of a slave the other end fastens itself round your own.
Bad counsel confounds the adviser. The devil is an ass."
" There is no den in the wide world to hide a rogue. There
is no such thing as concealment. Commit a crime, and the
earth is made of glass. Commit a crime, and it seems as if a
coat of snow fell on the ground, such as reveals in the woods
the track of every partridge and fox and squirrel and mole.
You cannot recall the spoken word, you cannot wipe out the
foot-track, you cannot draw up the ladder, so as to leave no
inlet or clew. Always some damning circumstance transpires.
The laws and substances of nature, water, snow, wind, gravi
tation, become penalties to the thief."
" Neither can it be said, on the other hand, that the gain of
rectitude must be bought by any loss. There is no penalty to
virtue, no penalty to wisdom; they are proper additions of be
ing. In a virtuous action, I properly am; in a virtuous act, I
add to the world; I plant into deserts, conquered from chaos
and nothing, and see the darkness receding on the limits of the
horizon. There can be no excess to love, none to knowledge,
none to beauty, when these attributes are considered in the
purest sense. The soul refuses all limits. It affirms in man
always an optimism, never a pessimism." *
By virtue of obedience to this law great men are
great, and only so:
" We do not yet see that virtue is height, and that a man or a
company of men plastic and permeable to principles, by the law
of nature must overpower and ride all cities, nations, kings,
rich men, poets, who are not."
"A true man belongs to no other time or place, but is the
center of things. Where he is, there is nature. He measures
you, and all men, and all events. You are constrained to ac
cept his standard. Ordinarily everybody in society reminds us
of somewhat else or some other person. Character, reality,
reminds you of nothing else. It takes place of the whole crea
tion. The man must be so much that he must make all cir
cumstances indifferent, put all means into the shade. This all
great men are and do. Every true man is a cause, a country,
and an age, requires infinite spaces and numbers and time fully
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, pp. 109, 116, 122.

EMERSON 89
to accomplish his thought; and posterity seem to follow his
steps as a procession." *
Through this any man has the power of all men:
"Do that which is assigned thee, and thou canst not hope too
much or dare too much. There is at this moment, there is for
me an utterance bare and grand as that of the colossal chisel
of Phidias, or the trowel of the Egyptians, or the pen of Moses,
or Dante, but different from all these. Not possibly will the
soul, all rich, all eloquent, with thousand-cloven tongue, deign
to repeat itself; but if I can hear what these patriarchs say,
surely I can reply to them in the same pitch of voice; for the
ear and the tongue are two organs of one nature. Dwell up
there in the simple and noble regions of thy life, obey thy
heart, and thou shalt reproduce the foreworld again."
" The great poet makes us feel our own wealth, and then we
think less of his compositions. His greatest communication
to our mind is, to teach us to despise all he has done. Shak-
speare carries us to such a lofty strain of intelligent activity
as to suggest a wealth which beggars his own; and we then feel
that the splendid works which he has created, and which in
other hours we extol as a sort of self-existent poetry, take no
stronger hold of real nature than the shadow of a passing
traveller on the rock." t
Yet he once says there is no progress of mankind;
" Society never advances."
" The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of
his feet. He is supported on crutches, but loses so much sup
port of muscle. He has got a fine Geneva watch, but he has
lost the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical
almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he
wants it, the man in the street does not know a star in the
sky. The solstice he does not observe, the equinox he knows as
little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is without a
dial in his mind. His note-books impair his memory, his
libraries overload his wit, the insurance office increases the
number of accidents; and it may be a question whether ma
chinery does not encumber, whether we have not lost by refine
ment some energy, by a Christianity entrenched in establish-
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, pp. 70, 61.
t The same, Vol. 2, pp. 83-84, 289.

90 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ments and forms, some vigor of wild virtue. For every stoic
was a stoic, but in Christendom where is the Christian?"*
But this is an exaggeration, which he elsewhere cor
rects, and justly says that the great men of the nine
teenth century will one day be quoted to prove the bar
barism of their age.
He teaches an absolute trust in God:
" Ineffable is the union of man and God in every act of the
soul. The simplest person, who in his integrity worships God,
becomes God; yet for ever and ever the influx of this better
and universal self is new and unsearchable. Ever it inspires
awe and astonishment. . . . When we have broken our god
of tradition, and ceased from our god of rhetoric, then may
God fire the heart with his presence. It is the doubling of the
heart itself, nay, the infinite enlargement of the heart with a
power of growth to a new infinity on every side. It inspires
in man an infallible trust. He has not the conviction, but the
sight that the best is the true, and may in that thought easily
dismiss all particular uncertainties and fears, and adjourn to
the sure revelation of time, the solution of his private riddles.
He is sure that his welfare is dear to the heart of being. In
the presence of law to his mind, he is overflowed with a reliance
so universal that it sweeps away all cherished hopes and the
most stable projects of mortal condition in its flood. He be
lieves that he cannot escape from his good." t
" In how many churches, by how many prophets, tell me, is
man made sensible that he is an infinite soul; that the earth and
heavens are passing into his mind, that he is drinking for ever
the soul of God? Where now sounds the persuasion, that by
its very melody imparadises my heart, and so affirms its own
origin in heaven? Where shall I hear words such as in elder
ages drew men to leave all and follow — father and mother,
house and land, wife and child? Where shall I hear these
august laws of moral being so pronounced as to fill my ear, and
I feel ennobled by the offer of my uttermost action and pas
sion? The test of the true faith, certainly, should be its power
to charm and command the soul, as the laws of nature control
the activity of the hands, — so commanding that we find pleas
ure and honor in obeying. The faith should blend with the
light of rising and of setting suns, with the flying cloud, the
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, p. 85.
t The same, Vol. 2, pp. 292-3.

EMERSON 91
singing bird, and the breath of flowers. But now the priest's
Sabbath has lost the splendor of nature, it is unlovely, we are
glad when it is done; we can make, we do make, even sitting in
our pews, a far better, holier, sweeter, for ourselves." *
God continually communicates himself to man in
various forms:
"We distinguish the announcements of the soul, its mani
festations of its own nature, by the term Revelation. These are
always attended by the emotion of the sublime. For this com
munication is an influx of the Divine mind into our mind. It
is an ebb of the individual rivulet before the flowing surges of
the sea of life. Every distinct apprehension of this central
commandment agitates men with awe and delight. A thrill
passes through all men at the reception of new truth, or at the
performance of a great action, which comes out of the heart of
nature. In these communications the power to see is not sepa
rated from the will to do; but the insight proceeds from obe
dience, and the obedience proceeds from a joyful perception.
Every moment when the individual feels himself invaded by it,
is memorable." t
" The nature of these revelations is always the same ;
they are perceptions of the absolute law."
" This energy does not descend into individual life, on any
other condition than entire possession. It comes to the lowly
and simple; it comes to whomsoever will put off what is foreign
and proud; it comes as insight; it comes as serenity and grand
eur. When we see those whom it inhabits, we are apprized of
new degrees of greatness. From that inspiration the man
comes back with a changed tone. He does not talk with men,
with an eye to their opinion. He tries them. It requires of
us to be plain and true  The soul that ascendeth to
worship the great God is plain and true, has no rose-color, no
fine friends, no chivalry, no adventures, does not want admira
tion; dwells in the hour that now is, in the earnest experience
of the common day, — by reason of the present moment, and
the mere trifle having become porous to thought, and bibulous
of the sea of light."
" How dear, how soothing to man, arises the idea of God,

* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, pp. 136-7.
t The same, Vol. 2, pp. 280-1.

92 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
peopling the lonely place, effacing the scars of our mistakes
and disappointments ! " *
He says the same thing in yet more rhythmic notes :
" Not from a vain or shallow thought
His awful Jove young Phidias brought;
Never from lips of cunning fell
The thrilling Delphic oracle;
Out from the heart of nature rolled
The burdens of the Bible old;
The litanies of nations came,
Like the volcano's tongue of flame,
Up from the burning core below, —
The canticles of love and woe;
The hand that rounded Peter's dome,
And groined the aisles of Christian Rome,
Wrought in a sad sincerity;
Himself from God he could not free;
He builded better than he knew; —
The conscious stone to beauty grew.

"The passive Master lent his hand
To the vast soul that o'er him planned;
And the same pow.er that reared the shrine
Bestrode the tribes that knelt within.
Ever the fiery Pentecost
Girds with one flame the countless host,
Trances the heart through chanting choirs,
And through the priest the mind inspires." t
If we put Emerson's conclusions into five great
classes representing respectively his idea of man, of
God, and of nature; his idea of self-rule, the relation
of man's consciousness to his unconsciousness; his idea
of religion, the relation of men to God ; of ethics, the
relation of man to man ; and of economy, the relation
of man to nature, we find him in the very first rank
of modern science. No man in this age is before him.
* Centenary ed., Vol. 2, pp. 289-290, 292.
t The Problem.

EMERSON 93
He demonstrates nothing, but assumes his position far
in advance of mankind. This explains the treatment
he has met with.
Then in his writings there appears a love of beauty
in all its forms — in material nature, in art, litera
ture, and above all, in human life. He finds it every
where : " The frailest leaf, the mossy bark,
The acorn's cup, the raindrop's arc,
The swinging spider's silver line,
The ruby of the drop of wine,
The shining pebble of the pond
Thou inscribest with a bond,
In thy momentary play
Would bankrupt nature to repay.

" Oft, in streets or humblest places
I detect far-wandered graces,
Which, from Eden wide astray,
In lowly homes have lost their way." *
Few men have had a keener sense for this in com
mon Hfe, or so nice an eye for it in inanimate nature.
His writings do not disclose a very clear perception of
the beauty of animated nature; it is still life that he
describes, in water, plants, and the sky. He seldom
refers to the great cosmic forces of the world, that
are everywhere balanced into such systematic propor
tions, the perception of which makes the writings of
Alexander von Humboldt so attractive and delightful.
In all Emerson's works there appears a sublime con
fidence in man; a respect for human nature which we
have never seen surpassed, never equalled. Man is
only to be true to his nature, to plant himself on his in
stincts, and all will turn out weU:
* Ode to Beauty.

94 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" Build, therefore, your own world. As fast as you conform
your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its
great proportions. .A correspondent revolution in things will
attend the influx of the Spirit. So fast will disagreeable ap
pearances,— swine, spiders, snakes, pests, mad-houses, prisons,
enemies, vanish; they are temporary and shall be no more seen.
The sordor and filths of nature the sun shall dry up, and the
wind exhale. As when the summer comes from the south the
snow-banks melt, and the face of the earth becomes green
before it, so shall the advancing spirit create its ornaments
along its path, and carry with it the beauty it visits, and the
song which enchants it; it shall draw beautiful faces, and warm
hearts, and wise discourse, and heroic acts around its way,
until evil is no more seen. The kingdom of man over nature,
which cometh not with observation, — a dominion such as now
is beyond his dream of God, — he shall enter without more
wonder than the blind man feels who is gradually restored to
perfect sight." *
" Foolish hands may mix and mar,
Wise and sure the issues are."
He has also an absolute confidence in God. He has
been foolishly accused of pantheism, which sinks God in
nature ; but no man is further from it. He never sinks
God in man, he does not stop with the law, in matter or
morals, but goes back to the Lawgiver ; yet probably it
would not be so easy for him to give his definition of
God as it would be for most graduates at Andover or
Cambridge. With this confidence in God he looks
things fairly in the face, and never dodges, never fears.
Toil, sorrow, pain, — these are things which it is im
pious to fear. Boldly he faces every fact, never re
treating behind an institution or a great man. In
God his trust is complete ; with the severest scrutiny he
joins the highest reverence.
Hence come his calmness and serenity. He is evenly
balanced and at repose. A more tranquil spirit can-
* Centenary ed., Vol. 1, pp. 76-77.

EMERSON 95
not be found in literature. Nothing seems to fret or
jar him, and all the tossings of the literary world
never jostle him into anger or impatience. He goes
on like the stars above the noise and dust of earth,
as calm yet not so cold. No man says things more
terribly severe than he on many occasions ; few in
America have encountered such abuse, but in all his
writings there is not a line which can be referred to
ill-will. Impudence and terror are wasted on him ;
" upstart wealth's averted eye," which blasts the hope
of the politican, is powerless on him as on the piles of
granite in New Hampshire hills. Misconceived and
misreported, he does not wait to " unravel any man's
blunders ; he is again on his road, adding new powers
and honors to his domain, and new claims on the
heart." He takes no notice of the criticism from
which nothing but warning is to be had, warning
against bigotry and impudence; and goes on his way,
his only answer a creative act. Many shafts has he
shot, not an arrow in self-defence; not a line betrays
that he has been treated ill. This is small praise,
but rare ; even cool egotistic Goethe treated his " Philis
tine " critics with haughty scorn, comparing them to
dogs who bark in the court-yard when the master
mounts to ride:
"Es will der Spitz aus unserm Stall
Mit Bellen uns begleiten;
Allein der Hundes lauter Schall
Beweist nur dass wir reiten."
He lacks the power of orderly arrangements to a
remarkable degree. Not only is there no obvious
logical order, but there is no subtle psychological
method by which the several parts of an essay are
joined together; his deep sayings are jewels strung

96 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
wholly at random. This often confuses the reader;
this want appears the greatest defect of his mind. Of
late years there has been a marked effort to correct
it, and in regard to mere order there is certainly a
great improvement in the first series of Essays on
Nature, or rather formless book.
Then he is not creative like Shakspeare and Goethe,
perhaps not inventive like many far inferior men; he
seldom or never undertakes to prove anything. He
tells what he sees, seeing things by glimpses, not by
steady and continuous looking, he often fails of seeing
the whole object; he does not always see all of its
relations with other things. Hence comes an oc
casional exaggeration. But this is commonly corrected
by some subsequent statement. Thus he has seen
books imprison many a youth, and speaking to men,
desirous of warning them of their danger, he under
values the worth of books themselves. But the use he
makes of them in his own writings shows that this
statement was an exaggeration which his practical
judgment disapproves. Speaking to men whose chief
danger was that they should be bookworms, or me
chanical grinders at a logic-mill, he says that ecstasy
is the method of nature, but himself never utters any
thing " poor and extemporaneous ;" what he gets in his
ecstatic moments of inspiration he examines carefully
in his cool, reflective hours, and it is printed as re
flection, never as the simple result of ecstatic inspira
tion, having not only the stamp of Divine truth, but
the private mark of Emerson. He is never demonized
by his enthusiasm ; he possesses the spirit, it never pos
sesses him ; if " the God " comes into his rapt soul
" without bell," it is only with due consideration that
he communicates to the world the message that was

EMERSON 97
brought. Still he must regret that his extravagant
estimate of ecstasy, intuitive unconsciousness, has been
made and has led some youths and maids astray.
This mode of looking at things, and this want of
logical order, make him appear inconsistent. There
are actual and obvious contradictions in his works.
" Two sons of Priam in one chariot ride." Now he
is aU generosity and nobleness, shining like the sun
on things mean and low, and then he says, with a
good deal of truth but some exaggeration:
" Do not tell me of my obligation to put all poor men in
good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, thou foolish
philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent I
give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not
belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual
affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison, if
need be; but your miscellaneous popular charities; the educa
tion at college of fools; the building of meeting-houses to the
vain end to which many now stand, alms to sots, and the thou
sandfold Relief Societies; though I confess with shame I some
times succumb and give the dollar, it is a wicked dollar which
by-and-by I shall have the manhood to withhold."
Thus a certain twofoldness appears in his writings
here and there, but take them all together they form
a whole of marvellous consistency; take them in con
nection with his private character and life, we may
challenge the world to furnish an example of a fairer
and more consistent whole.
With the exceptions above stated there is a re
markable balance of intellectual faculties, of creative
and conservative, of the spontaneous and intuitive, and
the voluntary and reflective powers. He is a slave to
neither, aH are balanced into lovely proportions and
intellectual harmony. In many things Goethe Is
superior to Emerson — in fertility of invention, in a
wide acquaintance with men, in that intuitive per
il— 7

98 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ception of character which seems an instinct in some
men, in regular discipline of the understanding, in
hterary and artistic culture; but in general harmony
of the intellectual powers, and the steadiness of pur
pose which comes thereof, Emerson is incontestably
the superior even of the many-sided Goethe. He never
wastes his time on trifles ; he is too heavily fraught,
and lies so deep in the sea that a little flaw of wind
never drives him from his course. If we go a little
further and inquire how the other qualities are blended
with the intellectual, we find that the moral power
a little outweighs the intellectual, and the religious
is a little before the moral, as it should be, but the
affections seem to be less developed than the intellect.
There is no total balance of all the faculties to cor
respond with the harmony of his intellectual powers.
This seems to us the greatest defect in his entire being,
as lack of logical power is the chief defect in his intel
lect ; there is love enough for almost any man, not
enough to balance his intellect, his conscience, and his
faith in God. Hence there appears a certain coldness
in his ethics. He is a man running alone, and would
lead others to isolation, not society. Notwithstanding
his own intense individuality and his theoretic and
practical respect for individuality, still persons seem
of small value to him, of little value except as they
represent or help develop an idea of the intellect.
In this respect in his writings he is one-sided, and while
no one mental power has subdued another, yet his
intellect and conscience seem to enslave and belittle the
affections. Yet he never goes so far in this as Goethe,
who used men, and women too, as cattle to ride, as
food to eat. In Emerson's religious writings there
appears a worship of the infinite God far transcending

EMERSON 99
aH we find in Taylor or Edwards, in Fenelon or Chan-
ning; it is reverence, it is trust, the worship of the
conscience, of the inteUect ; it is obedience, the worship
of the wiU; it is not love, the worship of the affec
tions. No writer in our language is more rich in ideas,
none more suggestive of noble thought and noble life.
We wiU select the axioms which occur in a single
essay, which we take at random, that on Self-re
liance :
" It needs a divine man to exhibit anything divine."
" Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own
mind." " The virtue most in request is conformity. Self-reliance is
its aversion."
" No law can be sacred to me but that of my nature, the
only wrong what is against it."
" Truth is handsomer than the affectation of love."
" Your goodness must have some edge to it."
" Do your work and you shall reinforce yourself."
" A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
" To be great is to be misunderstood."
"Character teaches above our wills."
" Greatness always appeals to the future."
" The centuries are conspirators against the sanity and
majesty of the soul."
"If we live truly we shall see truly."
" It is as easy for the strong to be strong as it is for the
weak to be weak."
"When a man lives with God his voice shall be as sweet as
the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn.'"
" Virtue is the governor."
" Welcome evermore to gods and men is the self-helping
man." "Duty is our place, and the merry men of circumstance
should follow as they may."
" My giant goes with me wherever I go."
" It was in his own mind that the artist sought his model."
" That which each can do best none but his Maker can teach
him." "Every great man is an unique."

100 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of princi
ples." His works abound also with the most genial wit ; he
clearly sees and sharply states the halfnesses of things
and men, but his wit is never coarse, and wholly with
out that grain of malice so often the accompaniment
thereof. Let us now say a word of the artistic style and
rhetorical form of these remarkable books. Mr.
Emerson always gravitates towards first principles,
but never sets them in a row, groups them into a
system, or makes of them a whole. Hence the form of
all his prose writings is very defective, and much of
his rare power is lost. He never fires by companies,
nor even by platoons, only man by man ; nay, his
soldiers are never ranked into line, but stand scat
tered, sundered and individual, each serving on his
own account, and " fighting on his own hook." Things
are huddled and lumped together; diamonds, pearls,
bits of chalk and cranberries, thrown pell-meU to
gether. You can
" No joints and no contexture find,
Nor their loose parts to any method bring."
Here is a specimen of the Lucretian " fortuitous con
course of atoms," for things are joined by a casual
connection, or else by mere caprice. This is so in the
Orations, which were designed to be heard, not read,
where order is the more needful. His separate
thoughts are each a growth. Now and then it is so
with a sentence, seldom with a paragraph; but his
essay is always a piece of composition, carpentry, and
not growth.
Take any one of his volumes, the first series of

EMERSON 101
Essays, for example, the book does not make an or
ganic whole by itself, and so produce a certain totality
of impression. The separate essays are not arranged
with reference to any progress in the reader's mind,
or any consecutive development of the author's ideas.
Here are the titles of the several papers in their present
order: — History, Self -Reliance, Compensation, Spirit
ual Laws, Love, Friendship, Prudence, Heroism, The
Over-Soul, Circles, Intellect, Art. In each essay there
is the same want of organic completeness and orderly
distribution of the parts. There is no logical arrange
ment of the separate thoughts, which are subordinate
to the main idea of the piece. They are shot to
gether into a curious and disorderly mass of beauty,
like the colors in a kaleidoscope, not laid together like
the gems in a collection; still less grown into a whole
like the parts of a rose, where beauty of form, frag
rance, and color make up one whole of loveliness.
The lines he draws do not converge to one point;
there is no progress in his drama. Towards the end
the interest deepens, not from an artistic arrangement
of accumulated thoughts, but only because the author
finds his heart warmed by his efforts, and beating
quicker. Some artists produce their effect almost
wholly by form and outline, they sculpture with their
pencil, the Parcas of Michael Angelo is an example ; so
some writers discipline their pupils by the severity of
their intellectual method and scientific forms of
thought. Other artists have we known produce the
effect almost wholly by their coloring; the drawing
was bad, but the color of lip and eye, of neck and
cheek and hair, was perfect; the likeness all men saw,
and felt the impression. But the perfect artist will
be true to both, will keep the forms of things, and

102 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
only clothe them with appropriate hues. We know
some say that order belongs not to poetic minds, but
the saying is false. In all Milton's high poetic works
the form is perfect as the coloring ; this appears in the
grouping of the grand divisions of the Paradise Lost,
and in the arrangement of the smallest details in
L' Allegro and II Penseroso, and then the appropriate
hue of morning, of mid-day, or of night is thrown
upon the whole.
His love of individuality has unconsciously deprived
him of the grace of order; his orations or essays are
like a natural field; here is common grass, only with
him not half so common as wild roses and violets, for
his common grasses are flowers — and then rocks, then
trees, brambles, thorns, now flowers, now weeds, here
a decaying log with raspberry-bushes on the one side
and strawberry-vines on the other, and potentillas
creeping among them all. There are emmets and
wood-worms, earth-worms, slugs, grass-hoppers, and,
more obvious, sheep and oxen, and above and about
them, the brown thrasher, the hen-hawk, and the crow,
making a scene of beautiful and intricate confusion
which belongs to nature, not to human art.
His marked love of individuality appears in his
style. His thoughts are seldom vague, all is distinct;
the outlines are sharply drawn, things are always dis
crete from one another. He loves to particularize.
He talks not of flowers, but of the violet, the clover,
the cowslip and anemone; not of birds, but the nut
hatch, and the wren ; not of insects, but of the Volvex
Globator; not of men and maids, but of Adam, John,
and Jane. Things are kept from things, each sur
rounded by its own atmosphere. This gives great
distinctness and animation to his works, though lat-

EMERSON 103
terly he seems to imitate himself a little in this respect.
It is remarkable to what an extent this individual
ization is carried. The essays in his books are sep
arate, and stand apart from one another, only me
chanically bound by the Hds of the volume; his para
graphs in each essay are distinct and disconnected or
but loosely bound to one another, it is so with sentences
in the paragraph, and propositions in the sentence.
Take for example his essay on Experience; it is dis
tributed into seven parts, which treat respectively of
illusion, temperament, succession, surface, surprise,
reality, and subjectiveness. These seven brigadiers
are put in one army with as little unity of action as
any seven Mexican officers; not subject to one head,
nor fighting on the same side. The subordinates under
these generals are in no better order and discipline,
sometimes the corporal commands the king. But this
very lack of order gives variety of form. You can
never anticipate him. One half of the essay never
suggests the rest. If he have no order, he never sets
his method a going, and himself with his audience
goes to sleep, trusting that he, they, and the logical
conclusion will aU come out alive and waking at the
last. He trusts nothing to the discipline of his camp;
aH to the fidelity of the individual soldiers.
His style is one of the rarest beauty; there is no
effectation, no conceit, no effort at effect. He alludes
to everybody and imitates nobody. No writer that
we remember, except Jean Paul Richter, is so rich in
beautiful imagery; there are no blank waHs in his
building. But Richter's temple of poesy is a Hindoo
pagoda, — rich, elaborate, of costly stone, adorned
with costly work, but as a whole, rather grotesque
than sublime, and more queer than beautiful; you

104 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
wonder how any one could have brought such wealth
together, and still more that any one could combine
things so oddly together. Emerson builds a rambling
Gothic church with an irregular outline, a chapel here,
and a tower there, you do not see why; but all parts
are beautiful, and the whole constrains the soul to
love and trust. His manifold images come from his
own sight, not from the testimony of other men. His
words are pictures of the things daguerreotyped from
nature. Like Homer, Aristotle, and Tacitus, he de
scribes the thing, and not the effect of the thing. This
quality he has in common with the great writers of
classic antiquity, while his wealth of sentiment puts
him with the classics of modern times. Like Burke
he lays all literature under contribution, and presses
the facts of every-day life into his service. He seems
to keep the sun and moon as his retainers, and levy
black-mail on the cricket and the titmouse, on the
dawdling preacher and the snow-storm which seemed
'to rebuke his unnatural whine. His works teem with
beauty. Take for example this:
" What do we wish to know of any worthy person so much as
how he has sped in the history of this sentiment? [Love.] What
books in the circulating libraries circulate? How we glow over
these novels of passion when the story is told with any spark of
truth and nature ! And what fastens attention in the inter
course of life like any passion betraying affection between two
parties? Perhaps we never saw them before, and never shall
meet them again. But we see them exchange a glance, or be
tray a deep emotion, and we are no longer strangers. We un
derstand them, and take the warmest interest in the develop
ment of the romance. All mankind love a lover. The earliest
demonstrations of complacency and kindness are nature's most
winning pictures. It is the dawn of civility and grace in the
coarse and rustic. The rude village boy teases the girls about
the school-house door; but to-day he comes running into the
entry, and meets one fair child arranging her satchel, he holds
her books to help her, and instantly it seems to him as if she

EMERSON 105
removed herself from him infinitely, and was a sacred precinct.
Among the throng of girls he runs rudely enough, but one
alone distances him: and these two little neighbors that were
so close just now have learnt to respect each other's person
ality. Or who can avert his eyes from the engaging, half-artful,
half-artless ways of school girls who go into the country shops
to buy a skein of silk or a sheet of paper, and talk half an
hour about nothing with the broad-faced, good-natured shop-
boy. In the village they are on a perfect equality, which love
delights in, and without any coquetry the happy, affectionate
nature of woman flows out in this pretty gossip. The girls may
have little beauty, yet plainly do they establish between them
and the good boy the most agreeable, confiding relations, what
with their fun and their earnest, about Edgar, and Jonas, and
Almira, and who was invited to the party, and who danced at
the dancing-school, and when the singing-school would begin,
and other nothings concerning which the parties cooed. By-
and-by that boy wants a wife, and very truly and heartily will
he know where to find a sincere and sweet mate, without any
risk such as Milton deplores as incident to scholars and great
men." " The passion re-makes the world for the youth, lt makes all
things alive and significant. Nature grows conscious. Every
bird on the boughs of the tree sings now to his heart and soul.
Almost the notes are articulate. The clouds have faces as he
looks on them. The trees of the forest, the waving grass and
the peeping flowers have grown intelligent; and almost he fears
to trust them with the secret which they seem to invite. Yet
nature soothes and sympathizes. In the green solitude he finds
a dearer home than with men."
" Behold there in the wood the fine madman ! He is a palace
of sweet sounds and sights, he dilates, he is twice a man, he
walks with arms akimbo, he soliloquizes, he accosts the grass
and the trees; he feels the blood of the violet, the clover, and
the lily in his veins, and he talks with the brook that wets his
foot." Emerson is a great master of language; therewith
he sculptures, therewith he paints; he thunders and
lightens in his speech, and in his speech also he sings.
In Greece, Plato and Aristophanes were mighty mast
ers of the pen, and have not left their equals in ancient
Hterary art ; so in Rome were Virgil and Tacitus ; four

106 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
men so marked in individuality, so unlike and withal
so skilful in the use of speech, it were not easy to
find; four mighty masters of the art to write. In
later times there have been in England Shakespeare,
Bacon, Milton, Taylor, Swift, and Carlyle; on the
Continent, Voltaire, Rousseau, and Goethe ; all masters
in this art, skilful to work in human speech. Each of
them possessed some qualities which Emerson has not.
In Bacon, Milton, and Carlyle, there is a majesty, a
dignity and giant strength, not to be claimed for him.
Yet separating the beautiful from what men call sub
lime, no one of all that we have named, ancient or
modern, has passages so beautiful as he. From what
is called sublime if we separate what is simply vast, or
merely grand, or only wide, it is in vain that we seek
in all those men for anything to rival Emerson.
Take the following passage, and it is not possible,
we think, to find its equal for the beautiful and the
sublime in any tongue:
" The lovers delight in endearments, in avowals of love, in
comparisons of their regards. When alone, they solace them
selves with the remembered image of the other. Does that
other see the same star, the same melting cloud, read the same
book, feel the same emotion that now delight me? They try
and weigh their affection, and adding up all costly advantages, —
friends, opportunities, properties, exult in discovering that will
ingly, joyfully, they would give all as a ransom for the beau
tiful, the beloved head, not one hair of which shall be harmed.
But the lot of humanity is on these children. Danger, sor
row, and pain arrive to them as to all. Love prays. It makes
covenants with Eternal Power, in behalf of this dear mate.
The union which is thus effected, and which adds a new value
to every atom in nature, for it transmutes every thread
throughout the whole web of relation into a golden ray, and
bathes the soul in a new and sweeter element, is yet a tempo
rary state. Not always can flowers, pearls, poetry, protesta
tions, nor even home in another heart, content the awful soul
that dwells in clay. It arouses itself at last from these en-

EMERSON 107
dearments as toys, and puts on the harness, and aspires to
vast and universal aims. The soul which is in the soul of each,
craving for a perfect beatitude, detects incongruities, defects,
and disproportion in the behavior of the other. Hence arise
surprise, expostulation, and pain. Yet that which drew them
to each other was signs of loveliness, signs of virtue; and these
virtues are there, however eclipsed. They appear and reappear,
and continue to attract; but the regard changes, quits the sign,
and attaches to the substance. This repairs the wounded af
fection. Meantime, as life wears on, it proves a game of per
mutation and combination of all possible positions of the par
ties, to extort all the resources of each, and acquaint each with
the whole strength and weakness of the other. For it is the
nature and end of this relation, that they should represent the
human race to each other. All that is in the world which is or
ought to be known is cunningly wrought into the texture of
man, of woman. " The person love does to us fit,
Like manna, has the taste of all in it."
" The world rolls, the circumstances vary every hour. All the
angels that inhabit this temple of the body appear at the win
dows, and all the gnomes and vices also. By all the virtues they
are united. If there be virtue, all the vices are known as such;
they confess and flee. Their once flaming regard is sobered by
time in either breast, and losing in violence what it gains in
extent, it becomes a thorough good understanding. They re
sign each other without complaint to the good offices which
jnan and woman are severally appointed to discharge in time,
and exchange the passion which once could not lose sight of its
object for a cheerful disengaged furtherance, whether present
or absent, of each other's designs. At last they discover that
all which at first drew them together, — those once sacred
features, that magical play of charms, was deciduous, had a
prospective end, like the scaffolding by which the house was
built; and the purification of the intellect and the heart, from
year to year, is the real marriage, foreseen and prepared from
the first, and wholly above their consciousness. Looking at these
aims with which two persons, a man and a woman, so variously
and correlatively gifted, are shut up in one house to spend in
the nuptial society forty or fifty years, I do not wonder at
the emphasis with which the heart prophesies this crisis from
early infancy, at the profuse beauty with which the instincts
deck the nuptial bower, and nature and intellect and art emu-

108 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
late each other in the gifts and the melody they bring to the
epithalamium. " Thus are we put in training for a love which knows not sex,
nor person, nor partiality, but which seeketh virtue and wisdom
everywhere, to the end of increasing virtue and wisdom. We
are by nature observers, and thereby learners. That is our per
manent state. But we are often made to feel that our af
fections are but tents of a night. Though slowly and with pain,
the objects of the affections change, as the objects of thought
do. There are moments when the affections rule and absorb
the man, and make his happiness dependent on a person or
persons. But in health the mind is presently seen again, its
overarching vault, bright with galaxies of immutable lights,
and the warm loves and fears that swept over us as clouds,
must lose their finite character, and blend with God to attain
their own perfection. But we need not fear that we can lose
anything by the progress of the soul. The soul may be trusted
to the end. That which is so beautiful and attractive as these
relations must be succeeded and supplanted only by what is
more beautiful, and so on for ever."
We can now only glance at the separate works
named above. His Mature is more defective in form
than any of his pieces, but rich in beauty; a rare
prose poem is it, a book for one's bosom. The first
series of Essays contains the fairest blossoms and
fruits of his genius. Here his wondrous mind reveals
itself in its purity, its simplicity, its strength, and its
beauty too. The second series of Essays is inferior
to the first ; the style is perhaps clearer, but the water
is not so deep. He seems to let himself down to the
capacity of his hearers. Yet there is an attempt at
order which is seldom successful, and reminds one of
the order in which figures are tattooed upon the skin
of a South Sea Islander, rather than of the organic
symmetry of limbs or bones. He sets up a scaffold,
not a living tree, a scaffold, too, on which none but
himself can walk.
Some of his Orations and Addresses are noble ef-

EMERSON 109
forts ; old as the world is, and much and long as men
are given to speak, it is but rare in human history
that such Sermons on the Mount get spoken as the
Address to the Students of Theology, and that before
the Phi Beta Kappa at Cambridge. They are words
of lofty cheer.
The last book, on " Representative Men," does not
come up to the first Essays, neither in matter nor in
manner. Yet we know not a man, living and speaking
EngHsh, that could have written one so good. The
lecture on Plato contains exaggerations not usual
with Emerson ; it fails to describe the man by genus or
species. He gives you neither the principles nor the
method of Plato, not even his conclusions. Nay, he
does not give you the specimens to judge by. The
article in the last classical dictionary or the History
of Philosophy for the French Normal Schools gives
you a better' account of the philosopher and the man.
The lecture on Swedenborg is a masterly appreciation
of that great man, and to our way of thinking the
best criticism that has yet appeared. He appreciates
but does not exaggerate him. The same may be said
of that upon Montaigne; those on Shakspeare and
Goethe are adequate and worthy of the theme. In
the lecture on Napoleon it is surprising that not a
word is said of his greatest faculty, his legislative,
organizing power, for we cannot but think with
Carlyle, that he " will be better known for his laws
than his battles." But the other talents of Napoleon
are sketched with a faithful hand, and his faults justly
dealt with, not enlarged, but not hid; though, on the
whole, it seems to us, no great admirers of Napoleon,
that he is a little undervalued.
We must briefly notice Mr. Emerson's volume of

110 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Poems. He has himself given us the standard by
which to try him, for he thus defines and describes
the poet:
" The sign and credentials of the poet are, that he announces
that which no man foretold. He is the true and only doctor; he
knows and tells; he is the only teller of news, for he was pres
ent and privy to the appearance which he describes. He is a
beholder of ideas, and an utterer of the necessary and causal.
For we do not speak now of men of poetical talents, or of in
dustry and skill in metre, but of the true poet. I took part in
a conversation the other day, concerning a recent writer of
lyrics, a man of subtle mind, whose head appeared to be a
music box of delicate tunes and rhythms, and whose skill and
command of language we could not sufficiently praise. But
when the question arose whether he was not only a lyrist, but
a poet, we were obliged to confess that he is plainly a contem
porary, not an eternal man. He does not stand out of our low
limitations like a Chimborazo under the line, running up from
the torrid base through all the climates of the globe, with belts
of the herbage of every latitude on its high and mottled sides;
but this genius is the landscape-garden of a modern house,
adorned with fountains and statues, with well-bred men and
women standing and sitting in the walks and terraces. We
hear through all the varied music the ground tone of conven
tional life. Our poets are men of talents who sing, and not the
children of music. The argument is secondary, the finish of
the verses is primary.
" For, it is not metres, but a metre-making argument, that
makes a poem, — a thought so passionate and alive, that, like
the spirit of a plant or an animal, it has an architecture of
its own, and adorns nature with a new thing. The thought and
the form are equal in the order of time, but in the order of
genesis the thought is prior to the form. The poet has a new
thought, he has a whole new experience to unfold; he will tell
us how it was with him, and all men will be the richer in his
fortune." *
It is the office of the poet, he tells us, " by the
beauty of things " to announce " a new and higher
beauty. Nature offers all her creatures to him as a
picture language." " The poorest experience is rich
* Centenary ed., Vol. 3, pp. 8-10.

EMERSON 111
enough for all the purposes of expressing thought;"
" the world being put under the mind for verb and
noun, the poet is he who can articulate it ;" he " turns
the world to glass, and shows us all things in their
right series and proportions." For through that
better perception " he stands one step nearer things,
and sees the flowing or metamorphosis, perceives that
thought is multiform; that within the form of every
creature is a force impelling it to ascend into a higher
form, and, foHowing with his eyes the life, uses the
forms which express that life, and so his speech flows
with the flowing of nature." " The poet alone knows
astronomy, chemistry, vegetation, and animation, for
he does not stop at these facts, but employs them as
signs." " This insight, which expresses itself by what is called imagina
tion, is a very high sort of seeing, which does not come by
study, but by the intellect being where and what it sees, by
sharing the path or circuit of things through forms, and so
making them translucid to others. The path of things is silent.
Will they suffer » speaker to go with them? A spy they will
not suffer; a lover, a poet, is the transcendency of their own
nature, him they will suffer. The condition of true naming, on
the poet's part, is his resigning himself to the divine aura which
breathes through forms, and accompanying that.
" It is a secret which every intellectual man quickly learns,
that beyond the energy of his possessed and conscious intellect
he is capable of a new energy (as of an intellect doubled on
itself), by abandonment to the nature of things; that beside
his privacy of power as an individual man there is a great
public power, on which he can draw by unlocking, at all risks,
his human doors, and suffering the ethereal tides to roll and
circulate through him; then he is caught up into the life of the
Universe, his speech is thunder, his thought is law, and his
words are universally intelligible as the plants and animals.
The poet knows that he speaks adequately, then, only when he
speaks somewhat wildly, or, 'with the flower of the mind;' not
with the intellect, used as an organ, but with the intellect re
leased from all service, and suffered to take its direction from
its celestial life; or, as the ancients were wont to express them-

112 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
selves, not with intellect alone, but with the intellect inebriated
by nectar. As the traveller who has lost his way, throws his
reins on his horse's neck, and trusts to the instinct of the ani
mal to find his road, so we must do with the divine animal who
carries us through this world. For if in any manner we can
stimulate this instinct, new passages are opened for us into na
ture, the mind flows into and through things hardest and high
est, and the metamorphosis is possible." *
In reading criticisms on Emerson's poetry one is
sometimes reminded of a passage in Pepys' Diary,
where that worthy pronounces judgment on some of
the works of Shakspeare. Perhaps it may be thought
an appropriate introduction to some strictures of our
own. "Aug. 20th, 1666. To Deptford by water, reading Othello,
Moor of Venice, which I have heretofore esteemed a mighty
good play, but having so lately read the Adventures of Five
Hours, it seems a mean thing. Sept. 29th, 1662. To the King's
Theater, where we saw Midsummer Night's Dream, which I had
never seen before, nor shall ever again, for . it is the most in
sipid and ridiculous play that ever I saw in my life."
Emerson is certainly one
" Quem tu, Melpomene, semel
Nascentem placido lumine videris;
Spissse nemorum comae
Fingent jEolio carmine nobilem."
Yet his best poetry is in his prose, and his poorest,
thinnest, and least musical prose is in his poems.
The " Ode of Beauty " contains some beautiful
thoughts in a fair form:
"Who gave thee, O Beauty,
The keys of this breast, —
Too credulous lover
Of blest and unblest?
Say, when in lapsed ages
Thee knew I of old?
* Centenary ed., Vol. 3, pp. 26-27.

EMERSON 113
Or what was the service
For which I was sold?
When first my eyes saw thee,
I found me thy thrall,
By magical drawings
Sweet tyrant of all!
I drank at thy fountain
False waters of thirst;
Thou intimate stranger,
Thou latest and first!
Thy dangerous glances
Make women of men;
New-born, we are melting
Into nature again."
The three pieces which seem the most perfect poems,
both in matter and form, are the " Problem," from
which we have already given liberal extracts above;
" Each in all," which, however, is certainly not a
great poem, but simple, natural, and beautiful; and
the " Sphinx," which has higher merits than the
others, and is a poem of a good deal of beauty. The
Sphinx is the creation of the old classic mythology.
But her question is whoUy modern, though she has been
waiting so long for the seer to solve it that she has
become drowsy.
This is her problem: " The fate of the man-child; ^
The meaning of man."
All the material and animal world is at peace:
" Erect as a sunbeam
Upspringeth the palm;
The elephant browses,
Undaunted and calm;
In beautiful motion
The thrush plies his wings;
Kind leaves of his covert,
Your silence he sings.
....
II— 8

114 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" Sea, earth, air, sound, silence,
Plant, quadruped, bird,
By one music enchanted,
One deity stirred, —
Each the other adorning,
Accompany still;
Night veileth the morning,
The vapor the hill."
In his early age man shares the peace of the world:
The babe by its mother
Lies bathed in joy;
Glide its hours uncounted, —
The sun is its toy;
Shines the peace of all being
Without cloud, in its eyes;
And the sum of the world
In soft miniature lies."
But when the child becomes a man he is ill at ease:
" But man crouches and blushes,
Absconds and conceals;
He creepeth and peepeth,
He palters and steals;
Infirm, melancholy,
Jealous glancing around,
An oaf, an accomplice,
He poisons the ground."
Mother Nature complains of his condition :
"Who has drugged my boy's cup?
Who has mixed my boy's bread?
Who, with sadness and madness,
Has turned the man-child's head?"io
The Sphinx wishes to know the meaning of all this.
A poet answers that this is no mystery to him; man
is superior to nature, and its unconscious and in
voluntary happiness is not enough for him; superior
to the events of his own history, so the joy which he
has attained is always unsatisfactory:

EMERSON 115
"The fiend that man harries
Is love of the best;
Yawns the pit of the dragon,
Lit by rays from the blest.
The Lethe of nature
Can't trance him again,
Whose soul sees the perfect,
Which his eyes seek in vain.
" Profounder, profounder,
Man's spirit must dive;
To his aye-rolling orbit
No goal will arrive; "
The heavens that now draw him
With sweetness untold,
Once found, — for new heavens
He spurneth the old."
Even sad things turn out well:
"Pride ruined the angels,
Their shame them restores;
And the joy that is sweetest
Lurks in stings of remorse." 12
Thus the riddle is solved, then the Sphinx turns into
beautiful things: " Uprose the merry sphinx,
And crouched no more in stone;
She melted into purple cloud,
She silvered in the moon;
She spired into a yellow flame;
She flowered in blossoms red;
She flowed into a foaming wave;
She stood Monadnoc's head."
We pass over the Threnody, where " well-sung
woes " might soothe a " pensive ghost." The Dirge
contains some stanzas that are full of nature and well
expressed :
"Knows he who tills this lonely field,
To reap its scanty corn,

116 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
What mystic fruit his acres yield
At midnight and at morn?

" The winding Concord gleamed below,
Pouring as wide a flood
As when my brothers, long ago,
' Came with me to the wood.
" But they are gone — the holy ones
Who trod with me this lovely vale;
The strong, star-bright companions
Are silent, low, and pale.
"My good, my noble, in their prime,
Who made this world the feast it was,
Who learned with me the lore of time,
Who loved this dwelling-place!
"I touch this flower of silken leaf,
Which once our childhood knew;
Its soft leaves wound me with a grief
Whose balsam never > grew.
" Hearken to yon pine-warbler
Singing aloft in the tree!
Hearest thou, O traveller,
What he singeth to me?
"Not unless God made sharp thine ear
With sorrow such as mine,
Out of that delicate lay could'st thou
Its heavy tale divine.
"'Go, lonely man,' it saith;
'They loved thee from their birth;
Their hands were pure, and pure their faith,-
There are no such hearts on earth.

"Ye cannot unlock your heart,
The key is gone with them;
The silent organ loudest chants
The master's requiem.' "

EMERSON 117
Here is a Httle piece which has seldom been equalled
in depth and beauty of thought ; yet it has sometimes
been complained of as obscure, we see not why :
TO RHEA.
"Thee, dear friend, a brother soothes,
Not with flatteries, but truths,
Which tarnish not, but purify
To light which dims the morning's eye.
I have come from the spring-woods,
From the fragrant solitudes;
Listen what the poplar-tree
And murmuring waters counselled me.
"If with love thy heart has burned;
If thy love is unreturned;
Hide thy grief within thy breast,
Though it tear thee unexpressed;
For when love has once departed
From the eyes of the false-hearted,
And one by one has torn off quite
The bandages of purple light;
Though thou wert the loveliest
Form the soul had ever dressed,
Thou shalt seem, in each reply,
A vixen to his altered eye;
Thy softest pleadings seem too bold,
Thy praying lute will seem to scold;
Though thou kept the straightest road,
Yet thou errest far and broad.
"But thou shalt do as do the gods
In their cloudless periods;
For of this lore be thou sure, —
Though thou forget, the gods, secure,
Forget never their command,
But make the statute of this land.
As they lead, so follow all,
Ever have done, ever shall.
Warning to the blind and deaf,
'Tis written on the iron leaf,
Who drinks of Cupid's nectar cup
Loveth downward, and not wp;

118 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Therefore, who loves, of gods or men,"
Shall not by the same be loved again;
His sweetheart's idolatry
Falls, in turn, a new degree.
When a god is once beguiled
By beauty of a mortal child,
And by her radiant youth delighted,
He is not fooled, but warily knoweth
His love shall never be requited.
And thus the wise Immortal doethf—
'Tis his study and delight
To bless that creature day and night;
From all evils to defend her;
In her lap to pour all splendor;
To ransack earth for riches rare,
And fetch her stars to deck her hair;
He mixes music with her thoughts,
And saddens her with heavenly doubts:
All grace, all good his great heart knows,
Profuse in love, the king bestows:
Saying, ' Hearken ! earth, sea, air !
This monument of my despair
Build I to the All-Good, All-Fair.
Not for a private good,
But I, from my beatitude,
Albeit scorn'd as none was scorn'd,
Adorn her as was none adorned.
I make this maiden an ensample
To Nature, through her kingdoms ample,
Whereby to model newer races,
Statelier forms, and fairer faces;
To carry man to new degrees
Of power, and of comeliness.
These presents be the hostages
Which I pawn for my release.
See to thyself, O Universe!
Thou art better, and not worse.' —
And the god, having given all,
Is freed for ever from his thrall."
Several of the other pieces are poor; some are stiff
and rude, having no lofty thoughts to atone for their
unlovely forms. Some have quaint names, which
seem given to them out of mere caprice. Such are

EMERSON 119
the following: Mithridates, Hamatreya, Hermione,
Merlin, Merops, &c.14 These names are not more de
scriptive of the poems they are connected with than
are Jonathan and Eleazer of the men thus baptized.
What have Astrea, Rhea, and Etienne de la Boece to
do with the poems which bear their names?
We should think the following lines, from Hermione,
were written by some of the youngest Emersonidaj:
" Once I dwelt apart,
Now I live with all;
As shepherd's lamp on far hill-side
Seems, by the traveller espied,
A door into the mountain heart,
So didst thou quarry and unlock
Highways for me through the rock.
" Now, deceived, thou wanderest
In strange lands unblest;
And my kindred come to soothe me.
Southwind is my next of blood;
He has come through fragrant wood,
Drugged with spice from climates warm,
And in every twinkling glade,
And twilight nook,
Unveils thy form.
Out of the forest way
Forth paced it yesterday;
And when I sat by the watercourse,
Watching the daylight fade,
It throbbed up from the brook."
Such things are unworthy of such a master.
Here is a passage which we wiH not attempt to
criticise. He is speaking of Love:
" He will preach like a friar
And jump like a harlequin;
He will read like a crier,
And fight like a Paladin," &c*
* Centenary ed., Vol. 9, p. 108.

120 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Good Homer sometimes nodded, they say ; but when
he went fast asleep, he did not write lines or print
them. Here is another specimen. It is Monadnoc that
speaks : " Anchor'd fast for many an age,
I await the bard and sage,
Who, in large thoughts, like fair pearl-seed,
Shall string Monadnoc like a bead."
And yet another: " For the present, hard
Is the fortune of the bard."
" In the woods he travels glad,
Without bitter fortune mad,
Melancholy without bad."
We have seen imitations of this sort of poetry
which even surpassed the original. It does not seem
possible that Emerson can write such stuff simply
from " lacking the accomplishment of verse." Is it
that he has a false theory, and so wilfully writes in-
numerous verse, and plays his harp, all jangling and
thus out of tune? Certainly it seems so. In his
poems he uses the old mythology, and in bad taste;
talks of gods, and not God — of Pan, the Oreads,
Titan, Jove, and Mars, the Parcas and the Daemon.
There are three elaborate poems which demand a
word of notice. The " Woodnotes " contains some
good thoughts, and some pleasing lines, but on the
whole a pine tree which should talk like Mr. Emerson's
pine ought to be plucked up by the roots and cast into
the depths of the sea. " Monadnoc " is the title of
another piece which appears forced and unnatural, as
well as poor and weak. The third is called " initial,
daemonic, and celestial love." It is not without good

EMERSON 121
thoughts, and here and there a good line, but in every
attribute of poetry it is far inferior to his majestic
essay on Love. In his poetry Mr. Emerson often loses
his command of language, metaphors fail him, and the
magnificent images which adorn and beautify all his
prose works are gone.
From what has been said, notwithstanding the
faults we have found in Emerson, it is plain that we
assign him a very high rank in the literature of man
kind. He is a very extraordinary man. To no Eng
lish writer since Milton can we assign so high a place ;
even Milton himself, great genuis though he was, and
great architect of beauty, has not added so many
thoughts to the treasury of the race ; no, nor been the
author of so much loveliness. Emerson is a man of
genius such as does not often appear, such as has
never appeared before in America, and but seldom in
the world. He learns from all sorts of men, but no
English writer, we think, is so original. We sincerely
lament the want of logic in his method, and his exag
geration of the intuitive powers, the unhappy con
sequences of which we see in some of his followers and
admirers. They wiU be more faithful than he to
the false principle which he lays down, and will think
themselves wise because they do not study, learned be
cause they are ignorant of books, and inspired because
they say what outrages common sense. In Emerson's
poetry there is often a ruggedness and want of finish
which seems wilful in a man like him. This fault is
very obvious in those pieces he has put before his
several essays. Sometimes there is a seed-corn of
thought in the piece, but the piece itself seems like a
pile of rubbish shot out of a cart which hinders the
seed from germinating. His admirers and imitators

122 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
not unfrequently give us only the rubbish and proba
bly justify themselves by the example of their master.
Spite of these defects, Mr. Emerson on the whole
speaks with a holy power which no other man pos
sesses who now writes the Enghsh tongue. Others
have more readers, are never sneered at by respect
able men, are oftener praised in the journals, have
greater weight in the pulpits, the cabinets, and the
councils of the nation; but there is none whose words
so sink into the mind and heart of young men and
maids, none who work so powerfuUy to fashion the
character of the coming age. Seeing the power which
he exercises, and the influence he is likely to have on
generations to come, we are jealous of any fault in
his matter, or its form, and have allowed no private
and foolish friendship to hinder us from speaking of
his faults.
This is his source of strength, his inteHectual and
moral sincerity. He looks after truth, justice, and
beauty. He has not uttered a word that is false to
his own mind or conscience ; has not suppressed a word
because he thought it too high for men's comprehen
sion, and therefore dangerous to the repose of men.
He never compromises. He sees the chasm between
the ideas which come of man's nature and the institu
tions which represent only his history ; he does not seek
to cover up the chasm which daily grows wider be
tween truth and public opinion, between justice and
the state, between Christianity and the church ; he does
not seek to fill it up, but he asks men to step over
and build institutions commensurate with their ideas.
He trusts himself, trusts man, and trusts God. He
has confidence in all the attributes of infinity. Hence
he is serene; nothing disturbs the even poise of his

EMERSON 123
character, and he walks erect. Nothing impedes him
in his search for the true, the lovely, and the good;
no private hope, no private fear, no love of wife or
child, of gold, or ease, or fame. He never seeks his
own reputation ; he takes care of his being, and leaves
his seeming to take care of itself. Fame may seek
him; he never goes out of his way a single inch for
her. He has not written a line which is not conceived in
the interest of mankind. He never writes in the in
terest of a section, of a party, of a church, of a man,
always in the interest of mankind. Hence comes the
ennobling influence of his works. Most of the literary
men of America, most of the men of superior educa
tion, represent the ideas and interest of some party ; in
all that concerns the welfare of the human race they
are proportionably behind the mass who have only the
common culture, so while the thought of the people is
democratic, putting man before the accidents of a man,
the Hterature of the nation is aristocratic, and opposed
to the welfare of mankind. Emerson belongs to the
exceptional literature of the times ; and while his cul
ture joins him to the history of man, his ideas and his
whole Hfe enable him to represent also the nature of
man, and so to write for the future. He is one of the
rare exceptions amongst our educated men, and helps
redeem American literature from the reproach of imi
tation, conformity, meanness of aim, and hostility to
the progress of mankind. No faithful man is too
low for his approval and encouragement ; no faithless
man too high and popular for his rebuke.
A good test of the comparative value of books is
the state they leave you in. Emerson leaves you tran
quil, resolved on noble manhood, fearless of the con-

124 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
sequences ; he gives men to mankind, and mankind to
the laws of God. His position is a striking one.
Eminently a child of Christianity and of the American
idea, he is out of the church and out of the state. In
the midst of Calvinistic and Unitarian superstition, he
does not fear God, but loves and trusts him. He does
not worship the idols of our time — wealth and re
spectability, the two calves set up by our modern
Jeroboam. He fears not the damnation these idols
have the power to inflict, neither poverty nor social
disgrace. In busy and bustling New England comes
out this man serene and beautiful as a star, and shining
like " a good deed in a naughty world." Reproached
as an idler, he is active as the sun, and pours out his
radiant truth on lyceums at Chelmsford, at Waltham,
at Lowell, and all over the land. Out of a cold Uni
tarian church rose this most lovely light. Here is
Boston, perhaps the most humane city in America,
with its few noble men and women, its beautiful chari
ties, its material vigor, and its hardy enterprise; com
mercial Boston, where honor is weighed in the public
scales, and justice reckoned by the dollars it brings;
conservative Boston, the grave of the Revolution, wal
lowing in its wealth, yet grovelling for more, seeking
only money, careless of justice, stuffed with cotton yet
hungry for tariffs, sick with the greedy worm of
avarice, loving money as the end of life, and bigots
as the means of preserving it ; Boston, with toryism in
its parlors, toryism in its pulpits, toryism in its press,
itself a tory town, preferring the accidents of man to
man himself, and amidst it all there comes Emerson,
graceful as Phoebus-Apollo, fearless and tranquil as
the sun he was supposed to guide, and pours down the
enchantment of his light, which faUs where'er it may,

EMERSON 125
on dust, on diamonds, on decaying heaps to hasten
their rapid rot, on seeds new sown to quicken their
ambitious germ, on virgin minds of youths and maids
to waken the natural seed of nobleness therein, and
make it grow to beauty and to manliness. Such is the
beauty of his speech, such the majesty of his ideas,
such the power of the moral sentiment in men, and
such the impression which his whole character makes
on them, that they lend him, everywhere, their ears,
and thousands bless his manly thoughts.

Ill
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
It is now six years since William Ellery Channing,
ceasing to be mortal, passed on to his rest and his re
ward. We have waited impatiently for the publica
tion of his memoirs, that we might " beg a hair of him
for memory." They are now before us — three well-
printed volumes, mainly filled up with his own writings,
letters, extracts from journals, sermons, and various pa
pers hitherto kept from the press. As a pubhc speaker
and a popular writer he was well known before;
these volumes show us not merely the minister and the
author, but the son, husband, father, and friend. If
they reveal nothing new in his character, we have yet
in them ample materials for ascertaining whence came
his influence and his power. What estimate shall we
make of the man, and what lesson draw from his life
and works? These are matters worth considering, but
before answering the question, let us look a little at
the opportunities afforded him by his profession.
The church and state are two conspicuous and im
portant forms of popular action. The state is an
institution which represents man in his relations with
man ; the church, man in his relations with man and
God. These institutions, varying in their modifica
tions, have always been and must be, as they represent
two modes of action that are constant in the human
race, and come from the imperishable nature of man.
In each of these modes of action the people have their
126

CHANNING 127
servants, — politicians, the servants of the state, and
clergymen, the servants of the church.
Now the clergymen may be a priest or a minister,
the choice depending on his character and abiHty.
The same distinctions are noticeable in the servants of
the state, where we have the priest of politics and the
minister of politics. We wiU pass over the priest.
The business of the minister is to become a spiritual
guide to men, to instruct by his wisdom, elevate by his
goodness, refine and strengthen by his piety, to inspire
by his whole soul, to serve and to lead by going be
fore them all his days with all his life, a pillar of cloud
by day, of fire by night. The good shepherd giveth
his life to his sheep as well as for them. The minister
aims to be, to do, and to suffer, in special for his own
particular parish, but also and in general for mankind
at large. He proposes for himself this end, the eleva
tion of mankind, — their physical elevation to health,
comfort, abundance, skill, and beauty ; their intellectual
elevation to thought, refinement, and wisdom; their
moral and religious elevation to goodness and piety,
tiU they aU become sons of God also, and prophets.
However, his direct and main business is to promote
the spiritual growth of men, helping them to love one
another, and to love God.
His means to this end are, in general, the common
weapons of the church. To him the Sunday is a high
day, for it is the great day of work, when he comes
into close relations with men, to instruct the mind, to
warn in the name of conscience, gently arousing the
affections, kindling the religious emotions, and sc con
tinuing his Father's work; the meeting-house, chapel,
or church, is the great place for his work, and so, like
the Sunday, it is holy to him, both invested with a cer-

128 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
tain sanctity, as to the pious farmer or smith, the
plough or the hammer seems a sacred thing. The
Bible, the service-book, the traditions he appeals to, the
sacramental ordinances he uses, all are means, but not
ends, helps to whom they help, but nothing more, their
sanctity derivative, not of them but of the use they
serve. In our day the press offers him its aid, and
stands ready to distribute his thought among the mil
lions of mankind. By means of that he gradually gets
beyond the bounds of his parish, rural or metropolitan,
and if God has so gifted him has whole nations for his
audience, and long after his death, his word wiU circu
late among the nations a word of power and blessed
ness. The minister finds a certain respect paid to the
clergyman. This is not a thing that is new, but old,
hallowed, and slowly fading out of the consciousness
of the nations. This traditional respect gives him a
certain position and influence, and enables him at once
to anticipate and claim a place which is granted to
other classes of men only as the result of long Hfe
and faithful work. He finds a pulpit erected for him,
an audience gathered, respectful and disposed to Hsten
and gratefully to receive whatever good he has to
offer. While the priest uses this position and tra
ditional respect to elevate himself, to take his ease in
his inn, to keep men still, the minister uses it to help
men forward; not to elevate himself, but them. The
pulpit is his place to stand on and move the world.
It is not to be denied that even now, in incredulous
America, the calling of a clergyman gives a man a
good opportunity for power, for a real, serious, and
lasting influence, or it gives him the best chance for a
sleep, silent and undisturbed, and deep and long.

CHANNING 129
Such are the general means of the minister towards
his great end, means which belong to all clergymen,
and vary in efficiency only with the number, the wealth,
the talent, and social position of his audience. His
particular and personal means are his talents, little or
great; his skill, acquired by education and self-dis
cipline ; his learning, the accumulated thought which
has come of his diligence, as capital is accumulated by
toil and thrift; his eloquence, the power of speaking
the right thing, at the right time, with the right words,
in the right way ; his goodness and his piety, — in a
word, his whole character, intellectual, moral, and re
ligious. These are the means which belong to the
man, not the clergyman ; means which vary not with
the number, wealth, talent, and social position of his
audience, but only with the powers of the man him
self. His general means are what he has as servant
of the church ; his special, what he is as a man.
Say what men will, the pulpit is still a vantage
ground, an eminence ; often a bad eminence, it may be,
still one of the places of pubhc power. If a man would
produce an immediate effect and accomplish one par
ticular work, let him storm awhile in Congress, if he
will. But if he aims to produce a long and lasting in
fluence, to effect men deeply, and in many ways promote
the progress of mankind, he may ascend the pulpit, and
thence pour forth his Hght and heat on youth and age,
distil his early and his latter rain ; he is sure to waken
the tender plants at last, and sure to strengthen the
tallest and most strong. Yet for all that, say what
we may of the power of that position, the man is more
than the pulpit, more than the church, — yes, more
than all pulpits and all churches, and if he is right
and they wrong, he sets them a spinning around him
II— »

130 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
as boys their tops. Yet 'tis a great mistake to suppose
it is the spoken word merely that does all; it is the
mind, the heart, the soul, the character, that speaks
the word. Words, they are the least of what a man
says. The water in some wide brook is harmless
enough, loitering along its way, nothing but water ;
the smallest of fishes find easy shallows for their sport ;
careless reptiles there leave their unattended young,
children wade laughing along its course and sail their
tiny ships. But raise that stream a hundred feet, its
tinkle becomes thunder, and its waters strike with force
that nothing can resist. So the words of a man of no
character, though comforting enough when they are
echoed by passion, appetite, and old and evil habits of
our own — are powerless against the might of passion,
habit, appetite. What comes from nothing comes to
nothing. I know in whom I have beheved, said the
apostle — not merely what.
It is the minister's business to teach men truth and
religion, not directly all forms of truth — though to
help so far as he may even in that — but especially
truth which relates to man's spiritual growth. To do
this he must be before men, superior to them in the
things he teaches: we set a grown woman to take care
of children, a man to teach boys. There is no other
way; in mathematics and in morals the leader must
go before the men he leads. To teach truth and re
ligion the minister must not only possess them, but
must know the obstacles which oppose them both in
other minds — must know the intellectual errors which
conflict with truth, the practical errors which contend
with religion, and so be able to meet and confront the
falsehoods and the sins of his time. He must there
fore be a reformer, — there is no help for it. He may

CHANNING 131
have a mystical turn, and reform only sentiments; a
philosophical turn, and reform ideas — in politics,
philosophy, theology; or a practical turn, and hew
away only at actual concrete sins ; but a reformer must
he be in one shape, or in all, otherwise he is no
minister, serving, leading, inspiring, but only a priest,
a poor miserable priest, — not singing his own psalm
out of his own throat, but grinding away at the barrel-
organ of his sect — grating forth tunes which he did
not make and cannot understand.
The minister is to labor for mankind, for the noblest
end, in one of the highest modes of labor, and its
fairest form. He does not ask to rule, but to serve;
not praise but perfection. He seeks power over men
not for his sake, but theirs. He is to take the lead in
all works of education, of moral and social reform. If
need is, he must be willing to stand alone. The quali
ties which bind him to mankind for all eternity are
qualities which may sever him from his class and his
townsmen ; yes, from his own brothers, and that for his
mortal life. The distinctions amongst men must be
no distinctions to him. He must honor all men, be
come a brother to all, most brotherly to the neediest.
He must see the man in the begger, in the felon, in
the outcast of society, and labor to separate that dia
mond from the rubbish that hides its light. In a great
city the lowest ranks of the public should be familiar
to his thoughts and present in his prayers. He is to
seek instruction from men that can give it, and im
part of himself to all that need and as they need. He
must keep an unbroken sympathy with man ; above all,
he must dwell intimate with God. It is his duty to
master the greatest subjects of human thought; to
know the nature of man, his wants, appetites, expos-

132 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ures, his animal nature, his human nature, and his di
vine ; man in his ideal state of wisdom, abundance,
loveliness, and religion ; man in his actual state of ig
norance, want, deformity, and sin. He is to minister
to man's highest wants ; to> bring high council to low
men, and to elevate still more the aspirations of the
loftiest. He must be a living rebuke to proud men
and the scorner ; a man so full of heart and hope that
drooping souls shall take courage and thank God,
cheered by his conquering valor.
To do and to be all this he must know men, not with
the half-knowledge which comes from reading books,
but by seeing, feeling, doing, and being. He must
know history, philosophy, poetry; and life he must
know by heart. He must understand the laws of God,
be filled With God's thought, animated with his feel
ing, be filled with truth and love. Expecting much
of himself he will look for much also from other men.
He asks men to lend him their ears, if he have any
thing to teach, knowing that then he shall win their
hearts ; but if he has nothing to offer he bids men go
off where they can be fed, and leave the naked walls
sepulchral and cold to tell him, " Sir, you have nothing
to say, you had better be done ! " But he expects men
that take his ideas for truth to turn his words to life.
He looks for corn as proof that he sowed good seed
in the field; he trusts men will become better by his
words — wiser, holier, more full of faith. He hopes
to see them outgrow him, till he can serve them no
more, and they come no longer to his well to draw, but
have found the fountain of immortal life hard by their
own door; so the good father who has watched and
prayed over his children longs to have them set up for
themselves, and live out their own manly and indepen-

CHANNING 133
dent life. He does not ask honor, nor riches, nor ease,
only to see good men and good works as the result of
his toil. If no such result comes of a long life, then
he knows either that he has mistaken his calling or
failed of his duty.
We have always looked on the lot of a minister in a
country town as our ideal of a happy and useful life.
Not grossly poor, not idly rich, he is every man's
equal, and no man's master. He is welcome every
where, if worthy, and may have the satisfaction that
he is helping men to wisdom, to virtue, to piety, to the
dearest joys of this life and the next. He can easily
know all of his flock, be familiar with their thoughts,
and help them out of their difficulties by his superior
ity of nature or cultivation or religious growth. The
great work of education — intellectual and spiritual
— f aUs under his charge. He can give due culture to
all; but the choicer and more delicate plants, that re
quire the nicest eye and hand, these are peculiarly his
care. In small societies eloquence is not to be looked
for as in the great congregations of a city, where the
listening looks of hundreds or thousands would win
eloquence almost out of the stones. The ocean is al
ways sublime in its movements, but the smallest spring
under the oak has beauty in its still transparence, and
sends its waters to the sea. In cities the lot of the
minister is far less grateful, his connections less inti
mate, less domestic. Here, in addition to the common
subjects of the minister's discourse, everywhere the
same, the great themes of society require to be dis
cussed, and peace and war, freedom and slavery, the
public policy of states, and the character of their lead
ers, come up to the pulpits of a great city to be looked
on in the light of Christianity and so judged. With

134 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
a few hearers we see not how a man can fail to speak
simply, and with persuasive speech; before many,
speaking on such a theme as religion, which has pro
voked such wonders of art out of the sculptor, poet,
painter, architect, we wonder that every man is not el
oquent. Some will pass by the little spring nor heed
its unobtrusive loveliness ; all turn with wonder at the
ocean's face, and feel for a moment awed by its sub
limity, and lifted out of their common consciousness.
In the nineteenth century the clergy have less rel
ative power than ever before in Christendom ; it is
partly their own fault, but chiefly the glory and ex
cellence of the age. It has other instructors. But there
was never a time when a great man rising in a pulpit
could so communicate his thoughts and sentiments
as now; a man who should bear the same relation to
this age that Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Bern
ard of Clairvaux bore to their age, so far overtopping
men, would have more influence, not less than theirs.
Nations wait for noble sentiments, for generous
thoughts ; wait for the discoverer and organizer. The
machinery of the age is ready to move for him, — the
steam-horses, the steam-press. His audience has no
limit. Even now the position of a minister gives him
great advantages. He has a ready access to men's
souls, a respectful hearing from week to week, and
constant dropping will wear the stones, how
much more the hearts of men. The children grow up
under his eye and influence.
All ministers stand on the same level, and nothing
lifts one above another but his genius, his culture, his
character, and his life. In the pulpit the most dis
tinguished birth avails nothing; the humblest origin
is no hindrance. In New England, in America, every-

CHANNING 135
where in the world money gives power, never more than
to-day; a rich lawyer or merchant finds himself more
respected for his wealth, and listened to with greater
esteem by any audience. Wealth arms him with a
golden weapon. It is so in politics ; power is attracted
towards gold. With the minister it is not so. If a
clergyman had all the wealth of both the great
cardinals Wolsey and Richelieu, did he dwell in a
palace finer than the Vatican, all his wealth would
not give him a whit the more influence in his pulpit,
in sermon, or in prayer. Henry Ware moved men
none the less because he had so little of this world's
goods. In this way, therefore, the minister's influ
ence is personal, not material. The more he is a man,
the more a minister.
In virtue of his position he has the best chance to
know men. He overrides all distinctions of life, as
sociates with the humblest man as a brother, with the
highest as their equal. If well trained, his education
places him in the circle of the most cultivated minds,
while his sympathies and his duty attract him to
the lowest sphere of rudeness, want, and perhaps of
crime. He sees men in joy and in grief, at a wedding
and a funeral, and when flushed with hope, when
wrung with pain, when the soul bids earth farewell.
If a true man, the most precious confidence is re
posed in him. He looks into men's eyes as he speaks,
and in their varying faces reads their confession,
what they could oft conceal, both ill and good; reads
sometimes with astonished eyes. Reader, you have
seen an old coin worn smooth so that there was no
mark on it, not a letter; you know not whence it came
nor whose it is; but you heat it in the fire, and the
stamp of the die is plain as when the coin was minted

136 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
first; you see the image, read the superscription. So
the excitement of a sermon reveals the man's character
in his oft-unwilling face, and the preacher, astonished,
renders unto Cassar the things that are his, and unto
God his own. Sometimes one is saddened to see the
miser, satyr, worldling in his many forms under a
disguise so trim and neat ; but oftener, perhaps, sur
prised to find a saint he knew not of before, surprised
at the resurrection of such a soul from such a tomb.
The minister addresses men as individuals; the lawyer
must convince the whole jury, the senator a majority
of the senate or his work is lost, while if the minister
convinces one man, or but half convinces him, he has
still done something which will last. The merchant
deals with material things, the lawyer and the politi
cian commonly address only the understanding of
their hearers, sharpening attention by appeals to in
terest ; while the minister calls upon the affections,
addresses the conscience, and appeals to the religious
nature of man, to faculties which bind man to his
race and unite him with his God. This gives him
a power which no other man aspires to; which neither
the lawyer nor the merchant, nor yet the politician
attempts to wield, nay, which the mere writer of books
leaves out of sight. In our day we often forget these
things, and suppose that the government or the news
papers are the arbiters of public opinion, while still
the pulpit has a mighty influence. All the politicians
and lawyers in America could not persuade men to be
lieve what was contrary to common-sense and adverse
to their interest; but a few preachers, in the name of
religion, made whole millions beheve the world would
perish on a certain day, and now the day is past it
is hard for them to believe their preachers were mis
taken !

CHANNING 137
Now all this might of position and opportunity
may be used for good or ill, to advance men or retard
them; so a great responsibility rest always on the
clergy of the land. Put a heavy man in the pulpit,
— ordinary, vulgar, obese, idle, inhuman, and he
overlays the conscience of the people with his gross-
ness; his Upas breath poisons every spiritual plant
that springs up within sight of his church. Put
there a man of only average intelligence and religion,
he does nothing but keep men from sliding back; he
loves his people and giveth his beloved sleep. Put
there a superior man, with genius for religion, nay,
a man of no genius, but an active, intelligent, human,
and pious man, who will work for the human race
with all his mind and heart, and he does wonders;
he loves his people and giveth his beloved his own
life. He looks out on the wealth, ignorance, pride,
poverty, lust, and sin of the world, and blames him
self for their existence. This suffering human race,
poor blind Bartimasus, sits by the wayside, crying to
all men of power, " Have mercy on me ; " the minister
says, " What wilt thou ? " he answers, " Lord, that I
might receive my sight." No man may be idle, least
of all the minister; he least of all in this age, when
Bartimams cries as never before.
Dr. Channing was born at Newport in Rhode Island,
the 7th of April, 1780, and educated under the most
favorable circumstances which the country then af
forded; employed as a private teacher for more than
a year at Richmond, and settled as a clergyman in
Boston more than five and forty years ago. Here
he labored in this calling, more or less, for nearly
forty years. He was emphatically a Christian min
ister, in all the high meaning of that term. He has

138 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
had a deep influence here, a wide influence in the
world. For forty years, though able men have
planned wisely for this city, and rich men bestowed
their treasure for her welfare, founding valuable and
permanent institutions, yet no one has done so much
for Boston as he, none contributed so powerfully to
enhance the character of her men for religion and for
brotherly love. There is no charity like the inspira
tion of great writers. There were two excellent and
extraordinary ministers in Boston contemporary with
Dr. Channing, whose memory will not soon depart;
we mean Buckminster and Ware. But Dr. Channing
was the most remarkable clergyman in America, yes,
throughout all lands where the English tongue is
spoken, in the nineteenth century there has been no
minister so remarkable as he, none so powerful on
the whole. No clergyman of America ever exercised
such dominion amongst men. Edwards and Mayhew
are great names in the American churches, men of
power, of self-denial, of toil, who have also done ser
vice for mankind ; but Channing has gone deeper,
soared higher, seen further than they, and set in mo
tion forces which will do more for mankind.
What is the secret of his success? Certainly his
power did not come from his calling as a clergyman ;
there are some forty thousand clergymen in the United
States. We meet them in a large city; they are
more known by the name of their church than their
own name, more marked by their cravat than their
character. Of all this host not ten will be at all
well known, even in their own city or village, in a
hundred years; perhaps not one. Nay, there are not
twenty who are well known in America now even, out
of their denomination; they, perhaps, known by the

CHANNING 139
unlucky accident of some petty controversy rather
than by any real eminence of character and work.
Who of them is otherwise known to Europe, or even to
England? But Dr. Channing is well known in Ger
many and France, his writings more broadly spread
in England than in his native land; his power widens
continually, and deepens too.
His eminence came from no extraordinary intel
lectual gifts born with him. Truly his was a mind
of a high order. Yet it is not difficult to find men of
far more native intellectual force, both here and every
where; and throughout all his life in all his writings,
you see the trace of intellectual deficiencies, his de
ficiencies as a writer, as a scholar, and still more as
an original and philosophical thinker. Nor did it
come any more from his superior opportunities for
education. True, those were the best the country
afforded at that time, though far inferior in many re
spects, to what is now abundantly enjoyed with no
corresponding result. In his early culture there were
marked deficiencies, the results of which appear in his
writings even to the last, leading him to falter in his
analysis, leaving him uncertain as to his conclusion,
and timid in applying his ideas to practice. His was
not the intellect to forego careful and laborious and
early training; not an intellect to cultivate itself,
browsing to the full in scanty pastures, where weaker
natures perish for lack of tender grass and careful
housing from the cold.
His signal success came from no remarkable op
portunity for the use of his gifts and attainments.
He was one minister of the forty thousand. His own
pulpit was only higher than others, his audience larger
and more influential, because he made it so. His cleri-

140 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
cal brothers in his last years hindered more than they
helped him; his own parish gave him no remarkable
aid, and in his best years showed themselves incapable
of receiving his highest instructions, and in the latter
part of his life proved quite unworthy of so great a
man. He had none of the qualities which commonly at
tract men at first sight. He was little of stature, and
not very well-favored; his bodily presence was weak;
his voice feeble, his tone and manner not such as
strike the many. Beauty is the most popular and
attractive of all things, a presence that never tires.
Dr. Channing was but slightly favored by the graces ;
his gestures, intonations, and general manner would
have been displeasing in another. He had nothing
which at first sight either awes or attracts the care
less world. He had no tricks and made no com
promises. He never flattered men's pride nor their
idleness, incarnating the popular religion; he did not
storm or dazzle; he had not the hardy intellect which
attracts men with only active minds, nor the cowardly
conservatism which flatters propriety to sleep in her
pew; he never thundered and lightened, but only
shone with calm and tranquil though varying light.
He had not the social charm which fascinates and
attaches men; though genial, hospitable, and inviting,
yet few came very near him.
He was not eminently original, either in thought
or in the form thereof; not rich in ideas. It is true,
he had great powers of speech, yet he had not that
masterly genius for eloquence which now stoop down
to the ground and moulds the very earth into argu
ments, till it seems as if the stones and trees were or
dained his colleagues to preach with him, obedient to

CHANNING 141
his orphic enchantment ; not that genius which reaches
up to the heavens, pressing sun and moon and each
particular star into the service of his thought; which
proves by a diagram, illustrates by a picture, making
the unwilhng listeners feel that he had bribed the uni
verse to plead his cause; not that rare poetic power,
which is born genius and bred art, which teems with
sentiments and ideas, clothes and adorns them with
language gathered from letters, nature, art, and com
mon Hfe, grouping his family of thoughts as Raphael
in a picture paints the Madonna, Joseph, Baby, Ass,
Angel, Palm-tree, those incongruous things of earth
and heaven, aU unified and made harmonious by that
one enchanting soul. He had not that intellectual,
wealthy eloquence, beautiful as roses yet strong as
steel. Nor had he the homely force of Luther, who
in the language of the farm, the shop, the boat, the
street, or nursery, told the high truths that reason or
religion taught, and took possession of his audience
by a storm of speech, then poured upon them all the
riches of his brave plebian soul, baptizing every head
anew; a man who with the people seemed more mob
than they, and when with kings the most imperial man.
He had not the blunt terse style of Latimer, nor his
beautiful homehness of speech, which is more attrac
tive than all rhetoric. He had not the cool clear
analysis of Dr. Barrow, his prodigious learning, his
close logic, his masculine sense; nor the graceful
imagery, the unbounded imagination of Jeremy Tay
lor, " the Shakespeare of divines," nor his winsome
way of talk about piety, elevating the commonest
events of life to classic dignity. He had not the hard-
headed intellect of Dr. South, his skilful analysis, his
conquering wit, his intellectual wealth; no, he had not

142 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the power of condensing his thoughts into the energetic
language of Webster — never a word wrong or too
much — or of marshalling his forces in such magnifi
cently stern array ; no, he had not the exquisite
rhythmic speech of Emerson, that wonderful artist
in words, who unites manly strength with the rare
beauty of a woman's mind.
His eminence came from no such gifts or graces.
His power came mainly from the predominating
strength of the moral and religious element in him.
He loved God with his mind, his conscience, his affec
tions, and his soul. He had goodness and piety, both
in the heroic degree. His inteHectual power seemed
little, not when compared with that of other men, but
when measured by his own religious power. Loving
man and God, he loved truth and justice. He would
not exaggerate; he would not under-value what he
saw and knew, so was not violent, was not carried
away by his subject. He was commonly his own mas
ter. He said nothing for effect, he never flattered the
prejudice of his audience; respecting them, he put
his high thought into simple speech, caught their at
tention, and gradually drew them up to his own eleva
tion. He was ruled by conscience to a remarkable degree,
almost demonized by conscience, for during a part of
his life the moral element seems despotic, ruling at
the expense of intellect and of natural joy. But that
period passed by, and her rule became peaceful and
harmonious. He loved nature, the sea, the sky, and
found new charms in the sweet face of earth and
heaven as the years went by him, all his life. He had
a keen sense of beauty — beauty in nature, in art, in
speech, in manners, in man and woman's face. He

CHANNING 143
loved science, he loved letters, and he loved art; but
all of these affections were overmastered by his love
of man and God,, — means to that end, or little flowers
that bordered the pathway where goodness and piety
walked hand in hand. This supremacy of the moral
and religious element was the secret of his strength,
and it gave him a peculiar power over men, one which
neither Luther nor Latimer ever had ; no, nor Barrow,
nor Taylor, nor South, nor Webster, nor Emerson.
He had a large talent for religion, and so was fitted
to become an exponent of the higher aspirations of man
kind in his day and in times to come. He asked for
truth, for religion. He was always a seeker, his
whole life " a process of conversion." Timid and
self-distrustful, slow of inquiry and cautious to a
fault, always calculating the effect before fraterniz
ing with a cause, he had the most unflinching confi
dence in justice and in truth, in man's power to per
ceive and receive both.
Loving man and God, he loved freedom in all its
legitimate forms, and so became a champion in all
the combats of the day where rights were called in
question. He hated the chains of old bondage, and
moved early in the Unitarian reformation; but when
the Unitarian party became a sect and narrow like the
rest, when it also came to stand in the way of man
kind he became " little of a Unitarian," and cared no
more for that sect than for the Trinitarians. He
could not be blind to the existence of religion in all
sects, and did not quarrel with other men's goodness
and piety because he could not accept their theology.
He was not born or bred for a sectarian; such as
were he did not hate, but pity. He engaged in the
various reforms of the day; he labored for the cause

144 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
of peace, for temperance, for the improvement of
prisons, for the abolition of imprisonment for debt,
for education, for the general welfare of men by
elevating the most exposed classes of society. He was
an eminent advocate for the abolition of slavery.
We do not mean to say that he committed no errors,
that he never faltered. He had his imperfections
and weaknesses, which we shall presently consider;
sometimes he was over-timid, and seems to have allowed
meaner men to prevail over him with their counsels,
their littleness, and their fears. A sick body often
enfeebled his mind and sometimes his courage. So he
never stood in the foremost rank of any reform,
speculative or practical. This is partly owing to the
causes just hinted at; in part, also, to his want of
originality. He was, we think, the fairest model of a good min
ister known to the public or his age. He preached
what he knew and he lived what he preached. He had
a profound confidence in God, not in God merely as an
abstraction, the abstract power, wisdom, and love; but
as that abstraction becomes concrete through Provi
dence and reveals itself in the course of nature, men,
nations, and the world. He had also and accordingly
a profound respect for man and profound confidence
in man, not for great men, rich men, and cultivated
men alone, but for man as man, for all men ; he did
not despise the proud, the ignorant, the wicked. He
had a deep reverence for God and for man ; this gave
him eloquence when he spoke, gave him his name
among men, and gave him his power.
A good deal of his earlier preaching, it is said, re
lated to abstract matters, to ideas, to sentiments, to
modes of mind. Men complained that he did not

CHANNING 145
touch the ground. He spoke of God, of the soul, the
dignity of human nature ; of love to God, to men ; of
justice, charity, of freedom, and holiness of heart; he
spoke of sin, of fear, of alienation from God. Years
ago we remember to have heard murmurs at his ab
stract style of thought and speech ; it went over men's
heads, said some. But his abstractions he translated
into the most concrete forms. Respect for God be
came obedience to his laws; faith in God was faith in
keeping them; human nature was so great and so
dignified, the very noblest work of God, and therefore
society must respect that dignity and conform to that
nature; there must be no intemperance, and men who
grow rich by poisoning their brothers must renounce
their wicked craft; there must be no war, for its
glory is human shame, and its soldiers only butchers
of men ; there must be education for all, for human na
ture is a thing too divine for men to leave in ignorance,
and therefore in vice, and crime, and sin; there must
be no pauperism, no want, but society must be so re
constructed that Christianity becomes a fact, and there
are no idle men who steal their living out of the world,
none overburdened with excessive toil, no riot, no waste,
no idleness, and so no want; there must be no op
pression of class by class, but the strong are to help
the weak, the educated to instruct the rude; there
must be no slavery, for that is the consummation of
all wrongs against the dignity of human nature. So
his word became incarnate, and the most abstract
preacher in the land, the most mystical in his piety,
and, as it seemed at first, the furthest removed from,
practice, comes down to actual sins and toils for hu
man needs.
Then came the same grumblers, murmuring to an
il— 10

146 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
other tune, and said, " When Dr. Channing used to
preach about God and the soul, about holiness and
sin, we liked him, that was Christianity. But now
he is always insisting on some reform, talking about
intemperance, and war, and slavery, or telling us that
we must remove the evils of society and educate aU
men ; we wish Dr. Channing would preach the Gos
pel." Thus reasoned men, for their foolish hearts
were darkened. The old spirit of bondage opposed
him when with other good men he asked of Calvanism,
" Give us freedom, that we may go in and out before
the Lord, and find truth." But the new spirit of bond
age opposed him just as much when he came up with
others, and asked for the same thing. Each reform
he engaged in got him new foes. The Tories of the
church hated him because he asked for more truth;
the Tories of the state hated him because he asked for
more justice; the Tories of society hated him because
in the name of man and God he demanded more love !
Yet he silently prevailed against all these; new truth,
new justice, new love, came into the churches, into
the state, into society, and now those very Tories
think him an honor to all three, and claim him as their
friend ! Such is the mystery of truth !
We have just said he never stood in the van of any
reform — his lack of originality, his feeble health,
his consequent caution and timidity, hindering him
from that ; yet there was scarcely a good work or a
liberal thought in his time, coming within his range,
which he did not aid, and powerfully aid. True, he
commonly came late, but he always came and he never
went back. He was one of the leaders of new thought
in the new world and the old.
How strange is the progress of men on their march

CHANNING 147
through time, a democracy! how few are the leaders!
So a caravan passes slowly on in the Arabian wilder
ness, the men and the women, the asses and the camels.
There is dust, and noise, and heat, the scream of the
camels and the asses' bray, the shouts of the drivers,
the songs of the men, the prattle of the women, the
repinings and the gossip, the brawls and the day
dreams, the incongruous murmur of a great multi
tude. There are stragglers in front, in flank, in rear.
But there are always some who know the landmarks by
day, the sky-marks by night, the special providence
of the pilgrimage, who direct the march, giving little
heed to the brawls or the gossips, the scream, or the
bray, or the song. They lift up a censer, which all day
long sends up its column of smoke, and all the night
its fiery piUar, to guide the promiscuous pilgrimage.
The work before us is well named " Memoirs " of
Dr. Channing. It is not a life, it is almost wholly
autobiographical; we learn, however, from the book
a few facts relating to his life not related by himself.
It appears that when a boy he was " a remarkable
wrestler," fond of " adventurous sports ; " that he once
" flogged a boy larger than himself " for some injus
tice ; that in boyhood he was called " little King
Pepin," and "the Peacemaker;" that he was distin
guished for courage, and once offered to go and sleep
on board a ship at Newport which was said to be
haunted. He was studious and thoughtful, naturally
pious, a lover of truth and justice. At college he was
studious, yet mirthful, and excelled in the athletic
sports of his companions. He soon became disgusted
with the gloomy doctrines of Calvinism.
He early saw some of the contradictions in society.
" When I was young," says he, " the luxury of eat-

148 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ing was carried to the greatest excess. My first no
tion, indeed, of glory was attached to an old black
cook whom I saw to be the most important personage
in town." He was grave and reflective, fond of lonely
rambles by the sea-shore. His early Hfe was sad,
and each year of his course seemed brighter than the
last. His character was shaped more by his own soli
tary thought than the influence of companions. In
body, when a child, " he was small and delicate, yet
muscular and active, with a very erect person, quick
movement, a countenance that while sedate was cheer
ful ; " " an open, brave, and generous boy." He was
eminent at college, and graduated at Cambridge in his
nineteenth year with distinguished honors.
He served for one or two years as a private tutor
in a family at Richmond, and lost his health, which he
never fully recovered. He seriously set himself about
the work of self-improvement at an early age, and
diligently continued it all his life. At the age of
twenty-three he began to preach. " His preaching at
once attracted attention for its power, solemnity, and
beauty." On the first of June, 1803, he was ordained
as minister of the church in Federal street, Boston;
" a pale, spiritual-looking young man."
At that time he was serious in his deportment to a
degree that seemed oppressive.
" He had the air of one absorbed in his own contemplations,
and looked care-worn, weary, and anxious. Society seemed
distasteful, he joined but little in conversation; took his meals
in haste; was retired in his ways, lived mostly in his study,
appeared rather annoyed than pleased with visitors, seldom
went abroad, declining, when possible, all invitations; and, in
a word, was most content when left uninterruptedly to him
self. There was sweetness in his looks and. words, however-
solemn counsels were gently given, and an atmosphere of holi
ness threw a winning charm over his conversation and con
duct."

CHANNING 149
He says himself,
"In the early years of my ministry, ill health and a deep
consciousness of unworthiness took away my energy and hope,
and I had almost resolved to quit my profession. My brother
Francis begged me to persevere, to make a fairer trial; and to
his influence I owe very much the continuance of labors which,
I hope, have not been useless to myself or to others."
High expectations were naturally formed of such

" The devoutly disposed in the community looked to him with
the hope that he might be a means of fanning once more to
flame the smoldering ashes on the altars of piety. The seri
ousness of his deportment, the depth and sweetness of his
voice, the pathos with which he read the Scriptures and sacred
poetry, the solemnity of his appeals, his rapt and kindling
enthusiasm, his humble, trustful spirit of prayer, his subdued
feeling, so expressive of personal experience, made religion
a new reality; while his whole air and look of spirituality won
them to listen by its mild and somewhat melancholy beauty.
The most trifling saw in him a man thoroughly in earnest, who
spoke not of dreams and fictions, but of facts with which he
was intimately conversant; and the serious gladly welcomed
one who led the way and beckoned them nearer to the holy of
holies which they aspired to enter. Intellectual people, too,
were attracted by the power and grace of his pulpit addresses.
He opened to them a large range of thought, presented clear,
connected, and complete views of various topics, roused their
faculties of discernment by nice discriminations and exact state
ments, and gratified their taste by the finished simplicity of his
style. But the novelty, perhaps, that chiefly stirred his audi
ences was the directness with which he even then brought his
Christian principles to bear upon actual life. With no flights
of mystic exaltation, forgetful in raptures of the earth, with
no abstract systems of metaphysical theology, with no coldly
elegant moral essays, did he occupy the minds of his hearers,
but with near and sublime objects made evident by faith, with
lucid truths approved alike by Scripture and by conscience,
and with duties pressed urgently home upon all as rules for
daily practice. He saw, and made others see, that life was no
play-place, but a magnificent scene for glorifying God, and a
rich school for the education of spirits. He showed to men
the substance of which surrounding appearances are the

150 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
shadow, and behind transient experiences revealed the spiritual
laws which they express. Thus he gathered round him an en
larging circle of devoted friends, who gratefully felt that they
drank in from him new life. The old members of the society,
too, for the most part simple people of plain manners, took
the heartiest delight in his services, while feeling just pride in
his talents. And the few distinguished persons of the congre
gation knew well how to appreciate his rare gifts, and to ex
tend his fame."
" Thus passed the first ten years and more of Mr. Chan-
ning's ministerial life. They were uneventful, but inwardly
rich in results; and many good seeds then planted themselves,
which were afterward to bear abundant fruits. Inherited
errors, too, not a few, in thought and practice, had been slowly
outgrown, so slowly, that he was perhaps unconscious of the
change which had been wrought in his principles. Above all,
he had learned the lesson of keeping true to his purest, high
est self, or, to express the same fact more humbly and justly,
of being obedient to the Divine will, however revealed to his
inmost reason. Goodness had firmly enthroned itself as the
reigning power in his nature. He lived the life communicated
from above. He was becoming yearly and daily more and
more a child of God.
" From his very entrance on a public career he produced upon
all who came into his presence the impression of matured virtue
and wisdom, and inspired reverence though young. He wore
an air of dignity and self-command, of pure elevation of pur
pose, and of calm enthusiasm that disarmed familiarity. Care
ful of the rights of others, courteous and gentle, he allowed no
intrusions upon himself. He was deaf to flattery, turned at
once from any mention of his own services or position, paid no
compliments, and would receive none; but, by constant refer
ence to high standards of right, transferred the thoughts of
those with whom he held intercourse from personal vanity to
intrinsic excellence, and from individual claims to universal
principles. He gave no time to what was unimportant, made
demands upon the intellect and conscience of those he talked
with, and inspired them with a sense of the substantial realities
of existence. In his treatment of others there was no pre
sumption nor partiality. He was deferential to old and young,
listened without interruption and with patience, even to the dull
and rude, spoke ill of none, and would hear no ill-speaking,
tolerated no levity, but at once overawed and silenced it by
wise and generous suggestions; was never hasty, rash, nor
impetuous in word or act, and met these weaknesses in others

CHANNING 151
with an undisturbed firmness that disarmed passion while re
buking it. Above all, he recognized in his fellows no distinc
tions but those of character and intelligence, and, quietly dis
regarding capricious estimates and rules of mere etiquette, met
rich and poor, learned and ignorant, upon the broad ground'
of mutual honor and kindness. Thus his influence was always
sacred and sanctifying."
' But we must pass rapidly where we would gladly
delay our readers. His health became feebler; he
visited Europe in 1822, and was but little better in
1824. A colleague was settled with him; then, freed
from the necessity of producing one or two sermons
a week, he was enabled to devote more time to other
concerns, to direct all his efforts to objects of great
importance. Hereafter his position was highly favor
able to literary activity and extensive influence. He
became " less ministerial and more manly." His in
terest in the great concerns of mankind continued to
increase. AU his important works were written after
this period. Yet he was stifl deeply interested in the
ministry, though he did not accept the popular views
of that profession.
" I consider my profession as almost infinitely raised above
all others, when its true nature is understood, and its true
spirit imbibed. But as it is too often viewed and followed, it
seems to me of little worth to him who exercises it, or to those
on whom it ought to act. But when taken up for its respecta
bility, for reputation, for a support, and followed mechanically,
drudgingly, with little or no heartiness and devotion, or when
seized upon fanatically and with a blind and bigoted zeal, I
think as poorly of it as men of the world do, who, I grieve to
say, have had too much reason for setting us ministers down
among the drones of the hive of society 
."My mind turns much on the general question, what can be
done for the scattering of the present darkness? I think I see,
more and more, that the ministry, as at present exercised,
though, on the whole, a good, is sadly defective. What would
be the result of a superior man, not of the clergy, giving a
course of lectures on the teaching of Jesus, just as he would

152 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
give one on the philosophy of Socrates or Plato? Cannot this
subject be taken out of the hands of ministers? Cannot the
higher minds be made to feel that Christianity belongs to them
as truly as to the priest, and that they disgrace and degrade
themselves by getting their ideas of it from ' our order ' so
exclusively? Cannot learned men come to Christianity, just as
to any other system, for the purpose of ascertaining what
it is?"
" At the present day, there is little need of cautioning min
isters against rashness in reproving evil. The danger is all
on the other side. As a class, they are most slow to give of
fence. Their temptation is to sacrifice much to win the af
fections of their people. Too many satisfy themselves with
holding together a congregation by amenity of manners, and
by such compromises with prevalent evils as do not involve open
criminality. They live by the means of those whose vices they
should reprove, and thus are continually ensnared by a selfish
prudence. Is it said that they have families dependent upon
them, who may suffer for their fidelity? I answer, Let no
minister marry, then, unless the wife he chooses have such a
spirit of martyrdom as would make her prefer to be stinted
in daily bread rather than see her husband sacrifice one jot
or tittle of his moral independence. Is it said that congre
gations would be broken up by perfect freedom in the min
isters? Better far would it be to preach to empty pews, or
in the meanest halls, and there to be a fearless, disinterested
witness to the truth, than to hold forth to crowds in gorgeous
cathedrals, honored and courted, but not daring to speak one's
honest convictions, and awed by the world."
"The erroneous views which doomed the Catholic clergy to
celibacy are far from being banished from Protestantism. The
minister is too holy for business or politics. He is to preach
creeds and abstractions. He may preach ascetic notions about
pleasures and amusements, for his official holiness has a tinge
of asceticism in it, and people hear patiently what it is under
stood they will not practise. But if he 'come down,' as it is
called, from these heights, and assail in sober earnest deep-
rooted abuses, respectable vices, inhuman institutions, or ar
rangements, and unjust means of gain, which interest, pride
and habit have made dear and next to universal, the people
who exact from him official holiness are shocked, offended.
' He forgets his sphere.' Not only the people, but his brother-
ministers, are apt to think this; and they do so not mainly from
a time-serving spirit, not from dread of offending the people,—
though this motive too often operates,— but chiefly from false

CHANNING 153
notions about the ministry, its comprehensive purpose, its true
spirit, which is an all-embracing humanity. Ministers in gen
eral are narrow-minded and superstitious, rather than servile.
Their faults are those of the times, and they are more free
from these, perhaps, than most of the people. And are they
not becoming less and less ministers, and more and more
men? "
He continued to preach from time to time during
the greater part of his life.
All Dr. Channing's most important writings may be
arranged in three classes, — Reviews, essays, and ser
mons or addresses. His reviews, however, are not so
much accounts of books as of men. The articles on
Milton, Fenelon and Bonaparte comprise the most im
portant part of the first class. They were published
in 1826 and the three subsequent years, and are valu
able specimens of this kind of composition. They es
tablished his fame as a writer both at home and abroad.
But for ability of thought, for strength and beauty
of expression, they will not bear comparison with the
best pieces of Carlyle or even of Macaulay, not to
mention other and humbler names. Milton and Fene
lon he appreciates justly, and these two articles are
perhaps the most finished productions of his pen,
when regarded morely as pieces of composition. They
indicate, however, no very great depth of thought or
width of observation ; the style is clear, pleasing, and
in general beautiful. The article on Napoleon has
certainly great merits ; considering the time and cir
cumstances under which it was written, its defects are
by no means so numerous as might reasonably have
been looked for. In his later years he felt its imper
fections, but it is still, we think, the fairest estimate
of the man in the English language, though full jus
tice is not done to Napoleon as a statesman and a law-

154 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
giver. In some passages the style is elevated and
sublime, in others it becomes diffuse, wordy, and
tedious. The peculiar charm of these three articles
consists in the beautiful sentiment of religion which
pervades them all. This, indeed, as a golden thread
runs through all his works, giving unity to his re
views, essays, sermons, letters, and conversation.
His essays are more elaborate compositions. They
treat of the subject of slavery and its kindred themes,
the abolitionists, annexation of Texas, emancipation,
the duty of the free states in regard to slavery. Sev
eral of these essays are in the form of letters. They
are his most important and valuable productions.
They have been extensively read in America and
Europe, and have brought him more enemies than all
his other writings. Here Dr. Channing appears as
a reformer. His biographer says,
" Temperament and training, religious aspirations and
philosophical views, above all the tendencies of the times, con
spired to make Dr. Channing a social reformer; although the
loftiness of his desires and aims, the delicacy of his feelings,
the refinement of his tastes, his habits of contemplative thought,
and his reverence for individual freedom enveloped him in a
sphere of courteous reserve and guarded him from familiar
contact with all rude radicalism."
We shall never forget the remarks made by men
of high social standing at the publication of the Es
say on Slavery. They condemned both it and its
author. He was " throwing firebrands ; " " meddling
with matters which clergymen had no right to touch ; "
— as all important matters, we suppose, belong to
pettifogging lawyers, who can never see through a
precedent or comprehend a principle, or to politicians,
who make " regular nominations " and adhere to
them, or else to editors of partisan newspapers ; " he

CHANNING 155
will make the condition of the slaves a great deal
worse," " and perhaps ' produce an insurrection."
This offense was never forgiven him in Boston, and
he continued to increase it till the very period of his
death. His anti-slavery views struck a death-blow
to his popularity here. His zeal for the poor, the in
temperate, the criminal, the ignorant, extraordinary
as it was, could be suffered ; it was not wholly unmin-
isterial, and was eminently scriptural, — but zeal for
the slave, that was too much to be borne. The first
publication, in 1835, has had a wide influence and a
good one. The essay is not very philosophical in its
arrangement, but the matter is well treated, with clear
ness and force ; the wrong of slavery is ably shown.
High motives are always addressed in this, as in all
his productions. But we have one word of criticism
to make on Dr. Channing as an abolitionist. In his
first essay and his subsequent writings he distinctly
separates himself from the abolitionists who contend
for " immediate emancipation." He passed severe
censures upon them, censured their motto of " im
mediate emancipation," their method of acting by " a
system of affiliated societies," gave countenance to the
charge that they were exciting the slaves to revolt.
He condemned their " denunciations." This was at a
time when the abolitionists were not a hundredth part
so numerous as now ; when the pulpit, the press, and
the parlor rang with denunciations against them ; when
their property, their persons, and their lives were not
safe in Boston. Now we have no fault to find with
criticism directed against the abolitionists, no fear of
severity. But at a time when they were few in num
ber, a body of men whom many affected to despise be
cause they hated, and hated because they feared ; when

156 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
they were poor and insulted, yet manfully struggling
against oppression, equal to either fate ; when the
church only opened her mouth to drown the voice of
the fugitive crying to God for justice; when the state,
which had had but one president who spoke against
slavery, and he a man who sold the children of his
own body,1 ' riveted the fetters still closer on the slave's
limbs ; at a time when the press of the South and the
North, political or sectarian — but always commer
cial, low, corrupt, and marketable — said not one word
for the millions of slaves whose chains the state made
and the church christened ; when no man in Congress
either wished or dared to oppose slavery therein, and
no petitions could get a hearing; when the governor
even of Massachusetts 2 could recommend to her legis
lature inquiries for preventing freedom of speech on
that subject; at a time when the abolitionists were
the only men that cared or dared to speak; at a time,
too, when they were mobbed in the streets ; when an as
sembly of women was broken up by " respectable "
violence, and the authorities of the city dared not
resist the mob 3 ; when a symbolical gallows was erected
at night in front of the house of the leading abolition
ist of America, " by the order of Judge Lynch,4 " and
a price of five thousand dollars set on his head by the
governor of Georgia B — why, such criticism was at
least a little out of season ! Had the abolitionists
been guilty of denunciations? — in 1817, when a min
ister preaching in Boston 6 " actually vilified the char
acter of the Liberal clergy in the most" wholesale man
ner," Dr. Channing " directed all his remarks to
softening the feelings of those who were aggrieved.
. . . . ' I cannot blame this stranger so severely,'
said he; 'these harsh judgments never originated

CHANNING 157
from himself  How sad is controversy,
that it should thus tempt our opponents to misrepre
sent men when they might and should know better.' "
Yet here the difference between the stranger and the
Liberal clergy related only to a matter of theological
opinion, not to the freedom of millions of men. We
dislike denunciation as much as most men, but we
wish it was peculiar to the abolitionists ; denunciation
is the commonest thing in politics, the weapon of
Democrats and Whigs ; the pulpits ring with its noise ;
the Unitarians are denounced as " infidels " to this
day 7 ; and who does not know it is the fashion of whole
churches to denounce mankind at large as " totally
depraved," " capable of no good thing," " subject to
the wrath of God," " and deserving eternal damna
tion." If these terms mean anything they amount to
denunciation. If by denunciation is meant violent
speech, exaggeration, and ill temper, then it is an in
firmity, and is always out of place. Yet such is the
weakness of strong men that we meet with it in all
the great movements of mankind, in the Christian
Reformation and the Protestant Reformation, and in
aU great revolutions. The American Revolution was
the effort of a nation to free itself from tyranny, the
very mild tyranny of the British crown. The denun
ciations, violence, and bloodshed which followed are
well known. Yet now there are none but the aboli
tionists who think the Revolution was not worth what it
cost. But in the case which Dr. Channing complained
of, a population greater than that of all the colonies
in 1775 were entirely deprived of all their rights and
reduced to abject slavery, and the abolitionists — ul
tra-peace men and non-resistants almost all of them
— attempted no violence, and used nothing harder than

158 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
hard words. For our own part we confess their lan
guage has not always been to our taste, but we know
of no revolution of any importance that has been con
ducted with so little violence and denunciation. When
Dr. Channing wrote about Milton and the stormy
times of the English commonwealth, he thought differ
ently, and said,
" In regard to the public enemies whom he assailed, we mean
the despots in church and state, and the corrupt institutions
which had stirred up a civil war, the general strain of his
writings, though strong and stern, must exalt him, notwith
standing his occasional violence, among the friends of civil
and religious liberty. That liberty was in peril. Great evils
were struggling for perpetuity and could only be broken down
by great power. Milton felt that interests of infinite moment
were at stake, and who will blame him for binding himself to
them with the whole energy of his great mind, and for defend
ing them with fervor and vehemence? We must not mistake
Christian benevolence, as if it had but one voice, that of soft
entreaty. It can speak in piercing and awful tones. There is
constantly going on in our world a conflict between good and
evil. The cause of human nature has always to wrestle with
foes. All improvement is a victory won by struggles. It is
especially true of those great periods which have been distin
guished by revolutions in government and religion, and from
which we date the most rapid movements of the human mind,
that they have been signalized by conflict. Thus Christianity
convulsed the world and grew up amidst storms, and the
Reformation of Luther was a signal to universal war, and Lib
erty in both worlds has encountered opposition over which she
has triumphed only through her own immortal energies. At
such periods, men gifted with great power of thought and lofti
ness of sentiment, are especially summoned to the conflict with
evil. They hear, as it were, in their own magnanimity and
generous aspirations, the voice of a divinity; and thus com
missioned, and burning with a passionate devotion to truth and
freedom, they must and will speak with an indignant energy,
and they ought not to be measured by the standard of ordinary
minds in ordinary times. Men of natural softness and timidity,
of a sincere but effeminate virtue, will be apt to look on these
bolder, hardier spirits as violent, perturbed, and uncharitable;
and the charge will not be wholly groundless. But that deep

CHANNING 159
feeling of evils, which is necessary to effectual conflict with
them, and which marks God's most powerful messengers to
mankind, cannot breathe itself in soft and tender accents. The
deeply moved soul will speak strongly, and ought to speak
so as to move and shake nations."
There are not many things in Dr. Channing's life
which we could wish otherwise, but his relation to the
abolitionists is one of that number. In 1831, Mr.
Garrison, a printer in the office of the Christian Ex
aminer at Boston, issued the first number of the
" Liberator," making the declaration, " I am in
earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not excuse, I
wiU not retreat a single inch, and I will be heard."
He borrowed the type and press of the office he worked
in. He could not get trusted for fifty dollars' worth
of paper " because he was opposed to the Coloniza
tion Society." So he waited till a negro in Phila
delphia sent him that sum. He was obscure and
destitute, but " had a determination to print the paper
as long as he could live on bread and water, or his
hands find employment." He was reviled, insulted,
mobbed; a price set on his head; he lived in the same
city with Dr. Channing, struggling with poverty,
obscurity, and honorable disgrace for twelve years,
and Dr. Channing afforded him no aid, nor counsel,
nor sympathy, not a single " God , bless you, my
brother," and did not even answer his letter! This
we find it difficult to understand, as it is painful to
relate. We gladly hasten away from the subject,
which we could not pass by in silence, but have spoken
of in sorrow.
His public sermons and addresses — we speak now
only of such as he wished to preserve — treat of a large
variety of subjects: Temperance, Education, Christ,
Christianity, the Evidences of Religion, the Ministry,

160 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and kindred subjects. These are somewhat unequal,
but all are marked by the qualities mentioned above,
by a profound reverence for man, and most unhesi
tating confidence in God. None of those sermons in
dicates a mind of a very high order; as works of in
tellect they will not compare with the great sermons
of the best English preachers, but we know none of
which the effect is more ennobling. His analysis of
a subject is seldom final, he usually halts short of the
ultimate fact; his arrangement is frequently unphilo-
sophical; his reasoning often weak, unsatisfactory,
various parts of the argument not well connected,
his style diffuse and verbose. We know diffuseness is
the old Adam of the pulpit. There are always two
ways of hitting the mark, one with a single bullet,
the other with a shower of small shot. Each has its
advantages ; Dr. Channing chose the latter, as most
of our pulpit orators have done. It is commonly
thought men better understand a truth when it is told
two or three times over, and in two or three differ
ent ways; be that as it may, it is certain that a small
quantity of metal will cover the more space the thin
ner it is beaten, and when a man must write one or
two sermons in a week, never to be used again, perhaps
he may be forgiven if the depth be less as the sur
face becomes greater. Dr. Channing was not very
diffuse for a preacher, but certainly for a great man.
His vocabulary was not copious, there is no idiomatic
freshness in his style; his illustrations are trite, often
commonplace. Neither literature nor nature gets re
flected in his style. His thought and feeling are
American in the best sense of the word; but the form,
the coloring, the tone are wholly destitute of nation
ality ; there is no American image in his temple, no

CHANNING 161
American flowers in his garden. We think this a de
fect. In all his writings you see that he had lived
alone, not much among books, not much with nature
you would fancy, but with his own thoughts.8
As a speaker his style of eloquence was peculiar.
He stands alone. His powers of reasoning were cer
tainly not very great, by no means to be compared to
the many able men of his country or his age; he had
not that great power of demonstration which at once
puts the pointed thought into your mind, and then
drives it home with successive blows. He had not that
creative force which attracts, conquers, and then di
rects; nor that energy of feeling, which, making an
impression almost magical, carries the audience away
with its irresistible tide. He commanded attention by
presenting numerous minute particulars, trusting lit
tle to the effect of any one great argument. His elo
quent warfare was a guerilla war. He carried the
hearer's understanding little by Httle, never taking it
by storm. He did not represent a great reason, a
great imagination, or a great passion; but a great
conscience and a great faith. In this lay the power
of his eloquence, the charm of his preaching, the ma
jesty of his character.
As a pubhc speaker, at first sight he did not
strongly impress his audience, he did not look the
great man; his body was feeble and unusually small,
his voice not powerful, though solemn, affectionate,
and clear. How frail he seemed ! Yet look again,
and his organization was singularly delicate, womanly
in its niceness and refinement. When closely viewed
he seemed a soul very lightly clad with a body, and you
saw the soul so clearly that you forgot the vesture it
wore. He began his sermon simply, announced the
II— 11

162 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
theme, spoke of its importance, glanced over the sur
face for a moment, then sketched out his plan as the
farmer lands out his field which he is to plough up
inch by inch. He began simply, calmly, and rose
higher and higher as he went on, each thought deeper
and nobler than the last. His conscience and his faith
went into the audience till he held them breathless,
entranced, lifted out of their common consciousness ;
till they forgot their own littleness, forgot the
preacher, soul and body, and thought only of his
thought, felt only his feeling.
There was never such preaching in Boston, never
such prayers. His word sunk into men as the sun
into the ground in summer to send up grass and
flowers. Did he speak of sin, the ingenuous youth
saw its ugliness with creeping hate ; of the dignity of
human nature, you longed to be such a man; of God,
of his goodness, his love, you wondered you could ever
doubt or fear. It was our good fortune in earlier
years to hear him often, in his noblest efforts ; often,
too, on the same day have we Hstened to the eloquence
of another good minister, now also immortal, a man
of rare piety and singular power in the pulpit, we
mean the younger Ware. More sentimental than
Channing, more imaginative, with an intellect less
capacious and a range of subjects by no means so
broad, he yet spoke to the native soul of man with a
sweet persuasion rarely equalled. Ware told you
more of heaven, Channing more of earth, that you
might make it heaven here. It was his conscience and
his trust in God that gave him power. What strength
there is in gentleness, what force in truth, what magic
in religion ! That voice so thin and feeble, a woman's
word, it was heard above the roar of the street and

CHANNING 163
the clatter of legislation; it went beyond the Alle
ghanies ; it passed over the din of the Atlantic waves,
and became a winning and familiar sound in our
mother-land ; that hand, so thin and ghostly it seemed
a moonbeam might shine through, it held a power which
no sceptered monarch of our time could wield, — the
power of justice, of all-controUing faith; that feeble
form, that man with body frailer than a girl's, he had
an influence which no man that speaks the English
tongue now equals. He spoke not to men as members
of a party, or a sect, or tribe, or nation, but to the
universal nature of man, and that " something that
doth live " everlastingly in our embers answered to his
caU. He became conscious of his power. It could not be
otherwise when his word thus came echoed back from
the heights and depths of society. But this only made
him yet more humble. A name in both hemispheres
gave him no pleasure but as a means of usefulness and
increase of power; but made him more zealous and
more powerful to serve. Laudations he put aside
without reading, and abuse had small effect on him.
Did proud men scorn his humanity, and base men
affect to pity, it was only the pity which he returned.
Yet when a letter from a poor man in England came
to thank him for his words of lofty cheer, he could
well say, " This is honor." When a nursery-man for
got his plants and his customers to express an interest
in him, or a retired Quaker family was moved by his
presence, then he could say, " This is better than fame
a thousand times." Forgive him if that made him
proud. We remember well his lecture on the Eleva
tion of the Laboring Classes, and the sneers with
which it was received by some that heard it at the

164 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
time; and we shall not soon forget the feehngs it
brought to our heart, when one day, in a little town in
a Swiss valley, we saw in the shop of an apothecary,
who was also the bookseller, a copy of that lecture
in the German tongue. It was printed at that place,
and was the second edition ! The word which some
sneered at here was gone " to the Gentiles," to com
fort the poor laborers under the shadow of the Alps.
We know that men sneer at the pulpit, counting it
a low place and no seat of power; we know why they
sneer, and blame them not. But if there is a man in
the pulpit with a man's mind, heart, soul, the pulpit
is no mean place, it shall go hard if his power is not felt.
In Boston there are well nigh fivescore clergymen, out
of these were there fifty like Dr. Channing, fifty
more in New York, and yet another fifty in the pulpits
of Philadelphia; let them be of all ways of thinking,
— Catholic, Calvinistic, or Quaker, — only let them
love God as much and man as well, only let them love
truth and righteousness as weU as he, and labor with
as much earnestness to reform theology, society,
church, and state; what cities should we have, what
churches, what a society, what a state! Would there
be the intemperance, the pauperism, the ignorance
among the people, the licentiousness, the sheer and
utter lust of gain which now takes possession of the
most influential men of the nation? Oh no! — there
would have been no annexation of Texas for a new
slave-garden, no war against Mexico, no " Holy Al
liance " in America between Democrats and Whigs to
secure the " partition of our sister republic ; there
would not be three millions of slaves in the United
States, and a slave-holder on the throne of the na
tion, for 'tis a throne we speak of, and the people

CHANNING 165
only subjects of a base aristocracy, no longer citizens.
Did we speak of fifty Channings in Boston ? were there
only ten they would make this city, as we think, too
good to hope for. But there are not ten such men,
— nay, there are not but we will not count them.
There are still good men in pulpits, here ; only rare
and few, floating amid the sectarianism, wealth, and
pride which swim round in this whirlpool of modern
society. They never wholly failed in Boston. Nay,
when the oil has run low and the meal was almost
spent, some prophet came along to cheer this poor
widow of the church with his blessing, and the oil
held out in the cruse, and the meal was not spent, so
that her children did not wholly starve and die out
right, saying, " Who is the Lord ? " True, there has
always been some rod, a scion from the tree of life, that
held its own amid the drought, and kept obstinately
green, and went on budding and blossoming, a memory
and a hope ; always some sacramental portion of the
manna which fed our fathers, a fragrant reminiscence
of the old pilgrimage, and a promise of the true bread
which shall one day be given from heaven ; at least,
there is always some heap of stones to remind us that
our fathers passed over Jordan, and, though sorely
beset and hunted after, they could yet say, even in
their extremity, " Hitherto hath the Lord helped us ! "
These do not fail, " thanks to the human heart by
which we live ; " but a powerful ministry in any de
nomination we have not. Yet the harvest truly is
plenteous. How white are all the fields! only the la
borers are few, feeble, faint in heart and limb, and
while wrangling about names have so long left their
sickles idle in the sun that their very tools have lost
their temper, and ring no longer, as when of old they
cut the standing corn.

166 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Why does not the church save us from slavery,
party-spirit, ignorance, pauperism, licentiousness, and
lust of gain? It has no salvation to give. Why not
afford us great teachers, like the old and venerable
names, Edwards, Chaunceys, Mayhews, Freemans,
Buckminsters, Channings? The church has nothing
to teach which is worth the learning of grown men,
and even the baby-virtue of America turns off from
that lean, haggard, and empty breast, yet cries for
food and mother's arms. But there is a providence
in all this. Taking the churches as they are, ecclesi
astical religion as it is, it is well that able men do not
stand in the pulpits ; well that men of superior ability
and superior culture flee from it to law, politics, the
farm, and the shop. If the church has nothing bet
ter to teach than the morality of the market-place
and the theology of the dark ages, if she is the
foe to pure goodness, pure piety, and pure thought,
then parson Log is the best parson. Let us accept
him with thankfulness. But it will not always be so ;
no, not long. A better day is coming, when the real
church shall be the actual; when theology, the queen
and mother of science, shall assert her ancient rule,
driving off superstition and priestly unbelief; when
a real ministry in religion's name shall rebuke that
party-spirit which makes a monarch out of a presi
dent, a miserable oligarchy out of a republic, and
transforms the citizens of New-England into the sub
jects of slave-holders, and makes our free men only the
servants of gain. Pandora has opened her box, sec
tarianism and party-rage have flown out ; see the an
archy they make in church and state! But there is
yet left at the bottom, hope. When the lid is lifted
next that also will appear, and a new spring come out

CHANNING 167
of this winter, and we shall wonder at the White-Sun
day on all the hills, at the Pentecost of inspiration
and tongues of heavenly truth.
But we have wandered from our theme. In the
midst of Boston, so penny-wise and so pound-foolish,
— worldly Boston, which sent to the heathens more rum
and more Bibles than all the states, the one to teach
them our Christianity, and the other to baptize the
converts, making their calling and election sure ; which
sent sleek men to Congress, ambassadors to lie in the
capitol for the benefit of their party and themselves ;
in the midst of Boston where men set up the hay-scales
of their virtue, and on one side put their dollars and
on the other set patriotism, democracy, freedom,
Christianity, while the dollar weighed them all down ;
in the midst of this stood Dr. Channing, liberal, wise,
gentle, pious without narrowness, democratic, and full
of hope. Shall we wonder that he wrought so little ;
that he could not get an anti-slavery notice read in
his own pulpit, nor the door open to preach a funeral
sermon on his anti-slavery friend, the lamented Follen?
Rather wonder that he did so preach. No sailing
vessel can stem the Mississippi, nor the stout steamboat
go up the falls of St. Anthony; and it takes time to
go round.
Here was one great man in Boston who did not
seek wealth, nor want place, nor ask for fame; one
man who would not seU himself. He only asked,
sought, and coveted the power to serve. He was
afraid he should give too little and take too much.
So he took only his living, and gave men the toil of
his genius, his prayers, and his life. There is no
charity so great as this. See now, the effect of such
a life; here in America there is one great man, with

168 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
broad brows, a colossal intellect, and the most awful
prejudice the world has seen for some centuries, it is
said; one who would seem an emperor in any council,
even of the kings by nature; with understanding so
great that Channing's mind would seem but a baby in
his arms; a senator, who for many years has occupied
important public posts, — and yet in New-England,
in the United States, Channing has far more influence
than Webster. He was never in his life greeted with
the shout of a multitude, and yet he has swayed the
mind and heart of the best men, and affected the char
acter and welfare of the nation far more than the
famous statesman. In our last number we spoke of
that venerable man who breathed his last breath in
the capitol: John Quincy Adams had held high offices
for fifty years, been minister to courts abroad, had
made treaties, had been representative, senator, secre
tary of state, been president; he had Hved eighty
.years, a learned man, always well, always at work,
always in public office, always amongst great men and
busied with the affairs of the nation ; and yet, which
has done the most for his country, for mankind, and
most helped men to wisdom and religion, man's highest
welfare? The boys could tell us that the effect of
Adams and Webster both is not to be named in com
parison with the work done for the world by this one
feeble-bodied man. Yet there are forty thousand
ministers in the United States, and Channing stood al
ways in the pulpit, owing nothing to any eminent
station that he filled. In this century we have had two
presidents who powerfully affected the nation, one by
his mind, by ideas; his public acts were often foolish;
the other by his will, his deeds, ideas apparently of
small concern to him — we mean Jefferson and Jack-

CHANNING 169
son. But, with the exception of Jefferson, no presi
dent in this century has ever had such influence upon
men's minds as that humble minister. No, not all to
gether — Madison, Monroe, Adams, Jackson, Van
Buren and Harrison and Tyler and Polk. Some of
them did good things, yet soon they will be gone, all
but one or two ; their influence, too, will pass away, and
soon there will be left nothing but a name in a book,
for they were only connected with an office, not an idea,
while Channing's power will remain long after his
writings have ceased to be read and his name is for
got ; of so little consequence is it where the man stands,
if he be but a man, and do a man's work.
The one great idea of Dr. Channing's life was re
spect for man. He was eminent for other things,
but preeminent for this. His eminent piety became
eminent philanthropy in all its forms. This explains
his action as a reformer, his courage, and his inex
tinguishable hope. Dr. Channing was one of the few
democrats we have ever known. Born and bred
amongst men who had small confidence in the people,
and who took little pains to make them better, he be
came intensely their friend. The little distinctions of
life, marked by wealth, fame, or genius, were of small
account to him. He honored all men ; saw the man in
the beggar, in the slave. He never desponded; he
grew more Hberal the more he lived, and seemed greenest
and freshest when about to quit this lower sphere.
His youth was sad though hopeful; in the middle
period of his life he seems saddened and subdued, in
part by the restraints of his profession, in part by ill
health, and yet more by austere notions of life and
duty, imposed by a gloomy theory of religion, but
which in his latter days he escaped from and left be-

170 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
hind him. He is a fine example of the power of one
man, armed only with truth and love. By these he did
service here, and spoke to the best minds of the age,
giving hope to famous men, and cheering the hearts
of such as toiled all day in the dark mines of Cornwall.
By these he sympathized with men, with nature, and
with God. Hence he grew younger all his life, and
thought the happiest period was " about sixty." In
1839 he thus wrote:
" Indeed, life has been an improving gift from my youth; and
one reason I believe to be, that my youth was not a happy one.
I look back to no bright dawn of life which gradually ' faded
into common day.' The light which I now live in rose at a later
period. A rigid domestic discipline, sanctioned by the times,
gloomy views of religion, the selfish passions, collisions with
companions perhaps worse than myself, — these, and other
things, darkened my boyhood. Then came altered circum
stances, dependence, unwise and excessive labours for inde
pendence, and the symptoms of the weakness and disease which
have followed me through life. Amidst this darkness it pleased
God that the light should rise. The work of spiritual regener
ation, the discovery of the supreme good, of the great and
glorious end of life, aspirations after truth and virtue, which
are pledges and beginnings of immortality, the consciousness
of something divine within me, then began, faintly indeed, and
through many struggles and sufferings have gone on.
" I love life, perhaps, too much ; perhaps I cling to it too
strongly for a Christian and a philosopher. I welcome every
new day with new gratitude. I almost wonder at myself, when
I think of the pleasure which the dawn gives me, after having
witnessed it so many years. This blessed light of heaven, how
dear it is to me! and this earth which I have trodden so long,
with what affection I look on it! I have but a moment ago
cast my eyes on the lawn in front of my house, and the sight
of it, gemmed with dew and heightening by its brilliancy the
shadows of the trees which fall upon it, awakened emotions
more vivid, perhaps, than I experienced in youth. I do not
like the ancients calling the earth mother. She is so fresh,
youthful, living, and rejoicing! I do, indeed, anticipate a more
glorious world than this; but still my first familiar home is
very precious to me, nor can I think of leaving its sun and
sky and fields and ocean without regret. My interest, not

CHANNING 171
in outward nature only, but in human nature, in its destinies,
in the progress of science, in the struggles of freedom and
religion, has increased up to this moment, and I am now in my
sixtieth year."
His life was eminently useful and beautiful. He
died in good season, leaving a memory that will long
be blessed.

rv
PRESCOTT AS AN HISTORIAN
It is now more than eleven years since our accom
plished and distinguished countryman, Mr. Prescott,
appeared before the world as a writer of history.
Within that period he has sent forth three independent
historical works which have found a wide circle of
readers in the New World and the Old. His works
have been translated into all the tongues of Europe,
we think, which claim to be languages of literature;
they have won for the author a brilliant renown, which
few men attain to in their lifetime, few even after their
death. No American author has received such distinc
tion from abroad. The most eminent learned societies
of Europe have honored themselves by writing his
name among their own distinguished historians. He
has helped strengthen the common bond of all civilized
nations by writing books which all nations can read.
Yet while he has received this attention and gained
this renown, he has not found hitherto a philosophical
critic to investigate his works carefully, confess the
merits which are there, to point out the defects, if such
there be, and coolly announce the value of these writ
ings. Mr. Prescott has found eulogists on either conti
nent; he has found, also, one critic, who adds to na
tional bigotry the spirit of a cockney in literature,
whose stand-point of criticism is the church of Bow-
bell, a man who degrades the lofty calling of a critic
by the puerile vanities of a literary fop. The article
we refer to would have disgraced any journal which
172

PRESCOTT 173
pretended to common fairness. We often find articles
in the minor journals of America written in a little and
narrow spirit, but remember nothing of the kind so
little as the paper we speak of in the London Quarterly
Review, No. cxxvii., Art. I.1 We have waited long
for some one free from national prejudice to coine, with
enlarged views of the duty of an historian, having
suitable acquaintance with the philosophy of history,
a competent knowledge of the subjects to be treated of,
and enough of the spirit of humanity, and carefully
examine these works in all the light of modern
philosophy. We have waited in vain; and now, con
scious of our own defects, knowing that every qualifica
tion above hinted may easily be denied us, we address
ourselves to the work.
The department of history does not belong to our
special study; it is, therefore, as a layman that we
shaU speak, not aspiring to pronounce the high
cathedral judgment of a professor in that craft. The
history, literature, and general development of the
Spanish nation fall still less within the special range of
the writer of this article. We are students of history
only in common with all men who love liberal studies,
and pursue history only in the pauses from other toils.
However, the remarkable phenomena offered by the
Spanish nation in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
long ago attracted our attention and study. Still, it
is with reluctance we approach our task; had any of
the able men whose business it more properly is girded
himself and applied to the work we would have held
our peace, but in the silence of such we feel constrained
to speak.
Before we proceed to examine the works of Mr.
Prescott, let a word be said of the office and duty of

174 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
an historian, to indicate the stand-point whence his
books are to be looked upon. The writer of annals or
of chronicles is to record events in the order in which
they occur; he is not an historian but a narrator,
not an architect but a lumberer or stonecutter of
history. It does not necessarily belong to his calling
to elaborate his materials into a regular and complete
work of art, which shall fully and philosophicaHy rep
resent the life of the nation he describes.
The biographer is to give an idea of his hero, com
plete in all its parts, and perfect in each; to show how
the world and the age with their manifold influences
acted on the man, and he on his age and the world,
and what they jointly produced. It is one thing to
write the memoirs or annals of a man, and a matter
quite different to write his Life. Mr. Lockhart has
collected many memorials of Sir Walter Scott, labor
iously written annals, but the Life of Sir Walter he
has by no means written. In telling what his hero
suffered, did, and was, and how all was brought to
pass, the biographer must be a critic also, and tell what
his hero ought to have been and have done. Hence
comes the deeper interest and the more instructive
character of a true biography; memoirs may enter
tain, but a biography must instruct.
The annalist of a nation or a man works mainly in
an objective way, and his own character appears only
in the selection or omission of events to record, in re
ferring events to causes, or in deducing consequences
from causes supposed to be in action. There is little
which is personal in his work. On the other hand, the
personality of the biographer continually appears.
The lumberer's character or the stonecutter's does not
report itself in the oak or travertine of Saint Peter's,

PRESCOTT 175
while the genius of the architect confronts you as you
gaze upon his colossal work. Now as the less cannot
of itself comprehend the greater, so a biographer can
not directly, and of himself, comprehend a man nobler
than himself. All the oysters in the world would be
incompetent to write the life of a single eagle. It is
easy for a great man to understand the little man, im
possible to be directly comprehended thereby. It is
not hard to understand the position of a city, the
mutual relation of its parts, when we look dqwn thereon
from a high tower. Now while this is so, by the ad
vance of mankind in a few centuries it comes to pass
that a man of but common abilities, having the culture
of his age, may stand on a higher platform than the
man of genuis occupied a short time before. In this
way the biography of a great man, which none of his
contemporaries could undertake, because he so far over
mastered them, soon becomes possible to men of marked
ability, and in time to men of ordinary powers of
comprehension. At this day it would not be very
difficult to find men competent to write the life of
Alexander or of Charlemagne, yet by no means so
easy to find one who could do justice to Napoleon.
Lord Bacon was right in leaving his " name and
memory " " to foreign nations and to mine own coun
trymen after some time be passed over." We are
far from thinking Lord Bacon so great as many men
esteem him, but at his death there was no man among
his own countrymen or in foreign nations meet to be
his judge. The followers of Jesus collected only a
few scanty memorials of the man, and they who have
since undertaken his Hfe are proofs that the world has
not caught up with his thoughts, nor . its foremost
men risen high enough to examine, to criticise, and to

176 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
judge a spirit so commanding. But after all, no ad
vance of mankind, no culture, however nice and ex
tensive, will ever enable a Hobbes or a Hume to write
the life of a Jesus or even a Plato. It would be hard,
even now, to find a man in England or out of it
competent to give us the biography of Shakspeare,
even if he had all that annals and memoirs might
furnish. Now an historian is to a nation what a biographer
is to a man: he is not a bare chronicler, to indite the
memoirs of a nation and tickle his reader with a mere
panorama of events, however great and brilliantly
colored, — events which have a connection of time and
place, but no meaning, coming from no recognized
cause and leading to no conclusion ; he is to give us the
nation's Hfe, — its outer life in the civil, military, and
commercial transactions ; its inner Hfe in the thought
and feeling of the people. If the historian undertake
the entire history of a nation that has completed its
career of existence, then he must describe the country i
as it was when the people first appeared to take pos
session thereof, and point out the successive changes
which they effected therein ; the geographical position
of the country, its natural features — its waters,
mountains, plains, its soil, climate, and productions — ¦
all are important elements which help modify the
character of the nation. The historian is to tell of the
origin of the people, of their rise, their decline, their
fall and end ; to show how they acted on the world, and
the world on them, — what was mutually given and re
ceived. The causes which advanced or retarded the
nation are to be sought, and their action explained.
He is to inquire what sentiments and ideas prevailed in
the nation ; whence they came, from without the people

PRESCOTT 177
or from within ; how they got organized, and with what
result. Hence, not merely are the civil and military
transactions to be looked after, but the philosophy
which prevails in the nation is to be ascertained and
discoursed of; the literature, laws, and religion. The
historian is to describe the industrial condition of the
people, — the state of agriculture, commerce, and the
arts, both the useful and the beautiful; to inform us
of the means of internal communication, of the in
tercourse with other nations — military, commercial,
Hterary, or religious. He must tell of the social state
of the people, the relation of the cultivator to the soil,
the relation of class to class. It is important to know
how the revenues of the state are raised ; how the taxes
are levied on person or property, directly or indi
rectly; in what manner they are collected, and how a
particular tax affects the welfare of the people. The
writer of a nation's Hfe must look at the whole people,
not merely at any one class, noble or plebeian, and
must give the net result of their entire action, so that
at the end of his book we can say : " This people had
such sentiments and ideals, which led to this and the
other deeds and institutions, which have been attended
by such and such results ; they added this or that to the
general achievement of the human race."
Now in the history of each nation there are some
eminent men in whom the spirit of the nation seems
to culminate, either because they are more the nation
than the nation is itself or because by their eminent
power they constrain the nation to take the form of
these individuals ; such men are to be distinctly studied
and carefully portrayed, for while embodying the na
tion's genius they are an epitome of its history. In
a first survey we know a nation best by its great men,
II— 12

178 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
as a country by its mountains and its plains, its wat
ers and its shores, — by its great characters. Still,
while these eminent men are to be put in the fore
ground of the picture, the humblest class is by no
means to be neglected. In the family of man there
are elder and younger brothers ; it is a poor history
which neglects either class. A few facts from the
every-day life of the merchant, the slave, the peasant,
the mechanic, are often worth more, as signs of the
times, than a chapter which relates the intrigues of a
courtier, though these are not to be overlooked. It
is well to know what songs the peasant sung, what
prayers he prayed, what food he ate, what tools he
wrought with, what tax he paid, how he stood con
nected with the soil, how he was brought to war and
what weapons armed him for the fight. It is not
very important to know whether General Breakpate
commanded on the right or the left, whether he charged
uphill or downhill, whether he rode a bright chestnut
horse or a dapple gray, nor whether he got dismounted
by the breaking of his saddle-girth or the stumbling
of his beast. But it is important to know whether the
soldiers were accoutred well or ill, and whether they
came voluntarily to the war, and fought in battle
with a will, or were brought to the conflict against their
own consent, not much caring which side was vic
torious. In telling what has been, the historian is also to
tell what ought to be, for he is to pass judgment on
events, and try counsels by their causes first and their
consequences not less. When all these things are told,
history ceases to be a mere panorama of events hav
ing no unity but time and place ; it becomes philosophy
teaching by experience, and has a profound meaning

PRESCOTT 179
and awakens a deep interest, while it tells the lessons
of the past for the warning of the present and edi
fication of the future. A nation is but a single family
of the human race, and the historian should remember
that there is a Hfe of the race, not less than of the
several nations and each special man.
If the historian takes a limited period of the life of
any country for his theme, then it is a single chapter
of the nation's story that he writes. He ought to
show, by way of introduction, what the nation had done
beforehand ; its condition, material and spiritual, the
state of its foreign relations, and at home the state of
industry, letters, law, philosophy, morals, and religion.
And after showing the nation's condition at starting,
he is to tell what was accomplished in the period under
examination ; how it was done, and with what result
at home and abroad. The philosophy of history is
of more importance than the facts of history ; indeed,
save to the antiquary, who has a disinterested love
thereof, they are of little value except as they set
forth that philosophy.
Now the subjective character of an historian con
tinually appears, colors his narrative, and effects the
j'udgment he passes on men and things. You see the
mark of the tonsure in a history written by a priest
or a monk ; his standing-point is commonly the belfry
of his parish church. A courtier, a trifler about the
court of Queen EHzabcth, has his opinion of events,
of their causes and their consequences; a cool and wise
politician judges in his way; and the philosopher,
neither a priest nor courtier, nor yet a politician, writ
ing in either age, comes to conclusions different from
all three. A man's plilosophical, political, moral, and
religious creed will appear in the history he writes.

180 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
M. de Potter and Dr. Neander find very different
things in the early ages of the Christian Church; a
Catholic and a Protestant History of Henry the Eighth
would be unlike. Mr. Bancroft writes the history of
America from the stand-point of ideal democracy, and,
viewed from that point, things are not what they seem
to be when looked at from any actual aristocracy.
Hume, Gibbon, Mackintosh, and Schlosser, Sismondi,
Michelet, and Macaulay, all display their own char
acter in writing their several works. Hume cannot
comprehend a Puritan, nor Gibbon a " Primitive Chris
tian ;" Saint Simon sees little in Fenelon but a disap
pointed courtier, and in William Penn Mr. Bancroft
finds an ideal democrat.
A man cannot comprehend what whoUy transcends
himself. Could a Cherokee write the history of Greece ?
A Mexican, with the average culture of his nation,
would make a sorry figure in delineating the character
of New England. If the historian be a strong man,
his work reflects his own character; if that be boldly
marked, then it continually appears, the one thing
that is prominent throughout his work. In the Life
and Letters of Cromwell we get a truer picture of the
author than of the Protector. The same figure ap
pears in the French Revolution, and all his historical
composition appears but the grand fabling of Mr.
Carlyle. But if the historian is a weak man, a thing
that may happen, more receptive than impressive, then
he reflects the average character of his acquaintance,
the circle of living men he moves in, or of the departed
men whose books he reads. Such an historian makes
a particular country his special study, but can pass
thereon with only the general judgment of his class.
This is true of all similiar men ; the water in the pipe

PRESCOTT 181
rises as high as in the fountain, capillary attraction
aiding what friction hindered ; you know beforehand
what an average party-man will think of any national
measure, because his " thought " does not represent
any individual action of his own, but the general aver
age of his class. So it is with an ordinary clergy
man ; his opinion is not individual but professional. A
strong man must have his own style, his own mode of
sketching the outline, filling up the details, and color
ing his picture ; if he have a mannerism, it must be
one that is his own, growing out of himself, and not
merely on him, while in all this the small man rep
resents only the character of his class ; even his style,
his figures of speech, will have a family mark on them,
his mannerism will not be detected at first because it is
that of all his friends. Perhaps it would make little
difference whether Michael Angelo was born and bred
amid the rugged Alps or in the loveliest garden of
Valombrosa, his genius seeming superior to circum
stances ; but with an artist who has little original and
creative power, local peculiarities affect his style and
appear in all his works.
Now within a thousand years a great change has
come over the spirit of history. The historical writ
ings of Venerable Bede and of Louis Blanc, the
Speculum Hystoriale of Vincencius Bellovacensis, so
eagerly printed once and scattered all over Europe, and
the work of Mr. Macaulay, bear marks of their re
spective ages, and are monuments which attest the
progress of mankind in the historic art.
In the middle ages Chivalry prevailed ; a great re
spect was felt for certain prescribed rules, a great
veneration for certain eminent persons. Those rules
were not always or necessarily rules of nature, but only

182 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
of convention; nor were the persons always or neces
sarily those most meet for respect, but men accidentally
eminent oftener than marked for any substantial and
personal excellence. The spirit of chivalry appears
in the writers of that time, — in the song and the ro
mance, in history and annals, in homilies, and in pray
ers and creed. Little interest is taken in the people,
only for their chiefs ; little concern is felt by great men
for industry, commerce, art, much for arms. Primo
geniture extended from law into literature ; history was
that of elder brothers, and men accidentally eminent
seemed to monopolize distinction in letters, and to hold
possession of history by perpetual entail. History
was aristocratic, rank alone was respected, and it was
thought there were but a few hundred persons in the
world worth writing of or caring for ; the mass were
thought only the sand on which the mighty walked
and useful only for that end, their lives were vulgar
lives, their blood was puddle blood, and their deaths
were vulgar deaths.
Of late years a very different spirit has appeared;
slowly has it arisen, very slow, but it is real and
visible, — the spirit of humanity. This manifests it
self in a respect for certain rules, but they must be laws
of nature, rules of justice and truth; and in respect
for all mankind. Arms yield not to the gown only,
but to the frock; and the aproned smith with his
creative hand beckons destructive soldiers to an humbler
seat, and they begin with shame to take the lower place,
not always to be allowed them. This spirit of hu
manity appears in legislation, where we will not now
follow it; but it appears also in literature. Therein
primogeniture is abolished, the entail is broken, the
monopoly at an end ; the elder sons are not neglected,

PRESCOTT 183
but the younger brothers are also brought into notice.
In history, as in trade, the course is open to talent.
History is becoming democratic. The life of the
people is looked after ; men write of the ground whereon
the mighty walk. While the coins, the charters, and
the capitularies — which are the monuments of kings
¦ — are carefully sought after, men look also for the
songs, the legends, the ballads, which are the medals of
the people, stamped with their image and super
scription, and in these find materials for the biography
of a nation. The manners and customs of the great
mass of men are now investigated, and civil and mih-
tary transactions are thought no longer the one thing
most needful to record. This spirit of humanity consti
tutes the charm in the writings of Niebuhr, Schlosser,
Sismondi, Michelet, Bancroft, Grote, Macaulay, the
greatest historians of the age ; they write in the interest
of mankind. The absence of this spirit is a sad de
fect in the writings of Mr. Carlyle; himself a giant,
he writes history in the interest only of giants.
Since this change has taken place a new demand is
made of an historian of our times. We have a right
to insist that he shaU give us the philosophy of history,
and report the lessons thereof, as well as record the
facts. He must share the spirit of humanity which
begins to pervade the age ; he must not write in the
interest of a class, but of mankind, — in the interest
of natural right and justice. Sometimes, however, a
man may be excused for lacking the philosophy of
history; no one could expect it of a Turk; if a Rus
sian were to write the history of France, it would be
easy to forgive him if he wrote in the interest of ty
rants. But when a man of New England undertakes to
write a history, there is less excuse if his book should be

184 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
wanting in philosophy and in humanity; less merit if
it abound therewith.
Mr. Prescott has selected for his theme one of the
most important periods of history, from the middle of
the fifteenth to the middle of the sixteenth century.
The three greatest events of modern times took place
during that period; the art of printing was invented,
America discovered, the Prostestant Reformation was
begun. It was a period of intense life and various
activity, in forms not easily understood at this day.
The revival of letters was going forward ; the classic
models of Greece and Rome were studied anew ; the re
vival, also, of art ; Lionardo da Vinci, Pietro Perugino,
Michael Angelo, Raphael, were achieving their
miracles of artistic skill. Science began anew ; new
ideas seemed to dawn upon mankind ; modern literature
received a fresh impulse. The new thought presently
reported itself in all departments of life. ¦ Navigation
was improved; commerce extended, a new world was
discovered, and, baited by the hope of gold or driven
by discontent and restless love of change, impelled by
desire of new things or constrained by conscience, the
Old World rose and poured itself on a new continent,
and with new ideas to found empires mightier than the
old. In Europe a revolution advanced with the steps
of an earthquake. The Hercules-pillars of authority
were shaken; the serf rose against his lord, the great
barons everywhere were losing their power, the great
kings consolidating their authority. Feudal institutions
reeled with the tossings of the ground, and fell to rise
no more. It was the age of the Medici, of Machiavelli,
and of Savonarola; of Erasmus and Copernicus; of
John Wessel, Reuchlin, Scaliger, and Agricola ; Luther
and Loyola lived in that time. The ninety-five theses,

PRESCOTT 185
were posted on the church door; the Utopia was
written. There were Chevalier Bayard and Gonsalvo
" the Great Captain ;" Cardinal Ximenes, and Co
lumbus. Two great works mark this period, — one,
the establishment of national unity of action in the
great monarchies of Europe, the king conquering the
nobles ; the other the great insurrection of mind and
conscience against arbitrary power in the school, the
state, the church, — an insurrection which no legions of
mediaeval scholars, no armies, and no Councils of Basil
and of Trent could prevent or long hinder from its
work. Writing of this age, Mr. Prescott takes for his
chief theme one of the most prominent nations of the
world. Spain, however, was never prominent for
thought ; no idea welcomed by other nations was ever
born or fostered in her lap ; she has no great philos
opher, not one who has made a mark on the world ; no
great poet known to all nations ; not a single orator,
ecclesiastic or political; she has been mother to few
great names in science, arts, or literature. In com
merce, Venice and Genoa long before Spain, England
and HoUand at a later date, have far out-travelled
her. Even in arms, save the brief glory shed thereon
by the Great Captain, Spain has not been dis
tinguished; surely not as France, England, and even
the Low Countries. But her geographical position is
an important one, between the Atlantic and the
Mediterranean. At the time in question her popula
tion was great, perhaps nearly twice that of Eng
land; and she played an important part in the affairs
of Europe, while England had little to do with the
continent. Spain was connected with the Arabs, for
some centuries the most civilized people in Europe;

186 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
hence she came in contact with industry, skill, and
riches, with letters and with art, and enjoyed op
portunities denied to all the other nations of Europe.
For her subsequent rank among nations, Spain is in
debted to two events, which, as they did not come from
the genius of the people, may be called accidental.
One was the connection with the house of Austria, the
singular circumstance which placed the united crowns
of Castile and Arragon on the same head which bore
the imperial diadem of Germany. This accident gave
a lustre to Spain in the age of Charles the Fifth and
his successor. But the other cause, seemingly more
accidental, has given Spain a place in history which
nothing else could have done, the fact that when the
Genoese navigator first crossed the Atlantic the Spanish
flag was at his masthead.
Mr. Prescott writes of Spain at her most important
period, at the time when the two monarchies of Castile
and Arragon were blent into one, when the Moors were
conquered and expelled, the Inquisition established, the
Jews driven out, the old laws revised, a new world dis
covered, conquered, settled, its nations put to slavery,
Christianity, or death; an age when Negro Slavery,
Christianity, and the Inquisition first visited this west
ern world. Not only has the historian a great age
to delineate and great events to deal with, — a new
continent to describe, a new race to report on, their
origin, character, language, literature, art, manners,
and religion ; but, to enliven his picture, he has great
men to portray. We will not speak of Ferdinand, Isa
bella, and Charles the Fifth, who pass often before us
in kingly grandeur ; but there are Gonsalvo, Ximenes,
and Columbus, here are Cortes and Pizarro.
Few historians have had an age so noble to describe ;

PRESCOTT 187
a theme so rich in events, in ideas, and in men ; an
opportunity so fortunate to present the lessons of his
tory to ages yet to come. The author has this further
advantage ; he lives far enough from the age he writes
of to be beyond its bigotry and its rage. The noises
of a city hardly reach the top of a steeple, aU the din
of battle is hushed and still far below the top of Mont
Blanc; and so in a few years the passions, the heat,
the dust, the rage and noises of kings and nations are
all silenced and lost in the immeasurable stillness which
settles down upon the past. If the thinker pauses from
his busy thought, and after a year or so returns thither
again, how clear it aH becomes ! So is it with mankind ;
the problems of that age are no problems now, what
could not then be settled with all the noise of parlia
ments and of arms in the after-silence of mankind has
got its solution. Yet Mr. Prescott does not live so far
from the time he treats of that genuis alone has power
to recall the faded images thereof, to disquiet and
bring it up again to life. Yet he lives so remote that
he can judge counsels by their consequences as easily
as by their cause; can judge theories, laws, institu
tions, and great men by the influence they have had on
the world, by their seal and signal mark. In addition
to these advantages, he lives in a land where there is
no censorship of the press ; where the body is free, and
the mind free, and the conscience free to him who will.
His position and his theme are both enviable, giving
an historian of the greatest genius scope for all his
powers. To judge only from his writings, Mr. Prescott is
evidently a man with a certain niceness of literary
culture not very common in America, of a careful if not
exact scholarship in the languages and Hterature of

188 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Italy and Spain. Perhaps he cannot boast a very wide
acquaintance with literature, ancient or modern, but
is often nice and sometimes critical in his learning.
He is one of the few Americans not oppressed by the
Res angusta domi who devote themselves to literature,
to a life of study and the self-denial it demands in all
countries and eminently here, where is no literary class
to animate the weary man. His quotations indicate a
wealthy library, his own fortune enabling him to pro
cure books which are rare even in Spain itself. Where
printed books fail, manuscripts, also, have been dili
gently sought. He writes in a mild and amiable
spirit; if he differ frpm other historians, he empties
no vials of wrath upon their heads. He always shows
himself a gentleman of letters, treating his companions
with agreeable manners and courtesy the most amiable.
Few lines in these volumes appear marked with any
asperity, or dedicated in any sourness of temper. These
few we shall pass upon in their place.
Within less than thirteen years eight volumes have
appeared from his hand; the first evidently the work
of many years, but the last five volumes reveal a
diligence and ability to work not common amongst the
few literary gentlemen of America. Labor under dis
advantages always commands admiration. How many
have read with throbbing heart the lives of men
pursuing " knowledge under difficulties," yet such men
often had one advantage which no wealth could give,
no colleges and guidance of accomplished men supply,
an able intellect and the unconquerable will; but Mr.
Prescott has pursued his labors under well-known dif
ficulties, which might make the stoutest quail. These
things considered, no fair man can fail to honor the
accomplished author, and to rejoice in the laurels so

PRESCOTT 189
beautifully won and worn with modesty and grace.
After this long preamble, let us now examine the
three works before us, and see how the author has done
the high duties of an historian. Treating of this
great theme, we shall speak of the three works in their
chronological order, and examine in turn the History
of Spain, of Mexico, and of Peru,2 in each case speak
ing of the substance of the work, first in details, then
as a whole, and next of its form. The remainder of
this article will be devoted to the History of Ferdinand
and IsabeUa.
To understand what was done by Ferdinand and Isa
bella we must know what had been achieved before their
time; must take the national account of stock. This
Mr. Prescott undertakes in his Introduction ; but he
fails to render an adequate account of the condition of
Castile and Arragon, and of course it is not easy for
the reader to appreciate the changes that subsequently
were made therein.
To be a little more specific; his account of the con
dition of the law is meagre and inadequate, the history
of the reform and codification of laws poor and hardly
inteHigible, and though he returns upon the theme in
the general account of the administration of Ferdi
nand and Isabella, still it is not well and adequately
done. What he says of the Cortes of Castile and
that of Arragon does not give one a clear idea of
the actual condition and power of those, bodies. He
does not tell us by whom and how the members were
chosen to their office, how long they held it and on what
condition. The reader wonders at the meagreness of
this important portion of the work, especially when
such materials lay ready before his hands. After all,
we find a more complete and intelligible account of the

190 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
constitution, of the laws, and of the administration of
justice in the brief chapter of Mr. Hallam's work than
in this elaborate history. Nay, the work of Mr. Dun
ham, written for the Cabinet Cyclopaedia, written ap
parently in haste and not always in good temper, gives
a far better account of that matter than Mr. Prescott.
This is a serious defect, and one not to be anticipated
in an historian who in this country undertakes to de
scribe to us the ancient administration of a foreign
land. With a sigh the student remembers the masterly
chapter of Gibbon which treats of the administration
of justice and of the Roman law, a chapter which made
a new era in the study of the subject itself, and longs
for some one to guide him in this difficult and crooked
path. With the exception of the Code of the Visi
goths, the Fuero Juzgo, and the Siete Partidas, works
of Spanish law or treating thereof are in but few
hands; Marina, Zuaznavar, and Garcia de la Madrid
can be but little known in England or America, for
information the general scholar must here depend on
the historian ; considering the important place that
Spanish legislation has held, the wide reach of the
Spanish dominion on both continents, it was particu
larly needful to have in this work a clear, thorough, and
masterly digest of this subject.
In speaking of the revenue of the kingdom, Mr.
Prescott does not inform us how it was collected, nor
from what sources. We are told that the king had his
royal demesnes, that on some occasions one-fifth of the
spoils of war belonged to him, and it appears that a
certain proportion of the proceeds of the mines was
his ; but there is no systematic or methodical account of
the revenues. True, he tells us that Isabella obtains
money by mortgaging her real estate and pawning her

PRESCOTT 191
personal property ; afterwards it appears, accidentally,
that two-ninths of the tithes, Tercias, formed a part
of the royal income. We are told that the revenues
increased thirty-fold during this administration. It is
mentioned as a proof of sagacity in the ruler and of the
welfare of the people ; but we are not told whence they
were derived, and it appears that in 1504 the single
city of Seville paid nearly one-sixth of the whole
revenue.* In a note he tells us that the bulk of the
crown revenue came from the Tercias and the Alcavalas.
The latter was an odious tax of ten per cent, on all
articles bought, sold, or transferred. Mr. Prescott
tells us it was commuted, but how or for what he does
not say.
Armies figure largely in any history of Spain, but
it is in vain that we ask of Mr. Prescott how the
armies were raised, and on what principle, the modern
or the feudal; how they were equipped, paid, fed, and
clothed. He often dwells upon battles, telling us who
commanded on the right or the left, can describe at
length the tournament of Trani and the duel between
Bayard and Sotomayor; but he nowhere gives us a
description of the military estate of the realm, and no
where relates the general plan of a campaign. This,
also, is a serious defect in any history, especially in
that of a nation of the fifteenth century, a period of
transition. He does not inform us of the state of in
dustry, trade, and commerce, or touch, except in
cidentally, upon the effect of the laws thereon. Yet
during this reign the laws retarded industry in all its
forms, to a great degree. Soon after the discovery of
* Mr. Prescott says near a tenth. This is probably a clerical
or typographical error. The whole amount is given in the au
thority as 209,500,000 maravedis, of which Seville paid 30,-
971,096.

192 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
America, Spain forbade the exportation of gold and
silver, and, as Don Clemencin says, " our industry
would have died from apoplexy of money, if the ob
servance of the laws established in this matter had not
been sufficient for its ruin." At a later date it was
forbidden to export even the raw material of silk and
wool. " Spain," says M. Blanqui, the latest writer on
the political economy of that country that we have
seen, " is the country of all Europe where the rashest
and most cruel experiments have been made at the
expense of industry, which has almost always been
treated as a foe, managed to the death (exploitee a
I'outrance) instead of being protected by the govern
ment, and regarded as a thing capable of taxation,
rather than a productive element." Restrictions were
laid not only on intercourse with foreign nations, but
on the traffic between province and province, and a
tax, sometimes an enormous one, the Alcavala, was col
lected from the sale of all articles whatever. " Mem
bers of the legal and military profession," says M.
Blanqui, " affected the most profound contempt for
every form of industry. Any man who exercised a
trade was disgraced for life. A noble who ventured
to work lost his privilege of nobility, and brought his
family to shame. No town accepted an artisan for its
alcalde; the Cortes of Arragon, says Marina, never
admitted to their assembly a deputy who came from
the industrial class. You would think you were read
ing Aristotle and Cicero when you find in the writers,
and even in the laws of Spain, those haughty expres
sions of contempt for the men who bow their faces
towards the earth, and stoop to smite the anvil or tend
a loom." Mr. Prescott does not notice the condition of the

PRESCOTT 193
people, except in terms the most general and vague.
Yet great changes were taking place at that time in
the condition of the laboring class. He does not even
tell us what relation the peasantry bore to the soil;
how they held it, by what tenure, for what time, what
relation they bore to the nobles and the knights. In
Castile Mr. Hallam says there was no villanage. Mr.
Prescott gives us no explanation of the fact, and does
not mention the fact itself. In Catalonia a portion of
the peasantry passed out of the condition of vassalage,
— Mariana calls them Pageses, others Vassals de
Remenza, — to that of conditional freedom, by paying
an annual tax to their former owner, or to entire free
dom by the payment of a sum twenty times as large.
This was an important event in the civil history of
Spain. Mr. Prescott barely relates the fact. From
other sources we have learned, we knew not how truly,
that no artisan was allowed in the Cortes of Arragon,
that only nobles were eligible to certain offices there,
and no nobles were taxed.
In aU this History there are no pictures from the
lives of the humble, yet a glimpse into the cottage of
a peasant, or even at the beggary of Spain in the
fifteenth century, would be instructive, and help a
stranger to understand the nation. Much is said, in
deed, of the wealthier class, of the nobles, and of the
clergy, but we find it impossible from this History
alone to form a complete idea of their position in the
kingdom ; of their relation to one another, to the people,
or the crown; of the number of the clergy, of their
education, their character, their connection with the
nobles or the people, of their general influence — he
has nothing to tell us. He pays little regard to the
progress of society; to advances made in the com-
11—13

194 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
forts of life, in the means of journeying from place to
place. Now and then it is said that the roads were
in bad order, and so a march was delayed; even at
this day the means of internal communication are so
poor, the roads so few and impracticable, that some
provinces lie in a state of almost entire isolation. Says
M. Blanqui, " More than one province of Spain could
be mentioned which is more inaccessible than the greater
part of our most advanced positions in Africa."
" Castile and Catalonia differ as much as Russia and
Germany, and the inhabitants of Gallicia do not under
take the journey to Andalusia so often as the French
that to Constantinople."
A philosophical inquirer wants information on aU
these subjects, and the general reader has no authority
but histories Hke this. It cannot be said that Mr.
Prescott feared to encumber his work with such de
tails, and make his volumes too numerous or big. He
has space to spare for frivolous details ; he can describe
the pageant afforded by the royal pair in the camp
before Moclin, in 1486 ; can tell us that " the queen
herself rode a chestnut mule, seated on a saddle-chair
embossed with gold and silver ;"' that "the housings
were of a crimson color, and the bridles of satin were
curiously wrought with letters of gold ;" that " the In
fanta wore a skirt of fine velvet over others of brocade,
a scarlet mantilla of the Moorish fashion and a black
hat trimmed with gold embroidery," and that the king
" was dressed in a crimson doublet with chausses or
breeches of yellow satin. Over his shoulders was
thrown a cassock or mantilla of rich brocade, and a
sopra vest of the same material concealed his cuirass.
By his side, close girt, he wore a Moorish scymitar,
and beneath his bonnet his hair was confined by a cap

PRESCOTT 195
or head-dress of the finest stuff. Ferdinand was
mounted on a noble war-horse of a bright chestnut
color." The account of the Inquisition is eminently unsat
isfactory. No adequate motive is assigned for it, no
sufficient cause. It stands in this book as a thing
with consequences enough, and bad enough, but no
cause ; you know not why it came. Mr. Prescott treats
Catholicism fairly. We do not remember a line in
these volumes which seems dictated by anti-Catholic
bigotry. He has no sympathy with the Inquisition,
he looks on it with manly aversion ; but he treats the
subject with little ability, not showing how subtly the
Inquisition worked, undermining the church and the
state, and corrupting life in its most sacred sources.
Who made the Inquisition, for what purpose was its
machinery set a-going, what effect did it have on the
whole nation ? — these are questions which it was Mr.
Prescott's business to answer, but which, as we think,
he has failed to answer. Whosoever brought it to pass,
there is little doubt but it gained Ferdinand and Isa-
beUa the title of Catholic. But our historian does not
like to lay the blame on them ; they are the heroes of
his story. Ferdinand may indeed be blamed,j — it were
difficult in this century to write and not blame him;
but Isabella must not be censured for this — her hero
ism is to be spotless. The spirit of chivalry in our
author is too strong for the spirit of humanity. He
thinks Ferdinand may have had political motives for
establishing the Inquisition, but Isabella only religious
motives for its establishment in Castile. Certainly
there was a great blame somewhere ; it falls not on
the people who had neither the ability nor the will to
establish it, nor on the aristocracy of nobles and rich

196 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
men, — they had much to lose, and little to gain ; it
was always hateful to them. The priests, no doubt,
were in favor of the Inquisition, but they could not
have introduced it ; nay, could have had little influence
in bringing it about if the crown had opposed it.
Ferdinand and Isabella were no slaves to the priesthood,
they knew how to favor the interests of the church
when it served their turn ; but no forehead was more
brazen, on hand more iron than theirs to confront and
put down any insolence of sacerdotal power. Isabella
did not favor the old Archbishop of Toledo; she
abridged the power of the priests ; nay, that of the
Pope, and easily seized from him what other monarchs
had long clutched at in vain. She allowed no appeals
to him. The Pragmaticas of Isabella tended to re
strict the power of the clergy and of the Pope within
narrower limits than before. Ferdinand and Isabella
are the very parties to be blamed for the Inquisition ;
if so enlightened above their age the more to be blamed,
if cool-headed and farsighted they deserve more re
proach, if Isabella were so religious as it is contended
then the severest censure is to be pronounced against
her. It was only thirty-six years before the Reforma
tion that she introduced the Inquisition to Castile. It
is idle to lay the blame on Torquemada ; we profess no
great veneration for this genuine son of Saint Dominic,
but let him answer for his own sins, not his master's.
We cannot but think history is unjust in painting Isa
bella so soft and fair, while her inquisitor-general is
portrayed in the blackest colors, and she, with all her
intelligence, charity, and piety, puts the necks of the
people into his remorseless hands. Ferdinand and Isa
bella were not fools, to be deluded by a priest, however
cunning. It seems to us that the Inquisition must be

PRESCOTT 197
set down to their account, and should cover them both
with shame ; that as James the Second is to be blamed
for Jefferies and the bloody assizes, so are Ferdinand
and Isabella for Torquemada and the Inquisition. Mr.
Prescott admits the most obvious and pernicious cruel
ties thereof, but has not the heart to trace the evil to
its source. It is the fashion of certain writers to dwell
with delight on every fault committed by the masses of
men. What eloquent denunciation have we heard on
the " horrid crimes of the old French Revolution ;"
" horrid crimes " they were and let them be denounced,
but when the writers come to butcheries done by the
masters of mankind they have no voice to denounce
such atrocities. Yet both equally proceed from the
same maxim, that might is right. Llorente may be
wrong in the numbers who suffered by the Inquisition ;
perhaps there were not 13,000 burned alive at the
stake, and 191,143 who suffered other tortures. Sup
pose there were but half that number, nay, a tenth
part ; still it is enough to cover any monarchy in Eu
rope, since the twelfth century, with shame. Grant
that Torquemada proj ected the scheme ; the fact that
Isabella allowed it to be executed shows that she was of
soul akin to her infamous ancestor, Peter the Cruel,
and deserves the sharp censure of every just historian.
We come next to speak of the Moors and Jews. At
the time of Ferdinand and Isabella there were in Spain
two distinct tribes of men. On the one side were the
descendants of the Visigoths, one of the new nations
who had appeared in history not many centuries be
fore, and united with the existing population of Spain,
as the Romans had formerly united with the settlers
they found there; on the other side were two nations,
descended, as it is said, from Abram, the mythological

198 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ancestor of numerous tribes of Asia, the Moors and
the Jews. Both of these nations had been for centuries
distinguished for their civilization ; they had long dwelt
on the same soil with the Spaniards, and if we may
believe the tale, few families of the Spanish nobility
were quite free from all Moorish or all Hebrew taint.
A philosophical historian would find an attractive
theme in the meeting of nations so diverse in origin,
language, manners, and religion, as the sons of the
East and the West. It would be curious to trace the
effects of their union, to learn what the Hebrews and
the Moors had brought to Spain and what they es
tablished there; how much had been gained by this
mingling of races, which, as some think, is a perpetual
condition of national progress. The Jews were not
barbarians, they are commonly superior to the class
they mingle with in all countries. The Moors were
amongst the most enlightened nations of Europe:
they had done much to promote the common industrial
arts, the higher arts of beauty; they had practiced
agriculture and the mechanic arts with skill and
science, for unlike the Spaniards, they were not
ashamed of work ; they had fostered science and letters,
on their hearth had kept the sacred fire snatched from
the altar of the Muses before their temple went to the
ground, and still fed and watched its flame, in some
ages almost alone the guardians of that vestal fire.
The English reader familiar with Gibbon's account of
the Arabian race, — a chapter not without its faults,
but which even now must still be called masterly, —
looks for something not inferior in this history, where
the occasion equally demands it. But he looks in vain.
The chapter which treats of the Spanish Arabs, though
not without merit, is hardly worthy of a place in a
history written in this age of the world.

PRESCOTT 199
After the two chief monarchies of Spain were prac
tically united into one, it was not to be expected that
the Catholic sovereigns would allow so fair a portion
of the peninsula to remain in the hands of the Moors.
They had only been there on sufferance, and seem never
to have recovered from their terrible defeat in 1210.
Spanish sovereigns, with the spirit of that age, would
wish to subdue the Moors — Christians, the " In
fidels ;" and when such feelings exist an occasion for
war is not long to seek. The conquest of a rich king
dom like that of Granada with a high civilization, is an
affair of much importance; the explusion of a whole
people in modern times, though still meditated by men
whom the chances of an election bring to the top of
society in Republican America, is an unusual thing, and
in this case it was barbarous not less than unusual.
Mr. Prescott does justice to the industry, intel
ligence, skill, and the general civilization of the Moors ;
while he points out defects and blemishes in their in
stitutions with no undue severity, he has yet just and
beautiful things to say of them. But he glozes over
the injustice shown towards them, and averts the
sympathy of the reader for the suffering nation by
the remark, that " they had long since reached their
utmost limit of advancement as a people ;" " that dur
ing the latter period of their existence they appear to
have reposed in a state, of torpid and luxurious in
dulgence, which would seem to argue that when causes
of external excitement were withdrawn the inherent
vices of their social institutions had incapacitated them
from the further production of excellence." Then he
puts the blame, if blame there be, on Providence, and
says, " in this impotent condition it was wisely ordered
that their territory should be occupied by a people

200 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
whose religion and more liberal form of government
qualified them for advancing still higher the
interests of humanity." Mr. Prescott elsewhere
speaks with manly and becoming indignation of the
conduct of Ximenes, who burnt the elegant libraries of
the Moors ; yet he has not censure enough, it seems to
us, for the barbarous edict which drove the Moors into
hypocrisy or exile.
The expulsion of the Jews is treated of in the same
spirit: the blame is laid in part on the priests, on
Torquemada, and in part on the spirit of the age.
Both were bad enough, no doubt, but if Ferdinand and
Isabella, as represented, were before their age in states
manship, and the latter far in advance of its religion,
we see not how they can be shielded from blame. It
is the duty of an historian to measure men by the gen
eral standard of their times, — certainly we are not to
expect the morals of the nineteenth century from one
who lived in the ninth; but it is also the historian's
duty to criticise that spirit, and when a superior man
rises he must not be judged merely by the low standard
of his age, but the absolute standard of all ages. Such
a judgment we seldom find in this work. Many acts
of these princes show that they were short-sighted.
Allowing Isabella's zeal for the church, which is
abundantly proved, it must yet be confessed that she
possessed its worst qualities < — bigotry, intolerance,
and cruelty — in what might be called the heroic de
gree. Ferdinand cared little for any interest but his
own. We doubt, after all, if it was love of the church
which expelled the Moors and the Jews, and think
it was a love yet more vulgar; namely, the love of
plunder. He hit the nail on the head who declared
that uncounted numbers of Jews were richer than

PRESCOTT 201
Christians — iwmumeri \_JudS030rumJ Christiants diti-
ores. The Jews displayed their usual firmness in refus
ing to pretend to be converted, but their resolution to
adhere to the faith of their fathers and their conscience
meets with but scanty praise from our author, living
under institutions formed by religious exiles, though
he caHs it " an extraordinary act of self-devotion."
Mr. Prescott's defence of Isabella does little honor
to his head or heart, but is in harmony with the gen
eral tone of the history. The Catholic sovereign thus
struck a deadly blow at the industry of the nation.
The Moors had almost created agriculture in Spain;
they had founded the most important manufactures,
that of silk, wool, leather, and of tempered steel.
They were ingenious mechanics and excellent artists.
Since that time foreigners have braved the national
prejudice against manual work. It was the Flemish
and the Italians who re-established the manufacture
of tapestry, of woolen goods, and of work in wood;
and more recently the English and French have en
gaged there in the manufacture of linen, cotton, and
mixed goods. In the time of Louis XIV. more than
seventy-five thousand Frenchmen had gone to settle
in Spain.
Mr. Prescott's account of the literature of Spain
has been much admired, not wholly without reason.
The chapters which treat of the Castilian Hterature
were certainly needed for the completeness of the work.
Everybody knows how much Mr. Schlosser adds to
the value of his histories by his laborious examination
of the literature, science, and art of the nations he
describes. To know a nation's deeds we must under
stand its thoughts. " It will be necessary," says Mr.
Prescott, " in order to complete the view of the internal

202 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
administration of Ferdinand and Isabella, to show its
operation on the intellectual culture of the nation.
It is particularly deserving of note in
the present reign which stimulated the active develop
ment of the national energies in every department of
science, and which forms a leading epoch in the orna
mental literature of the country. The present and
following chapter will embrace the mental progress of
the kingdom,  through the whole of
Isabella's reign, in order to exhibit as far as possible
its entire results."
The education of Isabella was neglected in her
youth, and at a mature age she undertook to supply
her defects, and studied with such success, says one
of her contemporaries, that " in less than a year her
admirable genius enabled her to obtain so good a
knowledge of the Latin tongue that she could under
stand without much difficulty what was written or
spoken in it." She took pains with the education of
her own children, and those of the nobility. She in
vited Peter Martyr and Marinaao Siculo to aid in edu
cating the nobility, which they readily did. Mr. Pres
cott mentions the names of several noblemen who en
gaged zealously in the pursuit of letters. " No Span
iard," says Giovio, " was accounted noble who held
science in indifference." Men of distinguished birth
were eager, we are told, to lead the way in science.
Lords, also, of illustrious rank, lent their influence to
the cause of good letters; one lady, called La Latina,
instructed the Queen in the Roman tongue, another
lectured on the Latin classics at Salamanca, and a
third on rhetoric at Alcala. Yet, spite of all this
royal zeal, this feminine and noble attention to letters,
Mr. Prescott confesses that little progress was made

PRESCOTT 203
in the poetic art since the beginning of the century.
Once cause thereof he finds in the rudeness of the lan
guage, which certainly had not become more rude dur
ing the progress of so much Latinity and rhetoric;
and another " in the direction to utility manifested in
this active reign, which led such as had leisure for
intellectual pursuits to cultivate science rather than
abandon themselves to the mere revels of the imagina
tion." Let us look at this subject a little more in detail,
and see what opportunities Spain had for intellectual
culture, what use she made of them, what results were
obtained, and how Mr. Prescott has described " the
mental progress of the nation."
The Arabians, as we have twice said before, were
for some time the most enlightened nation in the world ;
they cultivated arts, the useful and the elegant, with
singular success; they diligently studied physics and
metaphysics; they pursued literature, and have left
behind them numerous proofs of their zeal, if not of
their genius. There was a time when the great classic
masters of science were almost forgotten by the
Christians, but carefully studied and held in honor by
the disciples of Mahomet. Men of other nations
sought instruction in their schools, or sat at the feet
of their sages, or studied and translated their work-s.
By means of their vicinity to the Moorish Arabs the
Spaniards had an excellent opportunity to cultivate
science and letters, but they made little use of those
advantages. Robert and Daniel Morley, Campano,
Atkelhard, Gerbert of Aurillac (afterwards Sylvester
II.), and others, learned from the Arabian masters;
but there were few or no Spaniards of any eminence
who took pains to study the thought of their Mahom
etan neighbors.

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It seems to us that Mr. Prescott a good deal over
rates the literary tendency of the Spaniards under
Ferdinand and Isabella. It is true, at that time a
great movement of thought went on in the rest of
Europe. The capture of Constantinople drove the
Greek scholars from their ancient home; the printing-
press diffused the Scriptures, the ancient laws, the old
classics, spreading new thought rapidly and wide.
Literature and philosophy were studied with great
vigor. This new movement appeared in Italy, in
Switzerland, in Germany, and France, even in Eng
land. But in Spain we find few and inconsiderable
traces thereof. Mr. Prescott cites Erasmus for the
fact that " liberal studies were brought in the course
of a few years in Spain to so flourishing a condition,
as might not only excite the admiration but serve as
a model to the most cultivated nations of Europe."
But it deserves to be remembered that Erasmus made
this statement in a letter to a Spanish professor at
the University of Alcala, and besides, founds his praise
on the religion as much as on the learning of the
country. In a former letter he had said that the
study of literature had been neglected in Germany to
such a degree that men would not take learning if
offered for nothing, — " nobody was willing to hear the
professors who were supported at the public charge."
But elsewhere Erasmus knows how to say that in Ger
many their " schools of learning were numerous as the
towns." But this is of small importance.
It is certain that Ferdinand and Isabella did some
thing to promote the literary culture of their people;
yet it had not been wholly neglected before the Uni
versity of Huesca (Osca) was certainly old. Plutarch
in his Life of Sertorius informs us that the Roman

PRESCOTT 205
general founded a school there, and some one says
that Pontius Pilate was a " Professor Juris " — ¦
utriusque juris, we suppose — on that foundation;
Spaniards may believe the story. The University of
Seville was founded in 990, that of Valencia in 1200,
or about that time, that of Salamanca in 1239, — ¦
though some place it earlier and some much later;
universities had been founded at Lerida and Valladolid
in the fourteenth century. This statement may read
well on paper, but it is plain that universities had
done little to enlighten the nation, otherwise Cardinal
Ximenes had never celebrated that auto da fe with
the Arabian libraries.
Queen Isabella, we are told, encouraged the intro
duction of printing into Spain, and caused many of
the works of her own subjects to be printed at her
own charge; that she exempted a German printer
from taxation, and allowed foreign books to be im
ported free of duty. But more than twenty years
elapsed after the discovery of the art before we hear
of a single printing-press in the kingdom ; and dur
ing the whole of the fifteenth century we cannot find
that four hundred editions were printed in all Spain,
while during that period the press of Florence had
sent forth five hundred and fifty-three, that of Milan
six hundred and eighty-three, that of Paris seven
hundred and fifty-seven, Rome nine hundred and fifty-
three, Venice three thousand one hundred and thirty-
seven. The little city of Strasburg alone had pub
lished more than the whole kingdom of Spain. About
fifteen thousand editions were printed in the last
thirty years of that century. The character of the
works printed in Spain is significant ; first of all comes
a coUection of songs in honor of the Virgin, setting

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forth the miraculous conception. It is true, a transla
tion of the Bible into the Limousin dialect was printed
at Valencia in 1478, but during the fifteenth century
we do not find that a single edition of the Vulgate or
of the Civil Law was printed in all Spain, though no
less than ninety-eight editions of the Latin Bible came
forth from the presses of Europe.
Mr. Prescott professes to describe the mental pro
gress of the nation. To accomphsh this the historian
must tell us the result of what was done in law, in
the study of the Roman, the National, and the Canon
Law, for all three have been important elements in
the development of the Spanish nation ; what was done
in physics ; in metaphysics, including ethics and
theology, and in general literature. Now Mr. Pres
cott, in this examination, passes entirely over the first
three departments, and bestows his labor wholly upon
the last. It is true, he treats of the alteration of the
laws in his last chapter, but in a brief and unsatis
factory style. Yet he had before told us that the at
tention of studious men was directed to science, and it
is elsewhere asserted that much was done in this reign
for the reformation and codification of the laws. It
would be interesting to the mere reader, and highly
important to the philosophical student who wishes to
understand the mental progress of Spain, to know how
much the Roman Law was studied, how much the
Canon Law, and what modifications were made thereby
in the national institutions themselves, by whom, and
with what effect. After all that has been written of
late years, it would not be difficult, certainly not im-
posible, to do this. The publication of Las Siete Par-
tidas for the first time in 1491, twenty years after the
accession of Isabella to the throne, was an important

PRESCOTT 207
event; the legal labors of Alfonso de Montalvo de
served some notice ; the celebrated Consolato del Mare,
which has had so important an influence on the mari
time laws of Europe and America, and first got printed
during this reign, certainly required some notice,
even in a brief sketch of the intellectual history of
that reign. In all Catholic countries the study of
the Canon Law is of great importance, but during the
fifteenth century, though more than forty editions
thereof got printed in other parts of Europe, we do
not find one in Spain.
In science, including the mathematics and all de
partments of physics, the Spanish did little. Yet
circumstances were uncommonly favorable; the con
quest of Granada put them in possession of the libra
ries of the Moors, which were destined only to the
flames; under the guidance of Columbus, they dis
covered new lands and had ample oportunities to study
the geography, zoology, and botany of countries so
inviting to the naturahst. But nothing was done. It
is true, Andres, with his national prejudices, under
takes to mention some names that are illustrious in medi
cine, but Piquer and Lampillas, Monardes, Christoforo
da Costa, Laguma, " the Spanish Galen," and the rest
that he mentions, may be celebrated throughout all
Spain and even in La Mancha ; we think they are but
little known elsewhere. In the departments of geo
graphy and astronomy the Spanish accomplished noth
ing worthy of mention.
In metaphysics and ethics there are no Spanish
names before the sixteenth century, few even then;
scholastic philosophy, which once prevailed so widely
in the West of Europe, seems not to have found a
footing in the Peninsula. In the tenth century Ger-

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bert went to Spain to learn philosophy of the Arabs;
in the eleventh, Constantinus Africanus communicated
its doctrines to the world ; in the twelfth and thir
teenth, Athelhard of Bath, called Athelhard the Goth,
Gherard, Otho, of Frisingen, Michael Scott, and
others, filled Europe with translations of Arabian au
thors. But Spain did nothing.
In theology the Spaniards have but one work to
show of any note, which dates from the period in ques
tion. The Complutensian Polyglot was a great work ;
but to achieve that nothing was needed but great
wealth and the labors of a few learned and diligent
men. The wealth was abundant, and flowed at the
Cardinal's command; the treasures of the Vatican and
of all the Hbraries of Europe were freely offered; the
manuscripts of the Jews in Spain were at Ximenes'
command; the services of accomplished scholars could
easily be bought. Learned Greeks there were in the
South of Europe seeking for bread. Of the nine
men who were engaged in this undertaking, one was
a Greek and three were Jews, of course converted
Jews. Artists came from Germany to cast the types
for the printing. Mr. Prescott exaggerates the diffi
culty of the undertaking; the scholars could be had,
the manuscripts borrowed or bought, indeed, so poorly
was the matter conducted that some manuscripts, pur
chased at great cost, came too late for use. Mr. Pres
cott says, " There were no types in Spain, if indeed
in any part of Europe, in the Oriental character," but
only three alphabets were needed in the Polyglot 5 —
the Roman, the Greek, and the Hebrew. The two first
were common enough, even in Spain; and in various
parts of Europe, before the end of the fifteenth cen
tury, no less than thirty-nine editions had been printed

PRESCOTT 209
of the whole or a part of the Hebrew Bible. The
Complutensian Polyglot is indeed a valuable work, but
at this day few men will contend that in the Old
Testament it has a text better than the edition at
Soncino, or that the Complutensian New Testament is
better than that of Erasmus. Indeed, we hazard
nothing in saying that Erasmus, a sigle scholar and
a private man often in want of money, did more to
promote the study of the Scriptures and the revival of
letters than Cardinal Ximenes and all Spain put to
gether; and never burnt up a library of manuscripts
because they were not orthodox.
All these matters, except the Polyglot, Mr. Pres
cott passes over with few words in his sketch of the
mental progress of Spain in her golden age. While
France, Germany, Italy, and England made rapid
strides in their mental progress, Spain did little, Ht
tle in law, Httle in science, in theology little. But
Mr. Prescott writes in a pleasing style about another
portion of the Hterature of Spain, which is, after all,
her most characteristic production in letters, her bal
lads and the drama. The Redondilla is the most dis
tinctive production of the Spanish muse. The baUads
of Spain are unlike those of England, of Scotland, and
of Germany, in many respects, yet bear the same rela
tion to the genius of the people. They grew up in
the wild soil of the Peninsula ; no royal or ecclesiastical
hand was needed to foster them. Beautiful they are,
— the wild flowers of the field, — but under the eye
of Isabella they began to droop and wither; no new
plants came up so fair and fragrant as the old. Why
not? The Hfe of the people was trodden down by the
hoof of the priest whom Isabella had sent to his work.
The language was rude, says Mr. Prescott. That
II— 14

210 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
hindered not; Burns found a rude speech in Auld
Scotland, but the verses he sung in " hamely westlin
jingle " will live longer than the well-filed Hnes of
Pope. Rudeness of language hindered not the genius
of Chaucer, of Hans Sachs. Mr. Prescott had small
space to note the alteration of laws, the change of
social systems, or the progress of civilization in Spain,
but he has some twenty pages to bestow upon the
drama, and gives us an analysis of the " Tragicomedy
of Celestina, or Calisto and Melibea," spending four
pages upon such a work. A philosophical reader
would consent to spare all mention of Encina, Naharre,
Oliva, Cotu, and even Fernando de Roxas, if in the
place which they but cumber there had been an account
of the real thought, manners, and life of the nation.
Far be it from us to complain of the time and space
allotted to the popular literature of Spain, the chap
ters are the best of the work; but one familiar with
that delightful growth laments that the historian made
no better use of his materials to indicate the life,
character, and sentiments of the people.
Mr. Prescott overrates the excellence of Queen Isa
bella. The character of Ferdinand was so atrocious
that it admits of no defence. ShaU it be said that the
age was distinguished for fraud, double-dealing, per
fidy, and hypocrisy? It affords no good defence, for
it was in these very qualities that Ferdinand surpassed
his age. He was a tyrannical king; a treacherous
ally, a master whom no servant could trust; a faith
less husband in the Hfe of Queen Isabella, and false
to her memory after her death. Few will deny that
he had some ability and some knowledge of kingcraft,
though we think his powers and pohtical foresight have
been somewhat overrated. The great men of the realm

PRESCOTT 211
he used as his servants, but when they acquired renown
he endeavored to ruin them; cast them off neglected
and covered with dishonor. His treatment of Colum
bus, Gonsalvo, or of Ximenes, would have been a dis
grace to any prince in Christendom. He was no friend
of the nobility and quite as little the friend of his peo
ple; he did not favor commerce or the arts, no, nor
letters and science. His zeal for religion appears
chiefly in the expulsion of the Moors and the Jews.
IsabeUa had some natural repugnance to the establish
ment of slavery in America, but Ferdinand had none.
Mr. Prescott, who is not blind to his faults, says truly,
" His was the spirit of egotism. The circle of his
views might be more or less expanded, but self was
the steady, unchangeable centre."
Mr. Prescott censures Ferdinand, but it sems to
us for the purpose of making a contrast with Isabella,
quite as much as in reference to the unchangeable laws
of morality; the effects of his character on the in
stitutions of his country and the welfare of his people
he does not point out in a manner worthy of an his
torian. Let us turn to Isabella. " Her character,"
he says, " was all magnanimity, disinterestedness, and
deep devotion to the interest of the people." " Isa
beUa, discarding all the petty artifices of state pohcy
and pursuing the noblest ends by the noblest means,
stands far above her age ; " " she was solicitous for
everything that concerned the welfare of her people."
This is high praise; but laying aside the rules of
chivalry let us look in the spirit of humanity. The
great political work of this reign was the establish
ment of national unity of action. Spain had been
divided into many kingdoms, the separate provinces
of each had been united by a feeble tie; the power of

212 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the king was resisted and diminished by the authority
of the great barons, and thus the nation was dis
tracted, and its power weakened. Under these sov
ereigns the different kingdoms were formed into one,
the several provinces were closely united, the great
barons were humbled and brought into dependence
upon the throne ; and thus national unity of action es
tablished by the might of a great central power. To
accomplish this work, the first thing to be done after
the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella, was to dimin
ish the power of the nobles. The same problem was
getting solved in other countries at the same time.
In some countries as the nobles lost power, the cities
with their charters gained it; the communes, the
guilds, in short, the people, in one form or another,
got an increase of political power. But in Spain it
was not so. As power receded from the nobles it
fell into the hands of the king. The people only
gained domestic tranquillity, not practical political
power, or the theoretic recognition of their rights.
Ferdinand and Isabella were both jealous of the
Cortes. Once, when Isabella wanted the Cortes of
Arragon to declare her daughter their future sover
eign, and they refused, she exclaimed, " It would be
better to reduce the country by arms at once than
endure this insolence of the Cortes." After Isabella's
death Ferdinand for a long time neglected to convene
the Cortes. Once he obtained a dispensation from
the Pope, allowing him to cancel his engagement with
the Cortes. In the first two years of her reign, Isa
bella called three meetings of the Cortes, of the popu
lar branch alone. The motive was plain; she wanted
to reduce the power of the nobles, and the commons
were the appropriate tool. After this work was done

PRESCOTT 213
the sessions became rare. She made the Hermandad
take the place of the Cortes to the great detriment
of popular liberty. But in 1506 the foolish Cortes,
either incited by the court or stimulated by the Span
ish desire of monopoly, complained that the right
of representation was extended too far. Both Ferdi
nand and Isabella " were averse to meetings of the
Cortes in Castile oftener than absolutely necessary,
and both took care on such occasions to have their
own agents near the deputies to influence their pro
ceedings " and to make the deputies understand that
they had not so much power as they fancied. If
Isabella had all the superlative qualities which Mr.
Prescott and others also ascribe to her, the result
must have been different.
We will not deny that Isabella did much for the
nation, much to establish internal tranquillity, much
to promote the security of property and person. The
first thing mentioned by Don Clemencin — the restora
tion of the currency from its debased condition — if
taken alone was highly important. She elevated men
of worth to high stations, though they were men of
mean birth ; doubtless this was done in part to show
the nobles that she could dispense with them in places
which they had long monopolized; still she knew how
to distinguish between the accidents and the substance
of a man, and chose her counsellors accordingly. Her
management of the affairs of the church displayed
no little skill and much energy. She kept the church
from the incursions of the Pope, a task not so difficult
as it would have been a century or two before, for
the papal power was visibly on the wane; still, on the
whole, we must confess that she did little to elevate
the religious character of the clergy or the people.

2T4 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Did she encourage letters and establish printing-
presses ? few great works were published in Spain ; the
Lives of the faints, treatises in honor of the Virgin,
books of " Sacred Offices," and fulminations against
Moors, Jews, and heretics, Papal Bulls, and the works
of Raymond Lully — such were the books which the
Spaniards printed and devoured in the fifteenth cen
tury. The works of Sallust were the most important
works issued from the press of Valencia in that cen
tury. Did she encourage science? it bore no fruits
which the nation has aspired to gather from the Span
ish tree ; poetry ? little was brought to pass which could
rival the best works of former days. In theology,
with the exception of the Polyglot and the publication
of the Bible in the Limousin dialect, certainly a sur
prising event in that age, little was done, nothing
worthy of note. Under a hand so despotic, and un
der the eye of the Inquisition which Isabella had es
tablished, what could a Spaniard effect? It must be
confessed that Isabella did not foster the greatest in
terests of the nation. The publication of proclama
tions which had the force of law (pragmaticas), so
frequent in her reign, shows plainly enough her de
sire to rule without the advice, of the people whose
constitution she thereby violated. It matters not that
they purport to be made at the demand of the Cortes,
at the request of corporate cities, or of prominent
men. Even in America we could find here and there
a man in the Senate of the United States who would
recommend a powerful President to do the same, per
haps a city or even a state to advise it. Those
proclamations were the passing-bell of popular free
dom. Even if they did not, as Mr. Prescott assures
us, intrench on the principles of criminal law or af-

PRESCOTT 215
feet the transfer of property, they not less under
mined the liberty of Castile. The Cortes of Valla-
dolid, foolish as it was in other respects, was right
in remonstrating against those pragmaticas. Mr.
Prescott mentions several causes which contributed
to increase the royal power at the expense of the peo
ple: the control of the military and ecclesiastical or
ders, the pensions and large domains, the fortified
places, the rights of seigneurial jurisdiction, the in
crease of power over the Moors, the acquisition of ter
ritory in Italy and the discovery of a new continent ;
but he omits the one cause which gave force to all
these, the selfish disposition that counted political
power as a right, which the monarch might use for her
own advantage, not a trust which she must administer
by the rules of justice, and for the good of all her
subjects. This was the cause which enfeebled the peo
ple after it had broken their noble tyrants to pieces.
The rights of the people were continually abridged.
In 1495 the nobles and the representatives of the cities
complained that the people were without arms. Mr.
Prescott thinks this fact a proof that they were in a
fortunate condition, not remembering that in such an
age an armed people was what the Constitution is to
America; what the British Parliament and acknowl
edged law are to England, the one great barrier
against the incursions of the crown. She found the
people burthened with an odious tax, imposed for a
temporary emergency, and continued through the in
ertia of the Cortes and the tyranny of the crown.
Isabella had conscientious scruples about this tax, but
continued it. Monopolies were established by this
queen, who is represented as so far before her time;
goods must not be shipped in foreign vessels when a

216 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Spanish bottom could be had ; no vessel must be sold to
a foreigner, even horses were not allowed to be ex
ported , gold and silver must not be sent out of Spain
on pain of death. Yet when she forbade the exporta
tion thereof by her commercial policy, by sumptuary
laws she forbade their use at home. There are four
things which will long continue as the indelible monu
ments of her reign ; the establishment of the Inquisi
tion for the torture and murder of her subjects, the
expulsion of the Jews and the Moors, the enslaving
of the Indians in America, and the establishment of
Negro Slavery there. With this we leave her and
her memory, to speak on the general form and style of
this work. I
It is no part of our plan to criticise the account of
civil and military transactions ; but so far as we have
examined his authorities, Mr. Prescott is remarkably
accurate. Some errors will always escape the vigi
lance of an author, in this case they are rare and un
important. The whole work is divided into three por
tions; an Introduction, a History of the Domestic
Policy of Ferdinand and Isabella, and a History of
their Foreign Policy, their Discoveries and Conquests.
The main division is a good one, the minuter division
into chapters is judicious, and the chapters well ar
ranged. In separate chapters the author treats of
various subjects, so as not to confuse the reader. But
we notice several defects in the matter and style of the
work. There is no description of the large towns;
no account of their history, the growth or decHne of
their population, of their relation to the villages and
hamlets, of the political tendencies of their inhabitants.
A brief description of Madrid, Toledo, and Seville,
of Barcelona and Valencia, would be of great value to

PRESCOTT 217
one who wished to understand the age; the materials
for this are not wanting.
Again, his portraits of distinguished men are not
good; they often lack distinctness and specific char
acter. We have a right to demand a careful analysis
of the character of such men as Columbus, Gonsalvo,
and Ximenes ; an historian never does his duty com
pletely until he gives us a picture of each prominent
man of the times he describes. Portraits of men like
Torquemada, Fonseca, Carillo, and Mendoza, the
Archbishops of Toledo and Seville, of Bayard and
Foix, of the monarchs of those times, and of the other
eminent foreigners who come upon the stage, ought to
have a place in a work like this.
The author does not present himself to his readers
as a philosopher who knows man scientifically, and
therefore has an a, priori knowledge of men ; nor does
he appear as a man of the world, who knows men by
a wide practical acquaintance with them. In conse
quence of this twofold defect the reader finds neither
the careful judgment of the philosopher or the prac
tical judgment of the man of affairs. Both of these
defects appear frequently in this work; for example,
in his general review of the administration of Fer
dinand and Isabella, which is not written in the spirit
of the statesman, or the spirit of the philosopher, but
of an amiable gentleman of letters filled with the sjpirit
of chivalry.
The book lacks philosophy to a degree exceeding
belief. The author seems to know nothing of the
philosophy of history, and little, even, of political
economy. He narrates events in their order of time
with considerable skill, but the causes of the events,
their place in the general history of the race, or their

218 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
influence in special on the welfare of the nation, he
does not appreciate. He tells the fact for the fact's
sake. Hence there are no pages in the book, perhaps
no sentences, which the reader turns back to read a
second time, to see if the thought be true; here are
the facts of history without the thought which belongs
to the facts. It would be difficult to find a history in
the English language of any note, so entirely desti
tute of philosophy. Accordingly, the work is dull and
inanimate; the reading thereof tiresome and not
profitable. Thus lacking philosophy, and having
more of the spirit of chivalry than of humanity, it
is impossible that he should write in the interest of
mankind or judge men and their deeds by justice,
by the immutable law of the universe. After long
and patient study of his special theme, Mr. Prescott
writes with the average sense of mankind, with their
average of conscience, and his judgment, the average
judgment of a trading town, is readily accepted by
the average of men, and popular with them; but he
writes as one with little sympathy for mankind, and
seems to think that Spain belonged to Ferdinand and
Isabella, that their power was a right and not a trust,
and they not accountable for the guardianship which
they exercised over their subjects. The style of the
work is plain, unambitious, and easily intelligible.
The language, the figures of speech, the logic, and
the rhetoric are commonplace; like the judgment of
the author, they indicate no originality, and do not
bear the stamp of his character. There is a certain
mannerism about them, but it is not the mannerism of
Mr. Prescott, only of the class of well-bred men. His
metaphors, which usually mark the man, are common
place and poor; rarely original or beautiful. Here

PRESCOTT 219
are some examples : To " spread like wildfire ; " to act
" like desperate gamblers ; " to run " like so many
frighted deer ; " to extend " like an army of locusts ; "
to be " Hke a garden." He calls womankind " the
sex ; " not a very elegant or agreeable title. There
is a slight tendency to excess in his use of epithets ;
sometimes he insinuates an opinion which he does not
broadly assert, rhetorically understanding the truth.
In his style there is little to attract, nothing to repel,
nothing even to offend ; he is never tawdry, seldom
extravagant, never ill-natured. If he finds an author
in error, he takes no pleasure in pointing out the mis
take. Everywhere he displays the marks of a well-
bred gentleman of letters; this is more than can be
said of the reviewer we have alluded to before. After
long study of this work we take leave of the author
with an abiding impression of a careful scholar, dili
gent and laborious ; an amiable man, who respects the
feelings of his fellows, and would pass gently over
their failings ; a courteous and accomplished gentle
man, who after long toil, has unexpectedly found that
toil repaid with money and with honors, and wears the
honors with the same modesty in which they have been
won.

PRESCOTT'S CONQUEST OF MEXICO
After Mr. Prescott had finished his History of the
Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella several important
subjects seemed naturally to claim his attention; these
were the Discovery of America, and the Reign of
Charles V. But the first of these had already been
described by the graceful pen of Mr. Irving, adorn
ing what it touches; the second had been treated by
Dr. Robertson in a work of great though declining
celebrity, and rendered attractive by a pleasing style,
which often conceals the superficiality of the author's
research, the shallowness of his pohtical philosophy,
and the inhumanity of his conclusions. Few men would
wish to enter the literary career and run the race with
such distinguished rivals. A broader field yet re
mained, more interesting to the philosopher and the
lover of mankind ; namely, the Conquest and Coloniza
tion of America by the Spaniards. On this theme Mr.
Prescott has written two independent works of wide
popularity. Of the first of those we now propose to
speak, only premising what we said before in respect
to the office and duty of an historian.
The new world was discovered in the reign of Fer
dinand and Isabella ; its islands and continents, though
not for the first time, laid open to the eye of civilized
Europe. The greater part of America was found to
be thinly peopled by a single race of men, different in
many respects from the inhabitants of the eastern
hemisphere. A large part of the new world was in-
220

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 221
habited by tribes, not only not civilized, but not even
barbarous; the nations were eminently savage, though
most of them Were far removed from the lowest stage
of human life, still represented by the Esquimaux,
the New-Hollanders and the Bushmen of South
Africa. The French, the English, and the Dutch,
in their North American settlements, came in contact
with the barbarous portion of the nations, who had
a little agriculture, it is true, but subsisted chiefly on
the spontaneous products of the forest and the flood.
But some tribes had advanced far beyond this state,
some had ceased to be barbarous. There was an in
digenous and original civihzation in America. At
tempts have often been made to trace this civilization
to the old world, to connect it now with the Tyrians,
now with the Egyptians, and then with the Hebrews
or roving Tartars. Sometimes the attempt has been
guided by philology, which makes language the basis
of comparison; sometimes by physiology, and scien
tific men have sought in the bodies of the red Ameri
cans to discover some trace of the stock they sprung
from ; sometimes by theology, which seeks the affinity
indicated by kindred forms of religion. But com
monly inquirers have started with the theological prej
udice that all men are descended from the single
primitive pair mentioned in the Hebrew myth, and
have bent philology, physiology, and theology to con
form to their gratuitous assumption. Hitherto these
attempts have been in vain. Even the lamented Mr.
Prichard,1 who had this theological prejudice in the
heroic degree, — small for an English theologian, in
deed, but great for a philosopher, as he certainly was,
a prejudice which appears throughout his researches
into the physical history of mankind, — fails to con-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
nect the American civihzation with that of any other
race. We therefore take it for granted, in the
present stage of the inquiry, that it was original and
indigenous. Geologists inform us that the western
continent appears older than the eastern. If it be so,
perhaps the American aborgines are the oldest race
now in existence, and may look down on the bearded
and pale Caucasians as upstarts in the world. If this
be true, the red man has not advanced so rapidly in
civilization as the white; this seems owing to the in
ferior organization of the former, and also to the ab
sence of swine, sheep, horses, oxen, and large animals
capable of being tamed, which in the eastern con
tinent have so powerfully aided the progress of civ
ilization. The man who would tame the sheep and the
ox must tame also himself. The domestication of ani
mals, those living machines of an earlier age, once
promoted the progress of civilization as much as the
invention of machinery at this day. The camel, the
ship of the desert, and the steamboat, the ship of the
sea, have each something to do in ferrying man out
of barbarism.
After the discovery of America, the Spaniard soon
came in contact with the more advanced tribes of red
men, contended with and overcame them, partly in vir
tue of his superior development, but partly also
through the aboriginal and organic superiority which
marks the Caucasian race in all historical stages of
their progress, and appears in every conflict with any
kindred race. This indigenous American civilization
had two centres, or mother-cities, mainly independent
of one another, if not entirely so, Mexico and Peru.
The chief seats thereof were soon reached by the Span
iards and conquered, the advanced tribes reduced to

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 223
subjection, to slavery or to death. The European
brought there two things, wholly unheard of before —
the doctrines of Christianity and a sword of steel, each
thought to be the ally of the other in the conqueror's
hand. Here is a theme more important, and therefore more
profoundly interesting, than the Lives of Columbus
and his followers, or the Reign of Charles V, though
both of those bring great events before the thinker's
eye ; — certainly the biography of Columbus, of
Amerigo, Cabot, and Verrazzani, would offer an at
tractive field to a thinking man. A philosophic his
torian would delight in a land newly discovered. Its
geography, botany, and zoology were all new to the
eastern world ; there were tribes unheard of before,
with a peculiar physical structure, language, litera
ture, manners, arts, laws, institutions, and forms of re
ligion unlike the old. It were a noble task for the
naturahst to describe this virgin America as she ap
peared in the fifteenth century, when she first stood un
veiled before the European eye.
In ages before the historical period the Caucasian
race had taken possession of the fairest portions of
the ancient world. Now, for the first time during
many ages, on a grand scale it encounters another
race. For the first time in human history the white
man and the red man fairly meet. These two families,
so dissimilar in natural character, so unlike in their
development, now join in war, in wedlock, and at
length mingle in political union. Ethnographers of
this day somewhat obscurely maintain that the min
gling of tribes, if not races, is an essential condition of
progress. It would be instructive to pause over the
facts, and consider what influence in this case each

224 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
race has had on the other, and their union on the world.
Never before in the historical age had two races thus
met, nor two independent civilizations, with modes of
religion, so dissimilar, thus come together. In the
great wars which the classic nations engaged in the
two parties were commonly of the same stock. Even
in the expeditions of Sesostris, of Xerxes, and of
Alexander, it was Caucasian that met Caucasian.
The same is true, perhaps in its full extent, of the
expeditions of Hannibal and of the Moors. In all
the wars from that of Troy to the Crusades, the heroes
on both sides were of the same stock. The nations
that we meet in history, from Thule to the " fabulous
Hydaspes," all are Caucasians — differing indeed in
development and specific character, but alike in their
great, general peculiarities. Other races appear only
in the background of history, among the classic, the
Semitic, or the East-Indian nations ; but seldom even
there, and not as actors in the great drama of human
civilization. The Spanish colonies afford the best known example
of the mingling of men of different races. The
Anglo-Saxon is eminently Caucasian ; he also met the
red men. But the Saxon, though like other conquer
ors forgetting his dignity in loose armors, will not
mix his proud blood in stable wedlock with another
race. There seems a national antipathy to such
unions with the black, or even the red, or yellow races
of men — an antipathy almost peculiar to this re
markable tribe, the exterminator of other races. In
New England more pains were taken than elsewhere
in America to spare, to civilize, and to convert the
sons of the wilderness; but yet here the distinction of
race was always sharply observed. Even community

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 225
of religion and liturgical rites, elsewhere so powerful
a bond of union, was unable to soften the English
man's repugnance to the Indian. The Puritan hoped
to meet the Pequods in heaven, but wished to keep
apart from them on earth, nay, to exterminate them
from the land. Besides, the English met with no
civilized tribe in America, and for them to unite in
wedlock with such children of the forest as they found
in North America would have been contrary not only
to the Anglo-Saxon prejudice of race, but to the gen
eral usage of the world — a usage to which even the
French in Canada afford but a trifling exception. The
Spaniards had less of this exclusiveness of race, per
haps none at all. They met with civilized tribes of
red men, met and mingled in honorable and permanent
connection. In Peru and Mexico, at this day, there
are few men of pure Spanish blood.
All the historical forms of religion which have pre
vailed in Europe, and the parts of Asia inhabited by
the Caucasians, seem to have sprung from a common
stock. Perhaps this is not true, but at least their re
semblances may often be accounted for by reference
to some actual union, to their historical genealogy, not
whoUy by reference to human nature ; their agreement
is specific, not merely generic. But the forms of re
ligion that prevailed in America seem to have no his
torical element in common with those of the eastern
world. When they agree, as they often do, and in
their most important features, the agreement is gen
eric, referable to the identity of human nature acting
under similar conditions ; it is not specific, or to be ex
plained by reference to history, to community of tra
dition. It is the same human nature which appears
in aU races, and accordingly many, especially re-
II— 15

226 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ligious, institutions have a marked likeness all over
the world ; but the individual peculiarity of each race
appears also in those institutions. The civilization of
the Caucasian tribes in the eastern world, powerfuUy
affected by their religious institutions, seems to have
ben propagated by offsets and cuttings from some
primeval tree, and only modified by circumstances and
degrees of development; so there is an historical ele
ment common to all those nations. It appears in their
manners, dress, and military weapons; in their agri
culture, from the east to the west, where the same
staple articles of culture appear, and the same animals
— the cereal grasses, the sheep, the goat, the swine,
the horse, and the ox ; in their arts, useful and beauti
ful; in their politics, their morals, their forms of re
ligion ; in their literature, and even in the structure of
their language itself, so deep-rooted is the idiosyn
crasy of race. In America, to judge from the present
state of ethnographic investigation, it seems that an
other seed, independent and likewise aboriginal, got
planted, came up, grew, and bore fruit after its kind.
This also was propagated by cuttings and offsets, so
to say; its descendants had spread from the land of
the Esquimaux to Patagonia. Here, as in the other
hemisphere, the race became specifically modified by
external circumstances, and the degree of development.
Still there is a generic element common to aU the tribes
of America, running through their civilization, and
apparent in their institutions. The idiosyncracy of
race appears here also, conspicuous and powerful as
there. This diversity of race and the analogous difference
between the two civilizations, brought into such close
connection, renders the history of the Spanish settle-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 227
ments in America exceedingly interesting to a philo
sophical inquirer; the English colonies are interesting
on account of the ideas they brought hither and de
veloped, and the influence those ideas have had on the
world; the Spanish settlements are chiefly interesting
on account of the facts they bring to light. Under
these circumstances it becomes the huty of the histo
rian, who will write a book worthy of his theme, to note
the effect of this mingling of races and of civilizations ;
he is not merely to tell who was killed, and who
wounded, on which side of the river each one fought,
and how deep the water was between them, or how
bloody it ran ; he is to describe the civilization of the
nations, giving, however briefly, all the important fea
tures thereof, and then show the effect of the meeting
of the two.
More than three centuries have passed by since the
Mexican conquest was complete. During that time
great revolutions have taken place in the world, —
theological, political, and social. A great progress
has been made in the arts, in science, in morals and
religion, — in the subjective development thereof as
piety, the objective application to life in the form of
practical morality. But the Spanish- Americans have
but a small share in that progress; they seem to have
done nothing to promote it. They have not kept pace
with the Anglo-American colonies, not even with the
French. It is pretty clear that the population of
Spanish North America — continental and insular —
is less numerous now than when Columbus first crossed
the sea. The condition of the Americans in many re
spects is improved. Still it may be reasonably
doubted if the population of Mexico is happier to-day
than four hundred years ago. What is the cause of

228 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
this ; have the two races been weakened by their union,
were the Mexicans incapable of further advance, or
were the Spaniards unable to aid them? The
Europeans gave the Indian most valuable material
helps to civilization — cattle, swine, sheep, goats, asses,
horses, oxen, the cereal grasses of the East, iron and
gunpowder; ideal helps also in the doctrines of
Christianity; — the machinery of the old world. In
another work, Mr. Prescott declares the Moorish civili
zation incapable of continuing, as it had in its bosom
the causes of its ruin. Is the same thing trUe of the
Spanish civilization? Surely it cannot stand before
the slow, strong, steady wave of the Anglo-Saxon tide,
which seems destined ere long to sweep it off, or hide
it in its own ample bosom. The consequence is always
in the cause, there but hidden. The historian of the
conquest of Mexico, writing so long after the events
he chronicles, while those consequences are patent to
all the world, might describe to us the cause; nay, the
history is not adequately written until this is done.
Without this, a work is history without its meaning,
without philosophy. We must complain of Mr. Pres
cott's work, in general, that he has omitted this its
most important part. True, he was only writing of
the conquest of the country and the immediate coloni
zation; but this is not adequately described until the
other work is done.
Not only has Mr. Prescott an attractive theme —
obvious facts and glittering deeds, to attract all men
and satisfy the superficial, and larger, more general
facts of a profound significance, to pause upon and
explain ; but the materials for his work are abundant.
There are the narratives of men personally engaged in
the expeditions they write of, men like Bernal Diaz

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 229
and Gomara; official documents like the letters of
Cortes; early histories, as that of Solis ; works on the
antiquities of Mexico, like that of Clavigero, and the
magnificent volumes published by Lord Kingsborough.
Then there are works written by men themselves
descended from the Mexicans. In addition to printed
volumes, Mr. Prescott has richly supplied himself with
such manuscript treasures of Spanish history as few
American eyes ever behold. He has at his command
about eight thousand folio pages of the work of Las
Casas, Ixtlilxochitl, Toribio, Camarge, Oviedo, and
others. Pubhc and private collections abroad have
been opened to him with just and scholarlike liberality.
If we divide Mr. Prescott's work according to its
substance, it consists of three parts : — the first relates
to Mexico, its inhabitants and their civilization; the
second to the conquest of Mexico; and the third to
the subsequent career of Cortes. In respect of its
form, the volumes are divided into seven books, treat
ing respectively of the Axtec civilization, of the dis
covery of Mexico, the march thither, the residence
there, the expulsion thence, the siege and surrender
of the city, and the subsequent career of Cortes. A
valuable appendix is added, and a copious index, the
latter quite too uncommon in American books.
This history has been so much admired, so widely cir
culated in America and Europe, and so abundantly
read, that, as in the former article, we shall take it for
granted that our readers are familiar with the work,
and spare them our analysis thereof. We shall also
presuppose that the well-informed reader is sufficiently
familiar with the writings of Diaz and Solis, with the
printed works of Las Casas, with Clavigero, Herrera,
and the original accounts published at Madrid, a

230 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
hundred years ago, in the collection of " Historiadores
primitivos." We now propose to examine this history of the con
quest of Mexico somewhat in detail, and to say a word
of each of the three grand divisions of the subject.
We will speak first of the civilization of the Aztecs.
Mr. Prescott's account of the geography of Mexico,
with his description of the country, is attractive and
graphic. It seems to be sufficient; we only regret the
absence of a more extended map. With only the or
dinary maps the reader is often puzzled in trying to
make out the exact position of a place, and accord
ingly he cannot always understand the account of a
batttle or the description of a march. The two small
maps are of great service, and were prepared with
much care, but are not adequate to render all parts
of the text intelligible; thus Itztapalapan is said to
stand " on a narrow tongue of land which divides the
waters of the great salt lake from those of the fresh,"
while on the map no such narrow tongue exists, and
the reader must seek it in Clavigero or elsewhere.
But this is a trifle.
In Mexico Mr. Prescott finds four important tribes
or " races." The most conspicuous of these are the
Toltecs, who came from the North before the end of
the seventh century, and in the eleventh century " dis
appeared from the land as silently and mysteriously
as they had entered it ; " the Chichemecs, a numerous
and rude tribe who came from the North-west in the
twelfth century, and were soon " followed by other
races of higher civilization, perhaps of the same family
with the Toltecs ; " the most noted of these tribes were
the Aztecs or Mexicans, and the Acolhuans or Tezcu-
cans. The civilization of the Toltecs was communi-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 231
cated to the Tezcucans, and by them to the Chiche-
mecs. Of these four tribes — Toltecs, Chichemecs, Tezcu
cans, and Aztecs — the latter have become the most
celebrated. They are the Mexicans, and by that name
we shall designate them in what follows. After en
countering various fortunes in the land, they came to
the valley of Mexico in the year 1325, A.D., according
to Mr. Prescott, where they subsequently built Ten-
ochtitlan, the city of Mexico. The Mexicans were a
warlike people, and in less than two centuries their
empire extended from shore to shore. This rapid en
largement of their power proves the martial vigor of
the tribe, and their skill in forming political organi
zations, though Mr. Prescott seems to doubt their
political ability. But as the Mexican empire was
composed of several nations recently conquered and
united almost entirely by external force, it is plain it
contained heterogeneous elements which might easily
be separated. Like the old Roman and all other states
thus formed, it was a piece of carpentry, artificially
held together by outward circumstances, not a regular
growth, where the branch grows out of the bole, that
out of the root, and all are united by a central prin
ciple and partake of a common origin and history.
Mr. Prescott devotes four chapters to the civilization
of Mexico, and one to Tezcuco. His materials are
derived chiefly from Torquemada, Clavigero, Sahagun,
Gama, the works which have appeared in France and
England on the antiquities of Mexico, the writings
of Boturini and Ixtlilxochitl. Of these authors
Clavigero is the best known to general readers. Not
withstanding the advantage which Mr. Prescott has
in coming sixty years after the work of Clavigero

232 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
was published, we must confess that on the whole the
earlier writer has given the more satisfactory account
of the matter. It is true, Clavigero had space to be
minute and curious in particulars, — for nearly two
of his four quarto volumes are devoted to the subject,
but his general arrangement is better, though by no
means perfect or philosophical, — following an inward
principle, — and his account of the Mexican institu
tions is on the whole more distinct as well as more com
plete. Yet in some details Mr. Prescott surpasses his
predecessor. Mr. Prescott gives an account, sufficiently lucid, of
what may be called the Constitution of Mexico; he
speaks intelligently of the royal power, which was both
legislative and executive. He gives a good descrip
tion of the judicial power, certainly a very remarka
ble institution for such a nation, and in many respects
a very wise one. But his account of the nobles, of
their power and position, is meagre and unsatisfac
tory. He does not tell us how the distinction of no
bility was obtained.
What he says of the penal laws is still less satis
factory, or complete. The only punishments he men
tions are death, slavery, reduction of rank, and confis
cation of property. Clavigero adds confinement in
prison and banishment from the country. Prisons as
houses of punishment generally indicate a higher civil
ization than the penalty of death, or exile.
Clavigero has given the fuller and more satisfactory
account of the Mexican system of slavery. He men
tions also one important provision of the penal law
omitted by Mr. Prescott, that kidnapping was pun
ished with death.
Mr. Prescott's account of the manner of collecting

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 233
the revenue is full and clear. The same must be said
of his account of the military establishment of Mex
ico. Still the reader would be glad to know whether
the soldiers were volunteers or conscripts, how they
were fed, and, when succussful in war, what share of
the booty belonged to them. Clavigero mentions a
significant fact, that there were three military orders,
called Princes, Eagles, and Tigers (Achautin, Quauh-
tin, and Ocelo). Since the two last are titles of hon
our, as well as the first, they furnish an important
monument of the ferocity of the nation.
The civilization of the Mexicans has been sometimes
exalted above its merit; still it is plain they had at
tained a pretty high degree of culture. Yet it dif
fered in many respects from that of the eastern na
tions : it was a civilization without the cereal grasses ;
without wine, milk or honey; without swine, sheep, or
goats; without the horse or the ass, or any beast of
burthen; civilization without iron. Mexico seems to
have been the centre of refinement for all North Amer
ica. Agriculture, one of the earliest arts, seems to
have traveled northward; the three great staples
thereof among the natives of North America in the
temperate zone — maize, beans, and various species of
the pumpkin or squash — had journeyed from the
Gulf of Mexico to the Bay of Fundy, and extended in
land to the Rocky Mountains, covering a great extent
of country where they were not indigenous, and could
not exist but for the care of man.
In Mexico, the fundamental law or constitution was
fixed and well understood. The monarchy was elec
tive; though, by law or custom, the choice must be
made from a certain family, still the chief was chosen
for his personal qualities. Montezuma was distin-

234 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
guished as a soldier and a priest — compatible titles
in many a land not otherwise very barbarous — before
he was elected king. Throughout North America
there seems to have been a general custom of choosing
the ruler among the nephews rather than among the
sons of the former chief.
The judicial power was carefully separated from the
executive. The judges were appointed by the king or
chosen by the people, and held their office for life or
during good behavior. The laws seem to have been
well administered. Property was so secure that bolts
and bars were not needed. Life, liberty, and the
honor of women were carefully guarded, and seem to
have been more secure than in Scotland at the same
time. Lands were held in severalty and by a certain
tenure. Almost all men held real estate in their own
right. In the most densely peopled regions there was
Httle land not improved; far less than at the present
day, as we judge. The law of descent was fixed, and
well understood. The right of testament was uni
versal, i
Historians tell us that the laws were written, and
published to the people. We think they exaggerate
the extent of a written law, and the power of the Mex
icans to record laws with their imperfect mode of writ
ing. Perhaps Mr. Prescott with others has fallen
into a slight error in this particular, though we do
not say this with much confidence.
Slavery prevailed in a mild form. Men became
slaves by judicial sentence, as a punishment for crime,
by selling themselves, or from being sold by their par
ents. The slave could hold property, real or personal,
and devise it to whom he would; he could own other
slaves. This was not a privilege which the master

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 235
might revoke, but a right at common law. The slave's
life was, theoretically, sacred as the free man's. His
children were all free. Nobility was hereditary, while
slavery was merely a personal affair, and did not at
taint the blood. Indeed, the slave was only a vassal,
bound to render certain services to his feudal lord.
This fact shows that the nation had emerged from that
state where man is so lazy that only the slave can be
made to endure continuous toil, and where Slavery is
the chief handmaid of Industry.
The penal laws were severe; capital offences were
numerous. Theft was punished with death, as it was
until lately in England, if the property stolen exceeded
five shillings in value. Imprisonment, fine, exile, and
social degradation were legal punishments for certain
crimes. The revenues of the nation were collected in
a regular and constant form. As in most despotic
countries, the taxes were enormous ; but there seems no
reason for supposing that they were so excessive as
they have been for many years in the kingdom of
Naples; perhaps they were not proportionately so
great as in England at this day. Some of the nobles
were exempt from taxation, but we know not whether
this exemption was the reward of some extraordinary
service, or, as in France before the Revolution, came
purely from the selfishness of that class who had the
power to withdraw their necks from the common yoke.
War was conducted in a systematic manner; regu
larly declared and commenced in a formal style. The
arts of diplomacy were well known, and the rights of
ambassadors respected. The military code was min
ute in its provisions. The arms of the Mexicans were
well made and destructive. They used shields of
wood, and body armour of quilted cotton. They had

236 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
embattled fortifications of stone, well situated and con
structed with skill. There were military hospitals for
the sick and wounded soldier — institutions unknown
to the Eastern world till long after the time of Christ ;
hospitals better than the Spanish, and supplied with
surgeons more faithful.
Their cities were numerous and large, supplied with
water by aqueducts. There were many towns contain
ing thirty thousand inhabitants; the capital contained
at least three hundred thousand. In his second official
letter, Cortes says that Tlascala was larger and much
stronger than Granada when taken from the Moors ;
that it had more fine houses, and was better supplied
with provisions. Thirty thousand persons were daily
in its markets, to buy and sell. He says the exterior
aspect of Cholula is more beautiful than any town in
Spain. From a single temple (Mezquita) he counted
four hundred other temples with towers. Houses were
built of wood, of sun-dried bricks, and of stone. While
in Spain labor was a disgrace, in Mexico it was held
in honor. The calling of a merchant was honorable,
and he sometimes rose to distinction in the state, a very
remarkable circumstance in a nation so warlike.
Trading in slaves seems to have been as respectable
among the Catos of Mexico as of Rome. Agriculture
was held in high and deserved esteem. The harder
work in the fields was performed by the men ; only the
light work fell to the lot of women. Great pains were
taken with the cultivation of flowers, ornamental gar
dening was better understood in Mexico than in Eu
rope. In some places the land was artificially watered,
as among the Moors in Spain. There were floating
gardens on the lake of Mexico. In the large cities
there were public gardens of great extent and beauty.

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 237
Yet, though blessed with maize and potatoes, the Mex
icans lacked the valuable staples of Eastern agricul
ture — the more useful grains, the vine, and the olive ;
they had no aid from the ox or the horse, not even from
the humbler servant of the plough, the ass.
The mechanics wrought with adroitness and good
taste, in wood, in stone, and in feather-work. Their
earthern ware, says Cortes, was equal to the best in
Spain. Cotton was manufactured and dyed with taste
and skiU. Gold and silver were abundant, and
wrought with a dexterity which rivalled the best works
of Venice and Seville, astonishing the artists of Eu
rope. They used also copper, lead, and tin. It has
been said — we doubt if correctly — that they did not
know the power of fire to render metals more pliant
under the hammer. Iron was unknown, in its place
their cutting instruments were made of obsidian (itzli),
a stone which takes a keen edge, though it is easily
blunted. For money they used gold-dust, bits of tin,
and bags of cacao.
The pubhc roads excited the admiration of the
Spaniards, and were probably better than they left at
home. Runners went with such speed that despatches
were carried one or two hundred miles in a day.
Buildings were erected along the road side for their
accommodation. Indeed, couriers went with such
rapidity that fish were caught in the Gulf of Mexico,
and in twenty-four hours were two hundred miles off,
in the kitchen of Montezuma.
There were botanic gardens in several Mexican cit
ies, where the plants were scientifically arranged. Cor
tes mentions one two leagues in circumference; it con
tained an aviary, for Mexico is the country of birds,
as Africa of beasts, and basins stocked with numerous

238 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
varieties of fish. At that time such gardens were un
known in Europe.
The Mexicans had attained a considerable pro
ficiency in science. They had a peculiar system of
notation, counting by scores and not by tens, — first
they took the five digits of one hand, then of the next,
and in like manner the ten digits of the feet. They
had made a measurement of the year more exact than
that of the Greeks and Romans. Their week con
sisted of five days; four weeks, or twenty days, made
a month. There were eighteen months in the year,
and then five days were intercalated that belonged to
no month. Thus their common civil year consisted of
three hundred and sixty-five days. But in every one
hundred and four years, it is said, they intercalated
twenty-five days which belonged to no year. Thus
their calendar was exceedingly exact, and in many
years there would be no important difference between
actual and calculated time. Their day was divided
into sixteen hours ; they had sundials for time-pieces ;
they understood the causes of an eclipse, and knew the
periods of the solstices and the equinoxes.
Women shared in social festivities with the men.
Polygamy was allowed, as throughout all North Amer
ica, and as with the Hebrews before Christ; wealthy
men, and especially kings, had many wives; yet the
custom seems limited to such, as indeed it must have
been everywhere.
The languages of the various nations of Mexico
were remarkable for that peculiarity called agglutina
tion by philologists, which characterizes aU the dialects
of America, with perhaps, but a single exception, and
forms the linguistic distinction of the American race.
Their language was copious, regular and comprehen-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 239
sive. The Mexicans had a rude mode of writing, by
pictures and symbols, which enabled them to record
events, to transmit and preserve information. By
means of this help they recorded their laws, their ju
dicial transactions, and wrote their civil history. They
wrote poetry in the same manner. We would speak
with becoming diffidence in this matter, which we cer
tainly have not been able to investigate to our own sat
isfaction, and modestly express our fear that the art
of writing among the Mexicans has been a good deal
overrated. We doubt that an ordinary poem could be
recorded in Mexican characters. Still, this art of
writing seems to have been more perfect than the
Egyptian in the time of the pyramids, as indeed their
language was more copious and better developed,
though greatly inferior to that of the Chinese.
There were schools for the education of the children.
Elderly women, serving also as priestesses, took charge
of the girls ; the priests instructed the boys. The
former learned various feminine employments, were
taught to be modest, and to pay " entire obedience and
respect to their husbands." Boys were taught to work
and to fight; they were instructed in the art of writ
ing; they learned the traditionary lore of their coun
try, and studied such sciences as the Mexican knew;
they learned the principles of government, and were
taught to hate vice and love virtue — to practice the
duties of natural religion. To this, of course, was
added an acquaintance with the national mythology
and the rites of the popular worship. This education
was no doubt rude, and limited to a comparatively
small portion of the people. There was a general
Board of Education, called the Council of Music. All
this, we suspect, is a good deal more complete on paper

240 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
than it was in fact; but Diaz informs us that Monte
zuma intended to keep some of the Spandiards, whom
he hoped to conquer, for schoolmasters, and employ
them in teaching the people.
In their religion the Mexicans were polytheists. It
is not easy to get at the facts respecting this matter,
for the authors we depend upon seem unconsciously to
have lent a coloring to what they describe, and much of
the Christian tradition or doctrine has got mingled
with the opinions of the natives. But it is said that
they believed in one supreme Creator; they addressed
him as " the God by whom we live ;" " invisible, in
corporeal, one God, of perfect perfection and purity ;"
" under whose wing we find repose and a sure defence."
There were other gods beside him; the most popular
was their God of War, for the Mexicans were a
ferocious people, and this peculiarity appears also in
their mode of religion. In common with almost every
nation of the earth, and perhaps with all, they believed
in the immortality of the soul and the doctrine of fu
ture retribution. In the Mexican heaven there were
two degrees of happiness, of which the warrior had
the higher. The Roman poet had got beyond this.
There were three degrees of punishment in hell.
" Eternal damnation," it has been said, " is not learned
by the mere hght of nature, but is one of the truths
of revelation;" so we suppose the Mexicans were in
debted to their Spanish conquerors for this article of
the creed. The priests were a distinct class, numerous
and respected, and, as in nearly all countries, the best
educated class. They served God with an abundance
of forms, rites, ceremonies, fasts, and mortifications
of the flesh, — according to Mr. Prescott's quotation,
" In hope to merit heaven by making earth a hell."

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 241
However, in this respect their conquerors taught them
many devices which the simple Mexicans did not know
before. The Mexicans do not appear to have practiced
any ritual mutilation of the body as the Hebrews and
Mahometans do to this day. The priesthood was
not hereditary, or even heritable, as it seems. It did
not necessarily last for life. There was only a mova
ble priesthood, not a -caste perpetuating its traditions
and its rites in a single family from age to age. The
chief priest was elected, though it does not appear by
whom. Some elderly women served as priestesses. The
Mexicans had some rites which strangely resembled
the Christian : — they baptized their children by sprin
kling; the priests heard confession and gave absolu
tion from sin, and, what is remarkable, this absolu
tion not only was thought to save a man from future
torment, but actually held good and gave deliverance
in a court of justice on earth. There was a Mexican
goddess, Cioacoatl was her name, whe seems closely re
lated to mother Eve ; she was " the first goddess who
brought forth ;" she " bequeathed the sufferings of
childbirth to women ;" and by her " sin came into
the world." There was also a Mexican Noah, Coxcox,
who survived a deluge, and has often been taken for
the mythical patriarch of the Hebrew legend.
There is much that is revolting in the worship of
savage nations ; some of the disgusting features thereof
remain long after civilization has swept away civil and
social monstrosities. The most hideous thing con
nected with the Mexican worship was the sacrifice of
human beings. Human sacrifices have been common
with all nations at certain stages of their development.
The custom was well known among the Greeks and
Romans; the story of Abraham is a lasting monu-
II— 16

242 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ment of its existence among the Hebrews. But in no
country did this abomination prevail to so great a de
gree. To render the ghastly sacrifice still worse, the
worshippers devoured the flesh of the victims. Can
nibalism was solemnly practiced throughout Mexico.
Human blood was the holiest sacrament. The number
of victims is variously stated; one authority mentions
more than eighty thousand in a single day, an extraor
dinary occasion ; others but fifty in a year, the esti
mate of Las Casas. Mr. Prescott thinks it safe to
admit that thousands were sacrificed each year. Diaz
declares that there must have been more than a hun
dred thousand skulls of these victims in a single place,
and Gomara relates that two companions of Cortes
counted one hundred and thirty-six thousand in a
single edifice. No apology can be attempted for
such an abomination; but the same thing is called by
different names in different places. In thirty-five
years King Henry VIII. put to death seventy-two
thousand of his subjects by the hands of the public
executioner ; many thousand Moors were butchered by
the Spanish soldiers, after resistance was over, in the
time of Ferdinand and Isabella; a great number were
put to death with more terrible torments by the most
holy court of the Inquisition. A Mexican would write
that all these were sacrificed to God. Human sacri
fices in Mexico excited the just horror of Cortes and his
companions, while the butcheries in Spain perhaps did
not disturb them at all. Few things can be conceived
of more abhorrent than the human sacrifices and can
nibalism of the Mexicans : their civilization deprived
them of the excuse which shelters the Fiji and New
Zealander. Yet these men-slaughterers endeavored
to mitigate the sufferings of their victims. Mr. Pres-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 243
cott shows a just and hearty horror of this unnatural
mode of worship. But one of their gods, Quetzalcoatl,
it is said, taught " a more spiritualizing religion, in
which the only sacrifices were the fruits and flowers
of the season."
We come next to the conquest of Mexico by Cortes.
He first heard the name of Montezuma about Easter,
in 1519; on St. Hippolytus' day, August 12th, 1521,
the Spaniards carried the capital by assault, and the
Mexican empire lay at their disposal. Montezuma
had died a captive; Guatemozin, his successor, was in
their lands. Yet Cortes invaded this powerful em
pire with but a handful of soldiers. When he left
Cuba, February 10th, 1519, he had one hundred and
ten mariners, five hundred and fifty-three soldiers, ten
heavy guns, four falconets, and sixteen horses; he
had also about two hundred Indians. Two horses were
subsequently added, and eighteen men ; fifteen men
were sent away from the expedition, and there were
other but inconsiderable losses. He actually began his
march into Mexico with about four hundred foot and
fifteen horse, and seven pieces of artillery, such as it
was. At the same time, he had also thirteen hundred
Indian worriors and one thousand Tamanes or porters,
men of burthen. The number of Indians was soon in
creased to three thousand. When he first entered Mex
ico against the will of the vacillating monarch, his
whole force was less than seven thousand men; but
four hundred of these were Spaniards. After he had
been driven from the city, and had been reinforced by
others of his countrymen who joined the expedition,
when he reviewed his forces at Tezcuco, he had eighty-
seven horse, eight hundred and eighteen foot, of whom
one hundred and eight were arquebusiers and cross-

244 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
bowmen, three large field-pieces of iron, and fifteen
smaller guns of brass.
Such were the forces with which Cortes invaded and
finally conquered a country containing more inhabi
tants, to say the least, than the kingdom of Spain
at that time, with the capital as large and populous
as Seville and Cordova united, or twice as great as
Milan. Certainly the most daring enterprise of an
cient times becomes tame in comparison with this.
True, there were some circumstances which favored
the enterprise. Had there been no dissensions in the
Mexican empire, his attempt would have been in vain;
without his Indian allies he would soon have been cut
off. Then he was aided by the superstition of the
times. There Was a prophecy current among the Mexi
cans which Cortes was thought to fulfil. There was
a story of Quetzalcoatl, a mythical person worshipped
as a god ; he had taught the Mexicans agriculture,
the use of metals, and the arts of government, and
opposed human sacrifices which he could not prevent ;
he had a fair complexion and a flowing beard, the
patriarch of the golden age of Mexico ; he had left
the country, embarking for Tlapallan, the Mexican
Eden or Atlantis, but the prophecy said he would re
turn and resume the possession of the empire. The
Mexican saw Cortes, and said : " This is Quetzalcoatl
returned from Paradise." The Spaniards were " white
gods." Montezuma himself seems to have shared this
opinion. This " random shot of prophecy," as Mr.
Prescott calls it, seems to have hit the mark, and pre
pared the nation for conquest.
Then the Spaniards were Caucasians, and had the
organic superiority of that race ; besides, they were far
in advance of the Mexicans in the art of war. They

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 245:
had horses, steel, ships, gunpowder, muskets, and can
non; they understood the value of concerted action,
and of well-ordered movements on the field of battle;
they had weapons of offence and defence far superior
to those of their opponents. If Boston could be in
vaded by an army that should land at Provincetown,
ascend in balloons, and from a single position recon
noitre the whole state of Massachusetts, and from the
extremity of Cape Cod should bombard this city, lev
eling whole blocks of houses at a single shot; if they
had swords which could pierce through a ploughshare
as easily as sUk or cotton cloth, and fire-arms which
shot through the most solid walls of brick and stone
as readily as a rifle-ball goes through a glass window ;
if they had animals trained to war ten times larger
than the elephant, as heavy as the largest locomotive
steam-engine, swifter than that, and more difficult to
encounter — beasts of war that trod down horse, foot,
and dragoons, trampling the artillery itself into the
ground; if, in addition to this, the invaders were clad
in armour bullet-proof, were each stronger than ten
common men, had a skill, a foresight, a daring, and a
patient courage proportionate to their instruments of
destruction, and a cruelty not inferior to their cour
age; and if, still more, it was currently believed that
the Book of Revelations had predicted that they should
come and conquer the land ; if whole countries were
ready to help the invaders, — then we should be con
fronted with foes which would bear about the same
relation to us that the Spaniards bore to the Mexi
cans. Considering all these things, the success of the
conquerors, marvellous as it appears, is less remarka
ble than the courage and patience with which the
Mexicans resisted the attack. Had the Spaniards

246 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
known the full extent of the difficulty, even the iron
heart of Cortes must have failed him.
But we must ask, What right had the Spaniards
to invade Mexico and possess themselves of its soil?
Mr. Prescott examines this question in an unsatisfac
tory manner, and, we are sorry to say it, gives an un
just answer, but in accordance with the spirit in which
his three historical works have been written. An un
prejudiced man must say the Spaniards had no claim
to Mexico but that of the stout and well-armed high
wayman to the purse of the undefended traveler;
the right of the pirate over the unprotected ship of
the merchant. It is true, the Spanish monarch had a
conveyance from the Pope, which in reaHty gave no
better title and was worth no more than the compen
dious transfer offered by the tempter in the Bible —
" all these will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and
worship me." Neither Pope nor Satan could alienate
and convey what he did not possess. We think it
cannot be maintained in natural law that a savage tribe
has a right to arrest civilization in any given spot,
to keep a continent for a hunting-field dwelt in by
a few wild beasts and wild men. It is commonly, per
haps universally, conceded that a nation has eminent
domain over the lands of the individual, and allows
him to hold them in individual severalty for his pri
vate welfare when not adverse to the general good of
the state; even to bequeath them to his successor, sub
ject to the same condition. So the human race has em
inent domain over the lands of each particular nation,
allowing it to hold in national severalty for the nation's
welfare, when not adverse to the universal good of
mankind. As there is a solidarity of the nation, so
is there of the race, and rights and duties, national

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 247
or universal, thence accruing. But when the nation
takes the lands of the individual, which he has a good
natural title to, they must fully indemnify that in
dividual for his lands, else it is robbery; and robbery
by a nation, and for the sake of the greatest majority
of its citizens, is no better in itself than if done by one
man in his own name, — it is still robbery, spoliation
contrary to natural law. The same holds good be
tween any one nation and mankind, between the sav
age and the civilized who may assume to represent the
consciousness of mankind. This idea seems to have
been in the mind of the settlers of New England; if
not in their mind, they acted as if it were. The pil
grim and the puritan knew that the naked savages
of Massachusetts had no natural right adverse to the
welfare of the human race, no right to keep the land
a wilderness and shut civihzation out of it forever;
but they knew, also, that though the civilized man rep
resented the higher consciousness of mankind, and,
so far as that went represented the human race, still
he had no right, whatever necessity compelled him, to
take from the savages, against their will, all that
they had or anything that they had, without returning
them a complete equivalent therefor. So these settlers
of New England did not rely on the grant of the Eng
lish king for their title to the Indian land ; they
bought it of the Indians, took a deed, recorded the
transfer, and honestly paid for it — a small consider
ation, but enough to extinguish the title, and more than
it was worth to the Indians themselves. But in New
England no Indian owned land in severalty, more than
wind and water, excepting the spot his wigwam cov
ered, and the little patch subjected to the rude til
lage of his wife. These were the only * spots with

248 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
which he had mixed up his labor. There was enough
for all, and therefore personal and exclusive appro
priation had hardly begun. At the merest caprice,
the Indian left his place to whomsoever might take it,
and himself sought another — as free as the beaver
or the wild-cat, who like him respected the appropria
tion of another. This tract belonged to the Narra-
gansetts, that to the Pequods. There was appropria
tion by the tribe, not by the individual. The title
of the Narragansetts was good as against the Pequads,
or any other tribe, but each man of that tribe took any
of the national lands not previously appropriated, as
freely as he took the air and the water which was not
in another man's mouth. The chief of the tribe
seems to have acted as trustee, and in that capacity
gave his quitclaim deed to the chief of the white men,
acting in behalf of the rest, and conveyed away the
title of the tribe. The Indian parted with his land
for a " good consideration," for " value received."
In Mexico the case was quite different. Almost all
the valuable land was owned in severalty; individuals
had mixed their labor with the soil, owning it as much
as they owned the fish-hook they had made, or the
ear of corn they had grown ; owned it as completely as
a man can own the soil. The Mexicans were a civilized
people ; the lands in the valley of Mexico were as well
cultivated as the lands in Granada, the garden of Eu
rope ; the natives had not stopped in their progress,
as Mr. Prescott thinks the Moors had done in Spain,
and their land therefore could not be claimed as a
derelict of civilization ; on the contrary, they seem to
have been in a state of rapid advance, as much so as
the Spanish nation itself. The superior culture of the
Spanish gave him no right to these lands without in-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 249
demnifying the individual owners, — no more than the
English have to China, or the Dutch to Turkey; no
more than the New Englanders would have to seize
Spain and Italy at this day. The Spaniard could not
plead necessity, like the pilgrims, — poor, persecuted,
and just escaped from the ocean, — who took a fish
and some corn in their extremity, when they landed
on Cape Cod, and carefully paid for both when,
months afterwards, they found the owners ! Oppres
sion never planted a single Spaniard in America. The
Moors were not aUowed to migrate thither, under the
administration of Ferdinand and Isabella. The Span
iards did not attempt or pretend to buy a title to the
land. Their claim was the claim of the pirate. It is
true, the Pope as head of the human race, trustee for
all mankind, and vicegerent of Almighty God, gave
a title to America. Could Cortes and the others hold
under that? Mr. Prescott thinks they could satisfy
their own consciences in that way and though the
conveyance were worthless in itself, they would be sub
jectively in the right. But the Pope gave a grant of
lands subject to this condition, the heathen must be
converted. If that were not done, the title failed
through breach of covenant. We shall see how this
was attended to.
Mr. Prescott says the desire of converting the natives
was " paramount to every calculation of personal in
terest in the breast of Cortes." We are amazed at a
statement so gratuitous and irreconcilable with the
facts of the case; we should say that the calculation
of personal interest was always paramount to the de
sire of converting the natives. Mr. Prescott says,
" There was nothing which the Spanish government
had more earnestly at heart than the conversion of the

250 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Indians." We wish there were some facts to sustain
the assertion. It is true, a pretence was often made
of a desire to Christianize the Indians. Velasquez in
structs Cortes " to bear in mind, above all things,
that the object which the Spanish monarch had most
at heart was the convertion of the Indians;" he was,
however, to impress on them the grandeur and good
ness of his royal master, and to invite them " to give
in their allegiance to him, and to manifest it by regal
ing him with such comfortable presents of gold, pearls,
and precious stones, as, by showing their good will,
would secure his favor and protection." Imagine,
oh gentle or simple readers, imagine the American
board of foreign missionaries sending out their ser
vants to China with such instructions, asking for
" comfortable presents " of silks, and Sycee silver, and
tea ! Imagine, also, the admiration of the Castilian
court, if Cortes had believed that " the conversion of
the Indians " was " the object which the Spanish mon
arch had most at heart," and had converted the whole
of Mexico, overturned every idol, sending them all as
trophies to his " most noble, powerful, and catholic
prince, invincible emperor, and our sovereign lord,"
planted the cross on every teocalli, but the Spanish
flag nowhere, and had not sent home a single ounce of
gold, nor gained an inch of land ! Imagine the honors,
the triumphal processions, that would have been his
welcome home to old Castile! Mr. Prescott, in the
very teeth of facts, maintains that Cortes took this
part of his instructions to the letter, and with him
that the conversion of the natives was paramount " to
every calculation of personal interest." His " first ob
ject," says Mr. Prescott, " was to reclaim the natives
from their gross idolatry, and to substitute a purer

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 251
form of worship. . . . He was prepared to use
force if milder means should prove ineffectual." He
felt " he had a high mission to perform as a soldier of
the cross." Cortes comes to St. Juan de Ulloa, as
it is now called, and invites the natives " to abandon
their cursed idols, abolish human sacrifice, and abstain
from kidnapping." Everybody knows the fable of
the Fox turned Preacher ; it is less remarkable than the
historical and kindred fable of Cortes turned mis
sionary. This confessor of the faith, this missionary of the
Lord, this great first apostle to the Gentiles of Te-
nochtitlan, comes to Tabasco, full of war and Chris
tianity, resolved, as Mr. Prescott confesses, to build
"his faith upon
The holy text of pike and gun."
The natives opposed the entrance of armed strangers,
as the Dutch or the Portuguese would have done.
Coortes made proclamation, and assured them that " if
blood were spilt the sin would lie in their heads."
They answered with shouts of defiance and a shower
of arrows. He took the town, and two days after had
a severe battle with the inhabitants of the country.
Of course the Spaniards were victorious, and the In
dians suffered great loss; some say one thousand were
slain, some thirty thousand. The battle was fought
on Lady Day, the day of the miraculous conception of
the mother of God. The battle was a good type of
the " annunciation " brought by this new Gabriel to
the American Virgin. As the primitive Christians, it
is said, had miraculous assistance in wielding their
spiritual weapons, so these devout heralds of the faith,
" soldiers of the cross," and " followers of the Lamb,"
had aid from on high — a celestial champion

252 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" mounted on his grey war-horse, heading the rescue,
and trampling over the bodies of the fallen infidels ! "
Cortes thought it was his own tutelary saint, — Saint
Peter, a patron not wholly unsuitable for such a client,
— " but," says Pizarro y Orellana, " the common and
indubitable opinion is, that it was our glorious apostle,
Saint James, the bulwork and safeguard of the na
tion." After the battle the Indians were " converted,"
and the event celebrated on Palm Sunday. " Behold
thy King cometh unto thee meek " must have been
sung with great unction that sabbath morn, and the
lesson for the day, " Come unto me, ye that labour and
are heavy laden," must have delighted Saint Peter and
Saint James, heard " in this connection ! " A city
was afterwards built on the battle-field ; its name com
memorates the day, the deed, and the Christianity of
these apostles — Saint Mary of Victory !
At Compoalla Cortes tried his hand at the delightful
work of conversion ; the Indian monarch, however, de
clared his own gods were good enough for him, and
he could not comprehend how the Creator of the uni
verse " could condescend to take the form of humanity,
with its infirmities and ills, and wander about the
earth, the voluntary victim of .... those
whom his breath had called into existence." Poor be
nighted heathen ! To Cortes this was easy as drawing
his sword. However, the nation was converted — at
least the temples. Here, though not for the first
or last time,i — for " the things that are seen are tem
poral " and require to be renewed, — these devout apos
tles received a foretaste of their reward, in the form
of " eight Indian maidens, richly dressed, wearing
collars and ornaments of gold, with a number of female
slaves to wait on them." The chief requested that they

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 253
might become wives of the Spanish captains. " Cortes
received the damsels courteously," such was his zeal
for Christianity, but told the cacique they must first
be baptized." " Porque manera no era permitido
a, hombres, hijos de la Iglesia di Dios, tener commercio
con idolatras! " Similar comforters were frequently
" added "to their number." Bernal Diaz, a very plain-
spoken old soldier, who cared not over much for the
souls of the heathen, mentions these things oftener
than Mr. Prescott. Cortes himself, in virtue of his
apostolic dignity, we suppose, or as head of the new
church, took the right " to lead about " the celebrated
Marina, — not without other helpmeets, we think, — an
Indian woman who was of great service in the expedi
tion. This band of missionaries went to Cholula, and mas
sacred the inhabitants, who had been previously as
sembled in a narrow place convenient for the slaugh
ter. A portion of the town was burnt, and, as Cortes
himself says, three thousand of the inhabitants put to
death. Herrera makes the number six thousand, and
others yet greater. Mr. Prescott is far from justify
ing the deed, yet he endeavors to excuse the conduct
of Cortes ; these were heathens, religious infidelity
was thought a sin to be punished with fire and faggot
in this Hfe, and eternal suffering in the next. But
if it is believed that death sends a man to eternal tor
ment, a " soldier of the cross " would hesitate a little
before butchering six thousand men. Las Casas adds
that he burnt alive more than one hundred caciques
whom he had craftily got into his hands, and that
while the city was on fire, it was said that Cortes re
peated a snatch of poetry, comparing himself to Nero
looking down from the Tarpeian rock on the burn-

254 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ing of Rome, and caring not for the screams of the
children and the old men. This story seems less prob
able to Mr. Prescott than to us. After thus introduc
ing himself to the Cholulans, Cortes " urged the citi
zens to embrace the cross " and abandon their false
gods. When Cortes had his first interview with Monte
zuma, he told the monarch that the Christians had
come to snatch his soul and the souls of his people from
the flames of eternal fire. The Mexican king must
have thought them remarkable men for such a mis
sion. When about to advance to the siege of Mexico,
Cortes tells his soldiers that " the conversion of the
heathen is the work most acceptable in the eye of the
Almighty, and one that will be sure to receive his sup
port;" that without this the war would be unjust, and
all they might gain by it, robbery. When a new king
was established at Tezcuco, Cortes placed several Span
iards about him, ostensibly to instruct him in their lan
guage and religion, but really as spies to watch over
his conduct and prevent his correspondence with the
Mexicans. The Spanish apostles had one mode of distinguish
ing their converts and catechumens from such as had
not fallen into their hands which we do not find prac
ticed by the evangelists of other nations : they branded
their captives with a hot iron. The letter G was thus
indeliably burnt upon them, to denote that they were
the spoils of war (guerra). Diaz mentions the brand
ing of the captives a great deal oftener than Mr. Pres
cott ; on several occasions it was done to " a vast num
ber of the inhabitants," and again, " great numbers
were led away into slavery and marked in the face
with a red-hot iron." This hateful torment was

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 255
burned upon the women as well as the men ; even upon
the faces of the women who were to serve as temporary
" wives " to the conquerors, who, it seems, were not
always so anxious to ensure their baptism as their
branding. The motive of the conquerors was love of conquest
and plunder. This is plain enough in the despatches
of Cortes. Diaz makes no concealment of the fact ; he
wished the land to be divided as follows : one-fifth for
the king, one-fifth for the church, and the rest among
the conquerors, according to their rank and merits.
As the conquerors who survived the conquest could not
have been more than five or six hundred, they would
have been pretty well paid for two or three years' ser
vice. But what would be left for the converted na
tives? Heaven in the next life and slavery in this.
The design of the conquerors is made plain by the
invasion itself, by their conduct during the war, and
by the institutions they established after it was over;
they wanted the property and the persons of the Mex
icans. They took both, perhaps with as little ferocity
and as much decorum as any nation could rob and en
slave another. The plea of a desire to convert the
Indians is a poor defence, and unworthy of an histo
rian Hke Mr. Prescott. It would be better rhetoric,
as well as truer and more honest, to say: these were
hard, iron men, with rather less than the average in
telligence, morality, and piety of their nation ; they
went to Mexico, led thither by love of adventure, love
of fame, of power, or of gold; they only pretended to
care for the souls of the men whose property they
plundered, whose daughters they debauched, whose
persons they stole or slew !
Certainly they were very remarkable heralds of

256 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Christianity. By steel and gunpowder they subdued
kingdoms, wrought unrighteousness, obtained promises.
They wandered about in steel caps, dragging their ar
tillery after them, impoverishing, afflicting, torment
ing. They routed armies; cities they overthrew and
turned upside down ; captives they took and branded
in the name of God. As an earnest of their reward,
they had female slaves without number, the first-fruits
of them that believe, and having satiated their avarice
and their lust, and obtained a good report through
the blood of their victims, they received the promises,
the heritage of the heathen ; yea, such was the reward
of all those blessed apostles — of whom the world was
not worthy — horse, foot, and dragoons.
Some conquerors have a great idea, and for the
sake of that do deeds which revolt the moral sense of
mankind. Such men have some excuse for their vio
lent dealing with the world, in the service they render ;
they esteem themselves men of destiny, and in behalf
of their idea go forth through seas of blood of their
own shedding. Smiting with the sword, it is not for
themselves they smite. Thus there is some defence for
Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, and Charlemagne; for
Napoleon and for Cromwell ; even Frederic the Great
was not a mere fighter. But Cortes cannot be put
in this class. He had no idea in advance of his age;
in all but courage and military skill he appears be
hind his times. No noble thought, no lofty sentiment
seems to have inspired him ; none such breathes in his
words or deeds. Mr. Prescott says he was not a " mere
fighter," but we see nothing else that can be said to
distinguish him from the rest of men. He was one of
the most vulgar of fighters ; he loved the excitement of
adventurous deeds; he sought vulgar fame, and vul-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 257
gar wealth and power, by vulgar means for vulgar
ends. Few distinguished conquerors were so ignoble.
He came among the red men of America ; they began
by calling him a god, and ended with hating him as
the devil. In the hot region of Mexico he was treated
with great kindness ; his companions " experienced
every alleviation that could be desired from the atten
tions of the friendly nations." They made more than
a thousand booths for the Spaniards, and freely gave
provisions for Cortes and his officers. Montezuma
sent to learn who we were, says Diaz, and what we
wanted for our ships; we were only to tell what we
wanted, and they were to furnish it. The Indians who
attached themselves to his standard were faithful; of
the Tlascalans only Xicotencatl proved untrue. But
Cortes was crafty, insidious, and deceitful. He fo
mented discontent; he encouraged the disaffected na
tions to rely on his protection, " as he had come to
redress their wrongs," while he came to steal their pos
sessions and their persons. He told his own soldiers
they were to fight against rebels who had revolted from
their Hege lord; against barbarians, the enemies of
Christianity ; to fight the battles of the cross, to obtain
riches and honor in this life and imperishable glory
in heaven.
He was unjust to his own soldiers, seizing more than
his share of the booty. Diaz complains of this oftener
than Mr. Prescott; even the food was sometimes un
justly divided. Did the soldiers complain, Cortes
made a speech full of " the most honeyed phrases and
arguments most specious " (palabras muy mellifluas,
. . . razones muy bien dichas ). Some he
bribed into silence with gold, others with promises;
some he put in chains. Were the captives to be divided,
II— 17

258 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
he not only selected first the king's fifth thereof and
his own, but the finest of the women were secretly set
apart, so that, as one of these missionaries complains,
the common soldiers found only " old and ugly wo
men " left for them. After the spoil was divided in
this unjust fashion, he would not always aUow the
soldiers to keep their scanty share, but once remanded
one-third of it back again, and insisted that if it
were not restored he would take the whole. Under
pretense of loans he extorted a good deal from his
own soldiers — a circumstance which injured him
much, says Diaz. Mr. Prescott thinks such occasions
were " critical conjunctures which taxed all the address
and personal authority of Cortes. He never shrank
from them, but on such occasions was true to himself."
But truth to himself was falseness to his soldiers.
He would violate his word to them for the sake of
more plunder. Much as they honored and feared
him, few loved him much, and in one of his most
trying times, says the same old soldier we have often
quoted, they all grudged him a handful of maize to
stay his hunger.
Cortes was needlessly cruel; this appears in the
slaughter at Tabasco, and in the massacre at Cholula,
which even Mr. Prescott thinks a dark stain on the
memory of the conquerors. His punishments often
appear wanton: — he orders a man to be killed for
stealing a pair of fowls, another for speaking angrily
to Montezuma; he has the feet of his pilot chopped
off for some offence; he took fifty Tlascalans who
came to his camp as spies, cut off their hands, and sent
them home. The friendly Indians were curious to see
the Spaniards, and came too near the lines of their
encampment, and Cortes coolly relates that fifteen, or

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 259
twenty of them were shot down by the sentries. Mr.
Prescott excuses this; the "jealousy of the court and
the cautions he had received from his allies . . .
seem to have given an unnatural acuteness . . .
to his perceptions of danger." After the conquest an
insurrection took place and was speedily put down;
four hundred chiefs were sentenced to the stake or the
gibbet, " by which means," says Cortes, " God be
praised, the safety of the Spaniards was secured." He
burnt alive some of Montezuma's officers, who were
guilty of no offence but that of obeying their king;
at the same time he punished Montezuma for giving
them the order. He tortured the members of Guatemo-
zin's household, putting boihng oil upon their feet.
This great apostle to the Gentiles put Guatemozin
himself and the cacique of Tacuba to the torture —
not exactly to save his soul, " so as by fire," but to
get his gold. Afterwards, on a groundless suspicion,
he treacherously hung them both. Mr. Prescott shows
little horror at these cruelties, little sense of their in
justice ; nay, he seems to seek to mitigate the natural
indignation which a man feels at such tyranny of the
strong over the weak. We confess our astonishment
that an historian who thinks the desire of converting
the heathen was the paramount motive in the breast
of Cortes has no more censure to bestow on such wan
ton cruelties, so frequently perpetrated as they were.
The soldiers of the cross, going on their mission of
mercy, to snatch the Indians from the fires of hell,
dress the wounds of their horses with melted fat from
the bodies of the natives they were to convert; Mr
Prescott makes no comment. Cortes has the slaves
branded with a hot iron in the cheek. Diaz mentions
this more than ten times ; Mr. Prescott but twice, and

260 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
then has no word to say — more than if they had been
baptized with water.
The massacre at Cholula was terrible as it was need
less and wanton. " More than three thousand of the
enemy perished in ten hours," says Cortes. Mr. Pres
cott confesses this has " left a dark stain on the memory
of the conquerors," that he does not intend to vindicate
their cruel deeds, and then undertakes to excuse this
very cruelty. We confess our astonishment at such an
excuse. The massacre at Mexico, after the capture of the
city, was terrible. We will .not dwell upon it, nor re
count its bloody details. Cortes had destroyed town
after town ; army after army had he swept off. It is
within bounds to say that half a million men had been
put to the sword since the Spaniards came thither,
desirous above all things to convert their precious souls ;
now the mighty capital, the centre of civilization in
North America, whose influence had been felt from the
Mexique Gulf to the Bay of Fundy, along either shore
of the continent, has fallen; Guatemozin is captured;
the wide rich empire lies submissive at his feet ; Cortes
himself, all iron as he was and smeared with guiltless
blood, is moved with compassion ; the nation is to be
blotted out. But Mr. Prescott has no sympathy with
the Mexicans ; nay, he pauses to avert the sympathy of
other men, interposing his shield of ice between the
victim and the compassion of mankind. He says: —
"We cannot regret the fall of an empire which did so little
to promote the happiness of its subjects or the real interests
of humanity." "The Aztecs were emphatically a fierce and
brutal race, little calculated, in their best aspects to excite our
sympathy and regard. Their civilization, such as it was, was
not their own, but reflected, perhaps imperfectly, from a race
whom they had succeeded. ... It was a generous graft

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 261
on a vicious stock, and could have brought no fruit to perfec
tion. They ruled over their wide domains with a sword instead
of a sceptre. They did nothing in any way to ameliorate the
condition or in any way promote the progress of their vassals.
Their vassals were serfs, used only to minister to their
pleasure." " The feeble light of civilization," he says, " was
growing fainter and fainter." He gives not a single
fact to warrant this latter statement, but even if it
were true, the Spaniards did not mend the matter by
overturning the candlestick and putting their bloody
heel on the flickering torch. He attempts to remove
any little compassion which may«» linger in his reader's
heart; the Mexicans were guilty of human sacrifices,
they also were cannibals. True, and it is a horrible
thing to think of; but think of the butcheries com
mitted by the Spaniards, also in the name of God ; try
each nation by its light, and which is the the worse,
the cannibal or the Christian? Mr. Prescott tries to
excuse the barbarities of the conquerors ; when any
of the inhabitants fell into their hands, " they were
kindly entertained, their wants supplied, and every
means taken to infuse into them a spirit of concilia
tion." The sad shades of Montezuma and Guatemozin
what wiU they say to that? Diaz informs us of the
" means taken " in many an instance. They were re
duced to slavery, branded with a hot iron in the
cheek. This was the kindly entertainment they met
with from those Christian missionaries, who held their
lands on condition of converting the natives. We
might naturally look for justice from an American
writer, with no national prejudice to blind him. But
no, his sympathy is wholly with the conquerors; the
spirit of chivalry is mightier with him than the spirit
of humanity. Bustamente, however, spite of the

262 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Spanish blood in his veins, writing on the spot made
famous by the deeds of Cortes and his followers, wishes
a monument might be erected to Guatemozin, on the
spot where he was taken captive, and an inscription
thereon to " devote to eternal execration the detested
memory of those banditti." The work is needless;
themselves have erected a monument " more lasting
than brass," telling of their power and their prowess,
but also of their more than heathen cruelty, their
tyranny, and their shame. The rhetoric of Mr. Pres
cott cannot hide them from the justice of mankind.
We have little to say of the subsequent career of
Cortes. He made a bold and desperate expedition to
the southern part of North America, enduring won
derful hardships, fighting with his usual skill and
courage. Mexico was settled by hungry Spaniards,
the natives mainly reduced to slavery. Cortes became
rich and powerful. He was accused before the Em
peror, and defended himself. He received great
honors in Spain, when he returned thither. He set
tled down on an estate in Mexico. He died at length
in Spain, but in his will expresses doubts " whether
one can conscientiously hold property in Indian
slaves." Mr. Prescott writes the eulogy of his hero,
which we have not space to criticize. But there are
two ways of judging such a man ; one is that of hu
manity. Here the inquirer looks over the whole field
of history, impartially weighs the good and ill of a man,
allows for his failings if they belong to his age, and
detracts from his individual merits if they also are
held in common with the mass of men, but judges the
age and its institutions by the standard of absolute
justice. This is the work of the philosophic historian.
The other way is that of personal admiration of the

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 263
hero. We are sorry to say that Mr. Prescott has
taken the latter course. Crime is one thing; but the
theory which excuses, defends, justifies crime is quite a
different thing, is itself not to be justified, defended or
excused. We are sorry to add the name of Mr. Pres
cott to the long list of writers who have a theory
which attempts to justify the crime against mankind,
the tyranny of might over right. We are sorry to say
of this work in general, and on the whole, that it is
not written in the philosophy of this age, and, still
worse, not in the Christianity, the wide humanity,
which is of mankind. We know this is a severe judg
ment, and wish we might be mistaken in pronouncing
it, but such are the facts.
Mr. Prescott has little sympathy with the natives.
Marina, unmarried and a captive, becomes the concu
bine of Cortes, a married man and a conqueror. Her
religion aUowed the connection, it was not uncommon;
his religion forbade it, and he was living " in mortal
sin." She seems to have loved him truly and with all
her heart. To him she was a useful instrument, per-
sonaUy as his concubine, politically as his interpreter
and diplomatic agent. Mr. Prescott says, " she had
her errors, as we have seen." The only error he al
ludes to was her connection with Cortes not held un
lawful, against nature or custom, there ; but no censure
is passed on Cortes, though he had a wife at Cuba.
When his wife dies, Marina might be lawfully mar
ried to him, if he would ; she had borne him a son, the
unfortunate Don Martin Cortes. But he did not want
an Indian woman for his wife, whatever might be
her services, her love for him, or the connection be
tween them, or the children she had borne him. He
must wed one of the titled dames of Spain, daughter

R64 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
of the Count de Aguilar, beautiful and " much
younger than himself," and Cortes " gave Marina
away to a Castilian knight, Don Juan XamariUo, to
whom she was wedded as his lawful wife," says Mr.
Prescott, who makes no comment on this transaction,
and does not even mention it as one of the " errors "
of his hero!
Mr. Prescott takes sides with the Spaniards, passes
over much of their cruelty in silence, and often apolo
gizes for what he relates, suggesting some idle cir
cumstance which takes off the edge of indignation
from the reader, careless, superficial, and requiring a
moral stimulus from his instructor. In his narrative
he degrades the Mexicans fighting for their homes and
the altars of their gods, not less fondly cherished than
the homes and the faith of Christians. The Spaniards
are brave, chivalrous, heroic. Their victims, he tells
us, " filled the air with wild cries and howlings like a
herd of ravenous wolves disappointed of their prey."
In the attack on Mexico, a Spanish ensign narrowly
escaped falling into the hands of his foe : " The bar
barians," says Mr. Prescott, " set up a cry of dis
appointed rage." Again, at sight of the enemy and
of the sacrifice of prisoners going on in the temple,
the Mexicans " like vultures maddened by the smell
of distant carrion  set up a piercing
cry." The efforts of Guatemozin to defend his capi
tal were " menaces and machinations ; " the Mexicans
" raged with impotent anger, as they beheld their
lordly edifices, their temples, all they had been accus
tomed to venerate, thus swept away." If we remember
aright, the Jews mourned a little when Zion was trod
den under foot of the nations, but we should not envy
the heart of the historian who should say of the

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 265
Jeremiahs of that time, that they " raged with impo
tent anger." Even Cortes thought it a sad sight
(Que era Mstima cierto de lo ver), " but we were forced
to it." When driven to despair, some Mexicans,
valiant as Leonidas,
"in the public breach devoted stood,
And for their country's cause were prodigal of blood."
They would not ask for mercy ; Mr. Prescott says they
" glared on the invaders with the sullen ferocity of
the wounded tiger, that the huntsman has tracked to
his forest cave." Even the heroism of Guatemozin
is only a " haughty spirit."
The Spaniards established a form of slavery worse
than that of the heathens. If the Mexicans did little
for their vassals — what did their conquerors do?
Mr. Prescott passes over the horrors of the slavery
established there ; excuses the founders for their of
fense : Columbus had done the same ! " Three
Hieronymite friars and an eminent Jesuit, all men of
learning and unblemished piety," were sent out to
investigate the condition of the natives. They justi
fied slavery; the Indians would not work without com
pulsion, unless they worked, they would not be con
nected with the whites, and without that connection
would not be " converted," and of course not " saved."
Slavery, therefore, was their only road to escape
damnation. We must confess our amazement that a
man of liberal culture, in the midst of a Christian
country, writing of such cruelties as the Spaniards
practiced on their victims, reducing millions of freemen
to such a condition, should have no more condemna
tion for such atrocities. How shall we explain the
fact? Can it be that the commercial atmosphere of
Boston had stifled the natural and nobler breath of
Hie historian? We know not.

266 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
There was one Spaniard who steadfastly opposed the
enslaving of the Indians — the Dominican Las Casas,
a man who all his life sought continually one great
end, the welfare of the Indians. Mr. Prescott be
stows well-deserved encomiums upon him ; often praises
him, yet we think he is the only author of all whom
Mr. Prescott quotes that can complain of the smallest
injustice at his hands.
It now remains to speak briefly of the form of the
work. The division into books and chapters is suffi
ciently good. The style is clear and simple, though
a little less carefully labored than in his earlier work.
The references are abundant, and, so far as we have
examined them, distinguished by the same accuracy
which we noticed in the former history. Occasionally
there is a little harmless pedantry. Thus in the text,
he says that Cortes told his men to aim at the faces
of the foe, and in the margin quotes Lucan to remind
us that the veterans of Caesar hit the dandies of Pom-
pey's army in the same way. But such things are
rare, and by no means disagreeable.
He often refers events to Providence which other
men would be content with ascribing to human agency.
Thus he says, " it was beneficiently ordered by Provi
dence that the land [of the Mexicans] should be de
livered over to another race, who would rescue it from
the brutish superstitions that daily extended wider and
wider." But in the same manner " it was beneficently
ordered by Providence " that merchant ships should
be delivered over to Admiral Drake or Captain Kidd ;
that the Indians of Massachusetts should butcher the
white men at Deerfield, and the whites should carry
the head of King Philip on a pole into Plymouth and
seU his family into slavery. Again, speaking of Cor-

PRESCOTT'S MEXICO 267
tes, he tells us " Providence reserved him for higher
ends," and that he was " the instrument selected by
Providence to scatter terror among the barbarian mon-
archs of the western world, and lay their empires in the
dust." Montezuma, " was the sad victim of destiny."
But all this providential action is in behalf of the
invaders. Causa victrix placet diis.
The figures of speech are commonplace ; we do not
remember one that is original, except that already
quoted, in which the Mexicans are compared to " vul
tures maddened by the smell of distant carrion." Few
of them are elegant or expressive enough to deepen
the impression of the simple statement of the fact.
One figure, to " spread hke wild-fire," which is a
favorite in the History of Spain, appears also and
frequently in this work. Others are poor and com
mon : — to crowd " like a herd of deer," or a " herd of
wolves ; " to be " pale as death ; " to " rush like a
torrent ; " to swarm " like famished harpies ; " and to
be led " like sheep to the slaughter." They add little
to the freshness or beauty of the style, and do not
impress us very forcibly with the originality of the
author.

VI
HTLDRETH'S UNITED STATES
At the present day the United States present one
of the most interesting and important political phe
nomena ever offered in the history of mankind. Eng
land has planted her colonies in New Holland, in New
Zealand, in the East and the West Indies, at Cape Good
Hope, and at Labrador; at Mauritius, Gibraltar, and
in the Islands of the Pacific. She has forced an en
trance into China ; she longs to get firm footing in
Borneo and Nicaragua. Wheresoever her children
wander they carry the seed out of which British insti
tutions are sure to grow ; institutions, however, which
never produce their Hke, but nobler and better on an
other soil. Omitting aU mention of Ireland, America
Was the oldest of these colonies, the first to detach itself
from the parent stem, and is perhaps the prophecy
of what most of the others are destined to become.
It must be a vigorous tribe of men which can hold
so vast a portion of the earth while themselves are so
few in numbers. Three hundred years ago, in the
reign of Edward VI., England was a third-rate power
in Europe. Her population was less than three mil
lions, her exports were trifling, and consisted of the
raw materials of her clumsy agriculture and her min
eral treasures, which the Tyrians had traversed the
ocean to purchase two thousand years before. Her
soil could hardly raise a salad. Scotland was inde
pendent, Ireland not wholly subject to English rule,
Wales had but lately been added to her realm. She
268

HILDRETH 269
was remarkable chiefly for the stormy seas which girt
the isle, and the chalky cliffs along her shore, for the
fogs that cover it, for the rudeness of her inhabi
tants and the tough valor of her soldiers. Now, in
three hundred years, England contains some seventeen
millions of inhabitants, Scotland and Ireland ten mil
lions more. Russia, Austria, and France are the
only nations in Europe that outnumber her in popu
lation. Turkey, with nine millions, and Spain, with
twelve, are powerless beside her. Her ships are in
all the oceans of the world, the sun never sets on her
flag; her subjects capture the whale at Baffin's Bay,
and the elephant in India ; they sport at hunting lions
in South Africa. Her navigators, with scientific
hardihood, explore each corner of the Northern Sea,
or locked in ice wait the slow hand of death, or the
slower sun of an arctic summer. She has climes too
cold for reindeer ; cHmes too hot almost for the sugar
cane and the pine-apple; the lean larch of Scotland,
and the banyan-tree of Hindoostan, both grow in the
same empire. Esquimaux, Gaboon, and Sanscrit are
tongues subject to Britain. At least an eighth part of
the men now living in the world owe allegiance to
the queen of that little island.
Her children came to America when the nation was' in
all the vigor of its most rapid growth. The progress
of their descendants in population and in wealth
has been wthout parallel. Two hundred and fifty
years ago there was not an English settler in the
United States; now the population is not far from
two-and-twenty millions ; two thirds of the people are
of English origin. The increase of property has been
more rapid than that of numbers. In fifty years
Boston has multiplied her inhabitants nearly five-fold,

270 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and her property more than twenty-five fold in the
same time. The increase of intelligence is very re
markable, and probably surpasses that of property.
The Americans are now trying a political experi
ment which has hitherto been looked on with great
suspicion and even horror. Here is a democracy on
a large scale, a church without a bishop, a state with
out a king; society (in the free states) without the
theoretical distinction of patrician and plebian.
What is more surprising, the experiment succeeds bet
ter than its most sanguine friends ever dared to hope.
The evils which were apprehended have not yet befallen
us. The " Red Republic," x which hostile prophets
foretold, has not come to pass ; there are " red "
monarchies^ enough of them, the other side of the
world, born red ; doomed, we fear, to die in that sad
livery of woe; but in America the person of the citi
zen is still respected quite as much as in Austria and
England ; and nowhere in the world is property safer
or so much honored, the lovers of liberty here are
lovers of order as its condition. Even Mr. Carlyle,
accustomed to speak of America with bitterness and
contempt, and of the ballot-box with loathing and
nausea, confesses to the success of the experiment so
far as wealth and numbers are concerned. Indeed,
it is a mater of rejoicing to warm-hearted men, that
we have cotton to cover and corn to feed the thousands
of exiles who yearly are driven by hunger from Eng
land, to seek a home or a grave on the soil of America.
It is interesting to study the growth of the American
people; to observe the progress of the idea on which
the government rests, and the attempts to make the
idea an institution.
This is one of the few great nations which can

HILDRETH 271
trace its history back to certain beginnings; there is
no fabulous period in our annuals, no mythical centuries
when 01 wpara fiev fSXixorres IjSXeirop fiirny,
KXuovres o6k ijKovov' dXV ivetpdrav
' AXlyKioi popcfiaiai, rbv paKp&v xp'6vov
" E0upoc e&rij iravra, noire irXivtvipeis
Aofiovs npoaeiXovs rjaav, 08 (v\ovpytav'
Karwpi'xes S' ivaiov, Hare dr/avpoi
HiptinKes, ivrpav ev fivxois &vn\lots.
To be rightly appreciated, American history re
quires to be written by a democrat. A theocrat
would condemn our institutions for lacking an es
tablished church with its privileged priesthood; an
aristocrat, for the absence of conventional nobility.
MiHtary men might sneer at the smallness of the army
and navy; and aesthetic men deplore the want of a
splendid court, the lack of operatic and other spec
tacles in the large towns. The democrat looks for the
substantial welfare of the people, and studies America
with reference to that point. At present, America is
not remarkable for her literature or her art ; she has
made respectable advances in science, but her indus
trial works and her political institutions are by far
her most remarkable achievements hitherto. We are
not sanguine enough to suppose that all the advan
tages of aU the other forms of government are to be
secured in this, but yet trust that the most valuable
things will be preserved here. In due time, we doubt
not, the higher results of civilization will appear, and
we shall estimate the greatness of the nation not merely
by its numbers, its cotton, its cattle, and its corn.
But " that is not first which is spiritual." First of
all, the imperious wants of the body must be attended
to, — the woods are to be felled, the log-cabins built,
the corn got into the ground, the wild beasts destroyed,

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the savages kept at peace. There must be many gen
erations between the woodsman who erects the first
shanty of logs, and the poet who sheds immortal
beauty on logs and lumberers. Were there not ages
between the wooden hut of Arcadian Pelasgos in
Greece and the Parthenon? From mythical Cecrops
to Aristophanes the steps are many, each a generation.
The genius of liberty only asks two things — time
and space. Space enough she has, all America is be
fore her ; time she takes possession of fast enough, only
a second at once; and in the course of ages we think
she will make her mark on the world. Up to this
time the achievements of America are, taken as a whole,
such as we need not blush at. Some things there were
and are to be ashamed of — not of the whole. That
dreadful blot of slavery remains yet, an Ireland in
America ; among the whites, on the one hand, causing
the most shameful poltroonery which modern times
can redden at, and on the other, calhng forth heroism
that seems almost enough to redeem the wickedness
which has brought it to light. But, turning to that
half of the nation free from direct personal contact
with this sin of the state, forgetting for a moment the
foolishness of " political sages," the cowardice of those
leaders who never dare enact justice as a statute, but
take the responsibility of making iniquity a law, and
omitting the defalcation of men who forsake their
habitual worship of a calf of gold, to bow down before
a face of dough,2 — there is certainly a gratifying
spectacle. Here are some fifteen millions of free men
trying the voluntary system in church and state, richer
than any other people of the same numbers in the
world, and with the aggregate wealth of the nation
more equally distributed; a nation well fed, well

HILDRETH 273
clothed, well housed, industrious, temperate, well gov
erned, and respecting one another and themselves;
that certainly is something. In all that territory
there are probably more muskets in the hands of pri
vate men than there are habitations, yet not one is
kept for actual defense; and through the free states
no soldier walks abroad with loaded gun; only in the
large towns is there a visible police. There are not
two thousand soldiers of the state in all that terri
tory, and they are as inoffensive to the citizens as the
scare-crows in the field, only not so useful, nor so
well paying for their keep. Of this population some
three mUlions are in the public schools, academies, and
colleges. Nowhere are churches so numerous or so
well attended ; nowhere such indications of happiness,
comfort, intelhgence, morality among the mass of men.
This, we repeat, is something. We have no very great
men ; we have never had such. An Alexander, a Caesar,
a Charlemagne, a Napoleon, we have not had. Perhaps
we never shall ; but it is hardly worth while to go into
mourning yet for the absence of such. Great artists,
poets, philosophers, men of letters, we have not had,
hitherto. We have shown no great respect for such,
to our shame be it spoken ; but in due time we may
trust that they also will come and shine for ages,
with the halo of genius around their brow. However,
it does seem a little remarkable that in America every
thing seems to be done democratically — by the* com
bined force of many men with moderate abilities, and
not by one man of Herculean powers. It was so in
the early periods of the nation ; so in the Revolution,
and so now. It has always been so with the Teutonic
tribes of men, much more than with the nations from
the Semitic stock. With them there comes a Moses
11—18

274 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
or a Mahomet who overrides a nation for one or two
thousand years, and its progress seems to be by a
series of leaps ; while the western nations, with less
nationalism, and more individualism, accomplish less
in that way, but slope upwards by a more gradual as
cent. In the English Revolution there was no one great
man who condensed the age into himself, and created
the institutions of coming generations, as Moses and
Mahomet have done; spite of the great abilities and
great services of Cromwell, no just historian wiU claim
that for him. It was so in the American Revolution,
so in the French. Washington led our armies, and
Napoleon the legions of France, but neither gave the
actors the idea which was slowly or suddenly to be
realized in institutions.
It is an interesting work to trace the growth of the
American people from their humble beginnings to
their present condition ; to discover and point out the
causes which have helped that growth, and the causes
which have hindered it. To a philosophical historian
this is no unpromising field ; the facts are well known ;
it is easy to ascertain the ideas out of which the gen
eral political institutions of America have grown; it
is not difficult to see the historical causes which have
modified these institutions, giving them their present
character and form. None but a democrat can thor
oughly appreciate that history. As the history of
Christianity must be written by a Christian who can
write from within, and the history of art by a man
with an artistic soul, so must the history of America
be written by a democrat — we mean one who puts
man before the accidents of man, valuing his permanent
nature more than the transient results of his history.
American history up to the adoption of the Federal

HILDRETH 275
Constitution forms a whole, and has a certain unity
which is not obvious at first sight. The several col
onies were getting established, learning to stand alone ;
they were quite unlike in their origin, form of gov
ernment, ecclesiastical and other institutions. Very
different ideas prevailed in Georgia and New Hamp
shire. Looked at carelessly they seem only divergent;
but when studied carefully it seems as if there was
a regular plan, and as if the whole was calculated to
bring about the present result. No doubt there was
such a cancatenation of part with part, only the plan
lay in God, not in the mind of Oglethorpe and Cap
tain Smith, of Carver and Roger WiUiams.
Considering this history as an organic whole, to
treat it philosophically it seems to us it is necessary
to describe the material theatre on which this historic
drama is to be acted out; to describe the American
continent, telling of its extent and peculiarities in
general, its soil, climate, and natural productions, and
its condition at the time when the white men first
landed on its shores ; this, of course, comprises a de
scription of the inhabitants at that time in possession
of its soil.
Then the historian is to tell us of the men who
came here to found this empire; of their origin, their
character, and their history in general. He is to tell
the external causes which brought them here or the
motives which impelled them, and the ideas which they
brought, as well as those which sprung up under their
new circumstances. Next, he is to show speculatively
by the idea, and practically by the facts, how these
ideas worked under the new conditions of the people;
how they acted on circumstances and circumstances on
them, and what institutions came thereof. The his-

276 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
torian very poorly performs his duty who merely re
lates the succession of rulers, the increase or diminution
of wealth and numbers, the coming on of wars, and the
termination thereof, the rise of great men, with their
decline and fall, and the presence of institutions, with
out telling of the ideas they represented. Showing
the continual growth of the ideas which create the
institutions is little more than the work of an annalist
or chronicler.
If a great idea appears in human affairs, founding
new institutions and overturning the old, it is part
of the work of a philosophical historian to give us
the story of this idea ; to refer it back to its origin in
the permanent nature of man, or the accidents of his
development ; to show the various attempts to make
the thought a thing, and the idea a fact. Such is
the case in American history ; political institutions
were set agoing here radically unlike any others in the
world. True, we may find points of agreement be
tween the American and various European govern
ments. The trial by jury dates far back beyond the
" gray goose " code, and has its origin in remote an
tiquity; the habeas corpus is doubtless of English
origin, and its history may be read in Hallam, and
elsewhere ; the notion of delegates to represent corpora
tions or republics may have originated with the early
Christians, who sent their ministers and other servants
(or masters) to some provincial synod; the idea of
individual liberty, the sacredness of the person before
the state, may be traced to the wilds of Germany long
before the time of Christ. We know how much of
American freedom may be found in Sir John For-
tescue's Laudation of the laws of England, or in the
books of Moses, if we will ; but yet the American gov-

HILDRETH 277
eminent in nation, state, and town is an original
thing. The parts are old, many of them, but the
whole is the most original thing that can be found in
the political history of the world for many an age.
Almost every special and true moral precept of the
New Testament may be found in some heathen or
Hebrew writer before Jesus, but yet, spite of that,
Christianity was an original form of religion, as much
so as the statue of a goddess which a Grecian sculptor
gathered by a grand electicism from five hundred Spar
tan maids, corrected by the ideal in his own creative
and critical mind.
You trace the secret cause of the American institu
tions far off in the history of mankind. Here it is
a dim sentiment in the breast of the German in the
Hercynian forest ; then again it burns in the bosom
of the Christian, and he tells the world that God is
no respecter of persons, that Jew and Gentile are alike
to him. But it leads, at first, to no political conse
quences ; even its ecclesiastical results are trifling, and
its social consequences at first of small moment. It
could not make St. Paul hostile to personal Roman
slavery. In the middle ages you trace the path of this
idea. Sometimes it goes over the mountain side, and
is seen amid the works of great men, but commonly
it winds along in the low valleys of human life; a
little path, known only to the people, and worn by
their feet, not knowing whither it leads them; a by
path for the vassal, not the highway which the baron
and prelate took care to have in order. The record
of its existence is found in the song of the peasant or
in the popular proverb, in some fabulous legend of
unhistorical times, — times that never were, — or in
the predictions of days to come. This idea has not a

278 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
place in the pulpit of the minister; but in the silent
cell of the devout mystic it has its dwelling-place, and
gladdens his enraptured heart as a vision of the king
dom of heayen.
Now it waxes mighty, and contends against the op
pression of tyrannical men, less in the state than in
the church. Fast as it becomes an idea men organize
it as well as they can, now in little convents or mon
asteries, then in trading companies; then in guilds
of mechanics; in cities and small states, as in Italy
and in the Low Countries, in Switzerland, and the
Hanse towns. At length this impulse — it was hardly
an idea — puts all Europe into commotion. Men call
for spiritual freedom. Under the guidance of that
great spirit who stands as the water-shed between the
middle ages and modern times, feeling the contradic
tions of a divided age under Martin Luther, men
break the yoke of ecclesiastical tyranny they have
borne so long. Liberty of conscience was all mankind
called for, but for that time they must put up with
liberty of conscience limited on the divine side by the
Bible, on the human side by the king. Strait and op
pressive limits both proved to be, — bonds that ap
proached nearer and threatened to crush the strug
gling soul. Still men were not satisfied ; they wanted
political liberty as well as spiritual, and of spiritual
much more than they got. How rapidly the idea of a
free state got abroad over Europe. Bodinus, in his
Republic ; Thomas More, in his Utopia ; Bacon, in his
New Atlantis, — very undemocratic men at the best,
— are witnesses to the power of this demand. The
sentiment had long been in men's hearts; it was now
rapidly becoming an idea. Kings and priests told
men the less liberty they had the better; if they tried

HILDRETH 279.
to go alone they would certainly fall. Was it not
better to sit on the hearth of the king, their head
under the apron of the church, than thus try to walk
in the open air? There was good and bad scripture
for such a course; and of precedents the world was
full. But men would not be satisfied ; the king's hearth
was warm, and the motherly apron of the church made
the head easy and comfortable, but there was a divine
soul in man which would break out into aU sorts of
peasant wars, of Jack Cade's rebellions, of Runymedes
and the like. At length the idea gets so fully set
forth, as an idea, and so widely spread abroad by
fanatics and among sober men that the chief question
is, Where shall the idea first become a fact? Shall
it be in Germany, where the ecclesiastical Reforma
tion began and succeeded most? No, the feudal sys
tem had taken deep root in the Teutonic soil, and could
not be pulled up for some ages to come ; the Reforma
tion had affected thought in all departments in Ger
many, but politics suffered little change, and by that
little it does not appear that the people were directly
gainers to any considerable degree. Could it be in
France ? There was a body of enlightened men taking
the lead in European science and literature, but there
was no intelligence in the people. They seemed subjects
of authority, not subjects of reason, and though they
now and then gave indication of the sentiment for
fredom, which has since become so mighty in that na
tion, yet then no idea of it swept through the land,
stirring the tree-tops, and agitating the grass and the
very dust. In France there was a gorgeous court, a
wealthy king; nobles, rich, famous, and of long-re
nowned descent; there were soldiers with genius and
skiU, merchants and artists and clergymen, from

1280 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Abbe Jean to Cardinal Richelieu, but there was no
people to appreciate or desire freedom. In Spain no
one would think of free institutions ; the mind of the
nation, chained by the state and palsied by the church,
had only life enough left for mere external things,
for gold and sugar; even her European possessions
she could not hold against the vigor of Protestant
Dutchmen. Italy had given lessons in commerce, arts,
literature, religion, and politics to aU the rest of
Europe. Iri the dark ages she had kept the holy fire
of science and of literature, covered in the ashes of
old renown, and when occasion offered raked the em
bers, with her garment fanning them to a flame, and
sent little sparks thereof to Scotland, Ireland, Eng
land, and to all the north. While despotism laid his
iron rod on all the north of Europe, and the center too,
little commonwealths sprung up at practical Venice,
at prudent Pisa, and at haughty Florence, as a poet
caUs them ; green gardens were they in a snowy world,
filled with many a precious plant. But these, too,
had declined. Art, literature, science, " la bella
scienza," the sweet art of poesy, had flourished there,
but the nature of liberty craved another soil. The
Reformation, which winnowed the nations with a
rough wind, did not separate the wheat from the chaff
in Italy. The priests were too powerful, the people
too indolent; the chaff is so thick, and dry withal,
that the poor wheat can germinate but slowly.
" Ay ! down to the dust with them, slaves as they are,"
might well be said of Italy in the end of the six
teenth century. Other vineyards she had helped to
plant, but her own she had not kept. The last ser
vice she did mankind was, perhaps, the greatest: she

HILDRETH 281
showed them a new and savage world beyond the fabled
island of Atlantis in the West. Columbus and
Amerigo, Verrazani and the Cabots, were pioneers of
freedom for mankind. When Columbus turned his
bark's head to the West, he little knew that he was
leading the nations to universal democracy; but so it
seems now.
The new idea must come across the water to make
its fortune. To escape the persecution of the dragon
with seven heads and ten horns, the man-child must
flee with his mother into the wilderness and there so
journ, said our fathers, giving a " private interpreta
tion " to a dark " prophecy ; " at any rate, the
American " earth helped the woman." Here, three
thousand mUes from their native land, out of the reach
of old aristocratic institutions, the new nation could
unfold its sentimental to an idea, could develop the
idea into institutions; and, trying the experiment on
a smaU scale at first, prepare to found a great empire
on the American idea that aU men are created equal,
and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable
rights, and that it is the business of a goverment to
preserve for each man the perfect enjoyment of all
these natural rights, on the sole condition that he does
the corresponding duties.
There are two great periods of human history. In
the one men seek to establish unity of action, and
form the individuals into tribes and states. This is
commonly done to the loss of personal fredom; the
state subdues the citizen, and he becomes the subject
merely. In religion the ante-christian forms repre
sent this phase of men's affairs, and in politics it is
indicated by aristocracies, monarchies, and despotisms.
Then comes the second great period of history, in

282 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
which men seek for personal freedom. In religion
this is represented by Christianity, not the Christianity
of the Catholics or the Protestants, but the absolute
religion of human nature ; in politics, by a democracy,
the government of all, for all, and by all. The set
tlers of America in coming here mainly escaped from
the institutions of the former period of history, the
institutions which once helped mankind but at length
hindered them. They brought with them the senti
ments and ideas of the same period, imperfectly
formed, and such helps and institutions as had pre
viously come out of their sentiments and ideas. They
came from a nation more vigorous in the arts of peace
than any which the world had seen before. They came
from that nation in the time of its greatest spiritual
vigor. They brought with them the best treasures
of the private spiritual earnings of the English nation
— the common law, the habeas corpus, trial by jury,
the form of representative government, the rich, noble
literature of England, of its Elizabethan age. From
the general spiritual treasures of the world they
brought Christianity and the experience of mankind
for five or six thousand years. Virgin America, hid
den away behind the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, is
now to be married to mankind.
The first settlers came with different motives and
expectations, driven by different forms of necessity.
There came two types of men quite unlike in most
important particulars — the settlers of the North and
the South, the Puritans of New England, the secular
and more worldly planter of Virginia and the Caro-
linas. They came from different motives, for a dif
ferent purpose; they founded different institutions,
which produce the contradictory results we now see.

HILDRETH 283
The difference between South Carolina and Massa
chusetts in 1850 dates plainly back to the different
origin of the two colonies. New England was settled
for the sake of an idea ; Virginia and the Carolinas by
men who reasonably thought to better their condi
tion and make their fortune. M. Chevalier 3 long ago
pointed out the distinction between these two types,
the Puritan and the Cavalier; only he finds a distinc
tion in birth, wealth, and breeding in favor of the
Cavalier, which he would not have found had he known
American history somewhat better. However, the dif
ference between the secular and the religious colonies
still continues in the descendants of the two. But
these types unite or will unite, as he says, to form a
future national type, namely the Western man.
Let us look at the volumes of Mr. Hildreth. His
work is divided into forty-eight chapters, and, be
ginning with the first voyage of Columbus, ends with
the election of the first President after the adoption
of the Federal Constitution. When so great a theme
is to be treated in the small compass of three volumes,
the author must needs be brief; accordingly, he
despatches quite summarily the preliminary matter,
relating to the discoveries of the continent by the Italian
navigators, and briefly sketches a picture of the coun
try and its inhabitants at the period when European
colonization first began. The account of the Indians
is short, occupying but about twenty pages, yet dis
tinct and clear; for one so brief it is the best account
we remember to have seen. The whole Indian popula
tion within the limits of the United States and west
of the Rocky Mountains he thinks never exceeded, if
it ever reached, three hundred thousand; others make
the number not far from one hundred and eighty

284 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
thousand. The Indians have not yet received the at
tention which they demand from the historian and
philosopher ; they are as remarkable monuments in the
development of the human race as the fossils are in
the history of the physical changes of this earth. But
they are passing away ; their institutions, manners, tra
ditions, and language will soon be forgotten, and by
and by it will be impossible to reconstruct the history
of which they furnish so valuable a chapter.
Mr. Hildreth speaks of the French settlements in
America, and then comes to the history of the English
colonization here. For a long time there is an ap
parent want of unity in the subject, which no his
torical treatment can wholly disguise. The reader is
hurried from Virginia to New England, then to New
York, to Maryland, to the Carolinas, to Pennsylvania,
to Delaware, and to Georgia. However, for a long
time Virginia and New England are the objects of
chief interest. We shall dwell chiefly on the latter,
and call the attention of our readers to some things
of considerable importance in the story of America.
The character of the Puritans has been the theme of un
qualified praise and unqualified condemnation; the
Puritan of Hume, of Macaulay, and of Bancroft are
quite different characters. Perhaps no one of these
three great masters of the art of history has given
us a fair and just likeness of the men. Mr. Hildreth
is not ambitious in his attempt to defend the fathers
of New England; he rather leaves their actions to
speak for themselves. He thus speaks of them, how
ever : —
"As the other traditions of the church fell more and more
into contempt, the entire reverence of the people was concen
trated upon the Bible, recently made accessible in an English
version, and read with eagerness, not as a mere form of words

HILDRETH 285
to be solemnly and ceremoniously gone through with, but as an
inspired revelation, an indisputable authority in science, poli
tics, morals, life. It began, indeed, to be judged necessary,
by the more ardent and sincere, that all existing institutions in
church and state, all social relations, and the habits of every
day life should be reconstructed, and made to conform to this
divine model. Those who entertained these sentiments in
creased to a considerable party, composed chiefly, indeed, of
the humbler classes, yeomen, traders, and mechanics, but in
cluding, also, clergymen, merchants, landed proprietors, and
even some of the nobility. They were derided by those not in
clined to go with them as Puritans; but the austerity of their
lives and doctrines, and their confident claim to internal as
surance of a second birth and special election as the children
of God, made a powerful impression on the multitude, while
the high schemes they entertained for the reconstruction of
society brought them into sympathy with all that was great
and heroic in the nation.
" The Puritans denounced the church ceremonies, and pres
ently the hierarchy; but they long entertained profound rever
ence for the church itself, and a superstitious terror of schism.
Some of the bolder and more ardent, whose obscurity gave
them courage, took at length the decisive step of renouncing
the English communion, and setting up a church of their own,
upon what they conceived to be the Bible model. That, how
ever, was going further than the great body of the Puritans
wished or dared to follow, and these separatists remained for
many years obscure and inconsiderable."
There are certain peculiarities in the institutions
they at first founded, which Mr. Hildreth very
properly dwells upon and exposes. We refer to the
theocratical governments which they founded. No
historian of America has so fully done them justice
in this respect. He fears no man; he is not misled
by any reverence for the Puritans ; he shows no antip
athy to them; extenuates nothing, adds nothing, and
sets down naught in malice. We shall dwell a little
on the theocratical tyranny which they sought to exer
cise. In 1629, John and Samuel Browne, at Salem,
insisted on using the liturgy of the English church,
and set up a separate worship of their own for that

5>

286 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
purpose. They were arrested as " incorrigible,
" factious and evil conditioned," and shipped home
to England.
In 1631, the government of Masachusetts decided
that no man shall be admitted a freeman, that is, a
voter, a citizen in full, unless he were a member of a
church in the colony. The candidate for church
membership must state his " rehgious experience " be
fore the church, convince them of his " assurance
and " justification," before he shall be admitted as a
member. Thus the road to the ballot-box led through
the church, and lay directly in the range of the pul
pit. Hence it was no easy matter to become a free
man. Mr. Hildreth says not a fourth part of the
adult population were church members. Baptism was
the special privilege of church members and their " in
fant seed."
The clergy were aristocratic, in the evil sense of
that word. They would not let the inhabitants of
Newtown [Cambridge] remove to Connecticut in 1634,
for " the removal of a candlestick is a great judg
ment, which ought to be avoided." Fines were im
posed for absence from public worship ; they aided the
" Patricians " to carry " the point against the
Plebians." Stephen Goldsmith was fined forty pounds, forced to
make acknowledgment in all the churches (1636),
and give bonds for a hundred pounds, because he said
all the ministers in the colony, except Allen Wheel
wright, and, " as he thought, Mr. Hooker," " did
teach a covenant of works." Men were forbidden
to erect a dwelling more than half a mile from the
meeting-house, says Mr. Hildreth. The Puritan au
thorities became as arbitrary and unjust as the court

HILDRETH 287
of " High Commission," in England ; and persecuted
men, and women not less, for differing from the opinion
of the theocratic officers. Stoughton was persecuted
for political opinions, Williams for religious, and
Mrs. Hutchinson for philosophical notions on ques
tions of the most subtle character. Baptists and
Quakers were imprisoned, whipped, banished, or put
to death.
No man was allowed to settle in the colony without
a permit from the magistrate ; a new comer must not
have a house, and no man was suffered to entertain him
more than three weeks, without permission. Before
Massachusetts had been settled ten years, the synod
at Newtown condemned eighty-two prevalent opinions
as " false and heretical ! " Wheelwright and Mrs.
Hutchinson were banished for unpopular opinions;
freedom of worship was forbidden even to the like-
minded, and " the lords brethren " became as tyranni
cal as " the lords bishops." An attempt was made,
in 1639, to establish a church at Weymouth, on the
principle of admitting all baptized persons without
requiring a profession of faith or relation of experi
ence. It was promptly suppressed; the minister con
cerned in the business was forced to make an apology ;
some of the laymen were fined from two to twenty
pounds, one whipped " eleven stripes," and one dis
franchised. Two persons once called the churches
of Massachusetts " anti-christian," and were heavily
fined and imprisoned for the offense. Governor
Easton, of Rhode Island, it is alleged, once said, " the
elect have the Holy Ghost and also the devil in
dwelling." He had provocation for his conclusion.
The judicial treatment of Mrs. Hutchinson was in
famous, and the conduct of the leading clergy was

288 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
worthy of the darkest ages of popish bigotry. The
misfortunes of that noble woman were attributed to
" the hand of God." The treatment of Samuel Gor
ton and his coadjutors is nearly as desreputable. Did
Dr, Child and others petition for a change of laws,
so that inhabitants not church members might have the
rights of English subjects, it gave " great offense to
many godly priests, elders, and others ; " the petition
was " adjudged a contempt," the petitioners were fined
from ten to fifty pounds apiece. When the Doctor
was about to embark for England, his trunk was
searched for dangerous papers it might contain.
Copies of two memorials were found in the study of
Mr. Dand, addressed to the Commissioners of Planta
tions, one of them signed by some " fishermen of Mar-
blehead, profane persons," and by " young men who
came over servants, and never had any show of religion
in them," and by " men of no reason." " A young
fellow, a carpenter," by the name of Joy, had been
busy obtaining signatures to the petition, and was
kept in irons till " he humbled himself " and " blessed
God for these irons upon his legs, hoping they would
do him good while he lived." The offense of the men
in whose hands the petitions were found was deemed
" in nature capital," treason gainst the Commonwealth.
Dand was kept in prison more than a year, and Child,
with others, was heavily fined.
The magistrates of Massachusetts were long averse
to having fixed laws — preferring an arbitrary gov
ernment by men to he sober and dispassionate govern
ment of impartial statutes. The code made in 1649
contained some remarkable provisions : " Stubborn and
rebellious sons," and children over sixteen " who curse
or smite their natural father or mother," were pun-

HILDRETH 289
ished with death. Courtship must not be undertaken
without the permission of the parents or guardians of
the maid ; or, in their absence, that of the " nearest
magistrate," under penalty of fine and imprisonment.
Blasphemy was a capital crime. Men were to be ban
ished " for preaching and maintaining any damnable
heresies, as denying the immortality of the soul, or
resurrection of the body," or " that Christ gave him
self a ransom for our sins," or " for declaring that
we are not sanctified by his death and righteousness,"
or for denying " the morality of the fourth command
ment," or the efficacy of infant baptism, or for de
parting from church at the administration of that
ordinance. A few years later, a law was made pun
ishing with fine, whipping, banishment, or with death,
any persons " who denied the received books of the
Old and New Testaments to be the infallible word of
God." We know some persons who would be glad to
revive these pleasant statutes at the present day. We
are told it is not long since an attempt was made in
Massachusetts to secure the indictment of a distin
guished scholar for a learned article published in a
very respectable theological journal, in which he main
tained that there was no prophetic passage in the Old
Testament which was originaUy intended to apply
to Jesus of Nazareth.4 It is not ten years since there
appeared, in one of the leading secular newspapers of
Boston, an article written by a venerable clergyman,
calling for the arrest and punishment of a young
man who had, in a sermon, spoken against the cor
ruption of the Christian church at his day, and the
doctrines that had no foundation in reason and the
nature of things. Three years' confinement in the
state's prison was the punishment demanded for the
young minister ! B
11—19

290 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Everybody knows the treatment of Baptists and
Quakers in Massachusetts. The " great Cotton " de
clared that denial of infant baptism was " soul-mur
der," and a capital offense. When Obadiah Holmes
was fined thirty pounds for being a Baptist, as he went
from the bar he thanked God that he was "counted
worthy to suffer for the name of Jesus." " Where
upon," says Holmes, " John Wilson [minister of
' First Church ' in Boston] struck me before the judg
ment-seat and cursed me, saying : ' The curse of God
or Jesus go with thee.' " Holmes would not pay his
fine, and was whipped thirty stripes with a three-
corded whip, " the man striking with all his strength."
But he " had such a spiritual manifestation that I
could well bear it," says he, " yea, and in a manner
felt it not, although it was grievous, as the spectators
said." He told the magistrates, " you have struck
me as with roses," and " I pray God it may not be laid
to your charge." Two men came up after the brutal
punishment was over, and shook hands with him, say
ing, " blessed be God." They were fined forty shill
ings, and imprisoned. Yet the Baptists continued to
increase. Blow the fire, if you wish it to burn.
The town of Maiden was fined for presuming to
settle a minister without consulting the neighboring
churches, though there was no law to that effect. The
General Court forbade the settlement of Michael
Powell in the ministry at the second church in Boston ;
he had been a tavern-keeper at Dedham, and though
" gifted," was " unlearned." How humbly he sub
mitted : " My humble request is, that you would not
have such hard thoughts of me that I would consent
to be ordained to office without your concurrence; nor
that our poor church would attempt such a thing

HILDRETH 291
without your approbation." At his death, this
" gifted " man left furniture to the value of fourteen
pounds, and a library consisting of " three Bibles, a
Concordance, with other books," valued at " two
pounds." In Massachusetts men not members of the church
were compeUed to support the clergyman, and through
her influence Plymouth, always before her sister in
liberality, passed a law to the same effect. However,
Williams in his settlement at New Providence could
rejoice that we have not " been consumed with the over-
zealous fire of the so-called godly ministers." Salton-
stall writes to the New Englanders : " First, you com
pel such to come into your assemblies as you know will
not join you in your worship, and when they show
their dislike thereof, or witness against it, then you
stir up your magistrates to punish them for such, as
you conceive, their public affronts." Cotton and Wil
son replied, " Better be hypocrites than profane per
sons," " we fled from men's inventions," and only com
pelled others to attend to " God's institutions," — that
is, to aU the abominations of the Puritan creed and
ritual. " We content ourselves with unity in the
foundation of religion and church order."
Never was the violent attempt to secure " unity in
the foundation of religion " less successful. New
England was a perfect hotbed of heresy. " How is
it," writes Sir Harry Vane, in 1653, " that there are
such divisions among you, — such headiness, tumults,
disorder, injustice? Are there no wise men among
you, — no public self-denying spirits ? "
A law was passed prohibiting the erection of a meet
ing-house without the consent of the freemen of the
town, — who were aU theocratically orthodox,; — and

292 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the county court, or the consent of the General Court.
It would be " setting up an altar against the Lord's
altar." Quakers were banished or hanged. But all
this was ineffectual in making men think alike. Bap
tists, Quakers, Antinomians, Ranters of all sorts there
were, excited no doubt by the laws against freedom.
The " hateful Episcopalians " at length got a church
established, in 1686; the theocracy dwindled.
It is instructive to see the Puritans in New England
and the Jesuits in Canada, at the same time, contend
ing to establish a theocracy, both for the same pur
pose, each by the same means, — the suppression of in
dividual freedom in religion.
"Presbytery does but translate
The Papacy to a free state,"
said Butler, and with not a little truth. The laws of
Massachusetts, which continued in force till the Revolu
tion, provided that a " Popish priest " coming here
should be accounted " an incendiary, and disturber
of the public peace and safety." He was to suffer
perpetual imprisonment and death, if he attempted
to escape. But spite of the law against " Popish
priests," the worst part of Papacy came here, — the
spirit of intolerance and persecution.
Along with this intolerance of the churches, the old
elements of feudal aristocracy were brought to
America, and continued to live for awhile in the new
soil. A distinction was carefully kept up between
" gentlemen " and those of an inferior condition.
Only the "gentlemen " were allowed the title " Mr. ; "
their number was not very large. The rest rejoiced in
the appellative " Goodman." In 1639 some " persons
of quality " wished to come to New England, and it
was proposed to establish " a standing council for

HILDRETH 293
life ; " in the Commonwealth there were to be two
classes of men, namely, " hereditary gentlemen," to
sit as a permanent senate, and a body of " freehold
ers," who were to send deputies to constitute a lower
house. The magistrate's and elders favored the scheme,
finding it comformable to the " light of nature and
Scripture." The " great Cotton," an able man, with
the soul of a priest, liked the scheme well ; democracy
was " not a fit government either for church or state ; "
monarchy and aristocracy " are approved and directed
in Scripture," " but only a theocracy is set up in
both." " If the people are governors," says he, " who
shall be governed? " Indignant Mr. Savage, com
menting on this measure, says " the ministers were
perpetuaUy meddling with the regimen of the Com
monwealth; and we have frequent occasion to regret
that their references to the theocracy of Israel were
received as authority rather than illustration." But
how could it be otherwise, with such a theology?
Calvinism naturally leads to an aristocracy on earth,
as well as in heaven. The world — this and the next
— is for the elect, and who shall lay anything to
their charge? However, the people put an end to all
talk about " hereditary gentlemen," who disappear
from the history of New England for ever. Had
this ungodly proposition become a law the state of
things would have been a little different to-day ! For
a long time the law, however, recognized a distinction
between the gentleman and the simple man. "No
man," says a law of 1641, " shall be beaten above
forty stripes ; nor shall any true gentleman, or any
man equal to a gentleman, be punished with whipping,
unless his crime be very shameful and his career of life
vicious and profligate." But in 1703 Paul Dudley

B94 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
thought Massachusetts a very poor place for " gen
tlemen ; " meaning, says Mr. Hildreth, " those who
wish to grow rich on the labor of others." For some
time there was no trial by jury in Connecticut ; " no
warrant was found for it in the Word of God." We
find the democratic element active in New England at
the very beginning, continually increasing in strength.
At first, it is more powerful in Plymouth than in
Massachusetts. For eighteen years all the laws of
Plymouth were made in a general assembly of all the
people. The governor was only president of a council
of assistants. The church had no pastor for eight
years; Brewster, the ruling elder, and such members
as had the " gift of prophecy," exhorted the congre
gations. On Sunday afternoons there was a free
meeting; a question was started, and all spoke that
saw fit. But gradually the theocratic spirit of Massa
chusetts invaded the sister colony. Still, church mem
bership was not required as a condition of citizenship.
In 1631 the freemen in Massachusetts began to be jeal
ous of the theocratic oligarchy which ruled the colony,
and claimed the right of annually electing new as
sistants. The constitution of towns was democratic
from the beginning, and has been changed but little
since. The towns were then, as now, little republics,
managing their own affairs, voting money, levying
taxes, and choosing " selectmen," a town clerk, treas
urer, and constable. The town system is an original
New England institution, and has proved of great
value in the acquisition of political liberty. The free
dom of the town helped overcome the tyranny of the
church. At first the magistrates levied the taxes for the
whole colony; but, in 1632, the people of Watertown

HILDRETH 295
considered that it " was not safe to pay moneys after
that sort, for fear of bringing themselves and their
posterity into bondage." It was a wholesome and a
timely fear. The freemen determined to choose their
governor and deputy governor. In 1634 the first rep
resentative court assembled; there were three deputies
from each of the eight towns or plantations. Soon
they demanded fixed and definite laws. It seems quite
remarkable, but it is true, that while money was not
the chief basis of social respectability, Boston was far
before the country in point of liberality. Now, the
opposite is true. Providence Plantation led the way
in the estabhshment of liberty; for, in 1647, the gov
ernment was declared " democratical," freedom of
faith and worship was assured to all, " the first formal
and legal establishment of religious liberty ever pro
mulgated," says Mr. Hildreth. In 1652, in York
shire (in Maine), and in some other parts of New
England, church membership was not necessary to
citizenship. Toleration began to be demanded for the
Church of England, and as the Puritans had estab
lished a theocratic tyranny as bad as what they fled
from, so the Episcopalians became an humble instru
ment in promoting religious freedom in America. In
1662, the king demanded the repeal of the law which
limited citizenship to church members, substituting a
proper qualification instead, and the admission of all
persons of honest lives to baptism and the Lord's Sup
per. For some years there were three parties in New
England: the theocratic party, which continually
diminished; the Episcopalians, Baptists, and Quakers,
who demanded religious freedom; and the moderate
men, who mediated between the two extremes. The
" halfway covenant " was adopted in 1659 ; a few

296 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
years later a Baptist church was formally organized
in Boston, and though persecuted for a long time sur
vives to this day. After the revocation of the charter,
the theocratic party was weakened still further and
their domination at length came to an end.
" A new school of divines, known as Latitudinarians, sprung
up among the Protestants towards the conclusion of the previ
ous century, had essayed the delicate task of reconciling reason
with revelation. They not only rejected the authority of tra
dition, so highly extolled and implicitly relied upon by the
Catholics and the English High Churchmen; they scouted, also,
that special interior persuasion which the Puritans, after the
early Reformers, had denominated faith, but which to these
reasoning divines seemed no better than enthusiasm. They pre
ferred to rest the truth of Christianity on the testimony of
prophecy and miracles, of which they undertook to establish
the reality by the application to the Bible history of the ordi
nary rules of evidence; by which same rules they undertook
to establish, also, the authenticity and inspiration of the Bible
itself." " They presently pushed the principle of the halfway cove
nant so far as to grant to all persons not immoral in their
lives admission to the Lord's Supper; indeed, all the privileges
of full church membership. Much to the mortification of the
Mathers, who wrote and protested against this doctrine, the
college at Cambridge presently passed under the control of the
new party — a change not without important results on the in
tellectual history of New-England."
" In the century since its settlement, New England had un
dergone a great change. The austere manners of the Puritan
fathers were still, indeed, preserved; their language was re
peated; their observances were kept up; their institutions were
revered; forms and habits remained, but the spirit was gone.
The more ordinary objects of human desire and pursuit, the
universal passion for wealth, political squabbles with the royal
governors, land speculations, paper money jobs, and projects
of territorial and personal aggrandizement, had superseded
those metaphysical disputes, that spiritual vision, and that ab
sorbing passion for a pure theocratic commonwealth which had
carried the fathers into the wilderness. Even Cotton Mather,
such was the progress of opinion, boasted of the harmony in
which various religious sects lived together in Boston, and
spoke of religious persecution as an obsolete blunder."

HILDRETH 297
"Education and habit, especially in what relates to outward
forms, are not easily overcome. Episcopacy made but slow
progress in New England. A greater change, however, was
silently going on; among the more intelligent and thoughtful,
both of laymen and ministers, Latitudinarianism continued to
spread. Some approached even towards Socinianism, carefully
concealing, however, from themselves their advance to that
abyss. The seeds of schism were broadly sown; but extreme
caution and moderation on the side of the Latitudinarians long
prevented any open rupture. They rather insinuated than
avowed their opinions. Afraid of a controversy, in which
they were conscious that popular prejudice would be all against
them, unsettled many of them in their own minds, and not
daring to probe matters to the bottom, they patiently waited
the further effects of that progressive change by which they
themselves had been borne along. To gloss over their heresies,
they called themselves Arminians; they even took the name of
moderate Calvinists. Like all doubters, they lacked the zeal
and energy of faith. Like all dissemblers, they were timid
and hesitating. Conservatives as well as Latitudinarians, they
wished, above all things, to enjoy their salaries and clerical
dignities in comfort and in peace. Free comparatively in their
studies, they were very cautious in their pulpits how they
shocked the fixed prejudices of a bigoted people whose bread
they ate. It thus happened, that while the New England the
ology, as held by the more intelligent, underwent decided
changes, the old Puritan phraseology was still generally pre
served, and the old Puritan doctrines, in consequence, still kept
their hold to a great extent on the mass of the people. Yet
remarkable local modifications of opinion were silently produced
by individual ministers, the influence of the abler Latitudinarian
divines being traceable to this day in the respective places of
their settlement."
" As the exalted religious imagination of New England sub
sided to the common level, as reason and the moral sense began
to struggle against the overwhelming pressure of religious awe,
a party inevitably appeared which sought by learned glosses
to accommodate the hard text of the Scriptures and the hard
doctrines of the popular creed to the altered state of the public
mind." " The modern doctrines of religious freedom and free in
quiry have constantly gained ground, throwing more and more
into the shade that old idea, acted upon with special energy
by the Puritan colonists of New England — deep traces of
which are also to be found in every North American code —

298 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the theocratic idea of a Christian commonwealth, in which
every other interest must be made subservient to unity of
faith and worship."
At length Unitarianism and Universalism came,
after the Revolution, to bring things to their present
condition. As Mr. Hildreth says, of times soon after
that, even " in New England the old leaven of Latitu
dinarianism was still deeply at work among the
learned, while, among the less educated classes, the new
doctrine of Universalism began to spread."
Along with this bigotry of the Puritans, there was
a hardy vigor, a capacity for doing and enduring,
a manly reliance on God and their own arm, one
acknowledged, the other not confessed, which are
worthy of admiration.
The treatment of the natives has been remarkable.
We have before spoken of the national exclusiveness of
the Anglo-Saxon race; it was never made more ap
parent than by the Puritans in New England. It is
difficult even for one of their descendants, at the pres
ent time, to understand the feeling of our fathers re
specting the Indians. Dr. Joseph Mede was a learned
and enlightened man, but in 1634 he wrote to his
friend, Dr. Twisse, as follows :
" I think that the Devil, being impatient of the sound of
the Gospel and Cross of Christ in every part of this old world,
so that he could in no place be quiet for it, and foreseeing that
he was like at length to lose all here, bethought himself to pro
vide him of a seed over which he might reign securely; and in
a place, ubl nee Pelopidarum facta neque nomen audiret.
"That accordingly he drew a Colony out of some of those
barbarous Nations dwelling upon the Northern Ocean (whither
the sound of Christ had not yet come), and promising them
by some Oracle to shew them a Countrey far better than their
own (which he might soon do), pleasant, large, where never
man yet inhabited, he conducted them over those desart Lands
and Islands (which are many in that sea) by the way of the

HILDRETH 299
North into America; which none would ever have gone, had
they not first been assured there was a passage that way into
a more desirable Countrey. Namely, as when the world aposta
tized from the Worship of the true God, God called Abram
out of Chaldee into the Land of Canaan, of him to raise him »
Seed to preserve a light unto his Name: So the Devil, when he
saw the world apostatizing from him, laid the foundations of
a new Kingdom, by deducting this Colony from the North into
America, where since they have increased into an innumerable
multitude. And where did the Devil ever reign more absolutely
and without controll, since mankind fell first under his clutches?
And here it is to be noted, that the story of the Mexican
Kingdom (which was not founded above 400 years before ours
came thither) relates out of their own memorials and traditions
that they came to that place from the North; whence their
God Vitzliliputzli led them, going in an Ark before them: and
after divers years travel and many stations (like enough after
some generations) they came to the place which the Sign he had
given them at their first setting forth pointed out, where they
were to finish their travels, build themselves a City, and their
God a Temple; which is the place where Mexico was built.
Now if the Devil were God's ape in this; why might he not be
so likewise in bringing the first Colony of men into that world
out of ours? namely, by Oracle, as God did Abraham out of
Chaldee, whereto I before resembled it.
" But see the hand of Divine Providence. When the off
spring of these Runnagates from the sound of Christ's Gospel
had now replenisht that other world, and began to flourish in
those two Kingdoms of Peru and Mexico, Christ our Lord
sends his Mastives the Spaniards to hunt them out and worry
them: Which they did in so hideous a manner, as the like
thereunto scarce ever was done since the Sons of Noah came
out of the Ark. What an affront to the Devil was this, where
he had thought to have reigned securely, and been forever con
cealed from the knowledge of the followers of Christ?
" Yet the Devil perhaps is less grieved for the loss of his
servants by the destroying of them, than he would be to lose
them by the saving of them; by which latter way I doubt the
Spaniards have despoiled him but of a few. What then if
Christ our Lord will give him his second affront with better
Christians, which may be more grievous to him than the former?
And if Christ shall set him up a light in this manner to dazle
and torment the Devil at his own home, I will hope they
shall not so far degenerate (not all of them) as to come in
that Army of Gog and Magog against the Kingdom of Christ,

300 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
but be translated thither before the Devil be loosed, if not
presently after his tying up. And whence should those Na
tions get notice of the glorious happiness of our world, if not
by some Christians that had lived among them? " — The Works
of the Pious $ Profoundly-Learned Joseph Mede, B.D., some
time Fellow of Christ's College in Cambridge, &c, &c. Lon
don: 1677. pp. 800 — 801.
At Plymouth the Indians were treated with more
justice than is usual for the civilized to show to bar
barians. In 1633 legal provision was made in
Massachusetts for such red men as should become
civilized; but, with Anglo-Saxon exclusiveness, they
were to be formed into townships by themselves.
Major Gibbons, at a later date, was admonished " of
the distance which is to be observed betwixt Christians
and barbarians as well in war as in other negotiations."
It was with difficulty that Eliot obtained liberty to
organize a church at Natick. Yet the threat was
made by the praying Indians to the Wampanoags
that, unless they accepted the gospel, Massachusetts
" would destroy them by war." A sharp distinction
was always made between converted Indians and other
Christians; they were treated, in every respect, as an
inferior race; restricted to villages of their own, and
cut off by opinion, as well as law, from intermarriage
and intercourse with the whites. No one was allowed
to sell them horses or boats. It was proposed to ex
terminate them, as being of the " cursed seed of Ham."
Thus causes were put in action which at length have
brought the Indians to their present condition in
Massachusetts. At an early date many of them were reduced to
slavery, some in New England ; others were sent off as
slaves to the West Indies, eight score at one time
though regular prisoners of war. There were Old

HILDRETH 301
Testament examples for this, and even worse treat
ment. Roger Williams once received " a boy " as his
share of the plunder obtained at an Indian defeat.
In 1712, Massachusetts forbade the further inporta-
tion of Indian slaves; not from any moral scruples,
but on account of " divers conspiracies, outrages,
barbarities, murders, burglaries, thefts, and other no
torious crimes and enormities, perpetrated and com
mitted by Indians, being of a surly and revengful
spirit, rude and insolent in their behavior, and very
ungovernable." There seems to have been no moral
objection to slavery in the Great and General Court at
that time.
Outrageous cruelties were often practiced on the
Indians. It was once proposed by the commissioners
for the colonies, that in case of war " mastiff dogs
might be of good use." But we think the proposi
tion was not carried out tiU nearly two hundred years
later, then in a different latitude, to the amazement of
the civilized world. Even the men of Plymouth loved
bloody spectacles at the cost of the Indians. In 1622,
Wituwamat's head was carried thither and set up on
a pole, as a warning. It was in vain that pious Mr.
Robinson wished they had converted some before they
killed any. An order was once given to Endicott to
put to death all the Indian men on Block Island, and
make slaves of the women and children. He could not
kill the men, so he stove their canoes, burnt their
wigwams, and destroyed their standing corn. While
the Rev. Mr. Stone was once praying " for one pledge
of love," to confirm the fidelity of the Indian allies,
they came in with five such pledges, namely, five
Pequod scalps. No doubt, he thought his prayer was
" answered." In the war with the Pequods, in 1637,

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under Mason and Underhill, the colonists " bereaved
of pity and without compassion," gave no quarter, and
showed no mercy ; not even to old men, women, and chil
dren. In the capture of an Indian fort they took
only seven prisoners, seven more escaped, but hun
dreds were slain. Says Underhill, " Great and dole
ful was the sight, to the view of young soldiers, to
see so many souls lie gasping on the ground, so thick
that you could hardly pass along." But then " ' twas
a famous victory." On another occasion, in the same
war, twenty-two Indian prisoners of war were put
to death after they had surrendered; about fifty were
distributed as slaves, not " to every man a damsel or
two," but among the principal colonists. The scalp
of Sassacus was sent to Boston. Heads and hands
of Pequod warriors were brought in by other Indians !
Even the savages thought the " war too furious, and
to slay too many." But what can satisfy bigotry in
the name of the Lord? , Underhill refers to " the wars
of David " for his precedent ; and, for authority, says
" we had sufficient light from the Word of God for our
proceedings." Mason adds " that the Lord was pleased
to smite our enemies in the hinder parts, and to give
us their land for an inheritance." The New Eng
landers commanded him to kill Miantonimoh, their
captive and former friend; he did so, and ate a por
tion of the body, for which there was no scriptural
warrant. If an Indian injured a white man, and the
tribe did not give satisfaction, the offender might be
seized and delivered to the injured party, " either to
serve or to be shipped off and exchanged for negroes."
The women of Marblehead once murdered two Indian
prisoners ; it was Sunday, and the murderers had just
come out of church.

HLLDRETH 303
The most wholesale destructions of the Indians
took place during King Philip's war. More than two
thousand were killed or taken in a single year. Wita-
mo, the squaw-sachem of Pocasset, and friend of
PhiHp, was drowned, but her body was saved, the
head cut off and stuck upon a pole at Taunton, amid
the jeers and scoffs of the colonists. Philip's dead
body was beheaded and quartered ; one of his hands
was given to the Indian who shot him, and his head
was carried in triumph to Plymouth on a public day
of thanksgiving (August 17, 1676.) "Oh that men
would praise the Lord," says Secretary Morton, " for
his goodness and wonderful works unto them ! " His
wife and son were taken prisoners. What should be
done with the lad, a boy nine years old? The opinion
of the clergy was asked. Cotton of Plymouth, and
Arnold of Marshfield, thought in general " that rule
(Deuteronomy xxrv. 16) to be moral and therefore
perpetually binding," and the crime of the parent did
attaint the son. Yet they say:
"Yet, upon serious consideration, we humbly conceive that
the children of notorious traitors, rebells, and murtherers, espe
cially of such as have bin principal leaders and actors in such
horrid villainies, and that against a whole nation, yea, the whole
Israel of God, may be involved in the guilt of their parents,
and may, salva republica, be adjudged to death, as to us seems
evident by the Scripture instances of Saul, Ashan, Haman, the
children of whom were cut off, by the sword of Justice, for
the transgressions of their parents, although, concerning some
of those children, it be manifest, that they were not capable
of being co-actors therein." — Morton's Memorial, Davis' Edi
tion, p. 454, No. 1.
Increase Mather says: —
"I should have said something about Philip's son. It is nec
essary that some effectual course should be taken about him.
He makes me think of Hadad, who was a little child when
his father (the chief sachem of the Edomites) was killed by

304 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Joab; and, had not others fled away with him, I am apt to
think that David would have taken a course that Hadad should
never have proved a scourge to the next generation." — lb.,
No. 2.
Keith, of Bridgewater, gave a milder council, which
was followed. The boy was sold into slavery, and the
money deposited in the treasury of the colony.
Philip's wife also shared the same fate. The state of
Massachusetts is so much richer at this day. We
wonder the money arising from the sale, this price
of blood, was not given to " The Society for propagat
ing the Gospel among the Indians." In 1725 a
premium of one hundred pounds was offered for each
Indian scalp. It was estimated that each scalp, in
the war of 1704, had cost one thousand pounds. The
treatment the Indians receive at the hands of Mass
achusetts, at this day, is a terrible reproach to us.
There is another matter of a good deal of importance
we wish to refer to, namely, the indented servants
brought to New England. Governor Bradford, in one
of his poetical inspirations, thus alludes to them : —
" Another cause of our declining here
Is a mixed multitude, as doth appear.
Many for servants hitherto were brought,
Others came for gain, or new ends they sought;
And of those, many grew loose and profane,
Though some were brought to know God and his name."
" These servants," says Mr. Hildreth, " seem in
general to have had little sympathy with the austere
manners and opinions of their masters, and their fre
quent transgressions of Puritan decorum gave its mag
istrates no little trouble." In 1622 Weston sent out
nearly sixty of them; Gorges brought many the next
year ; Sir William Brewster sent several more in 1628 ;
nearly two hundred came in 1629; Richard Salton-

HILDRETH 305
stall sent twenty in 1635. It was one of the offenses
of Morton that his " merry mount " was a refuge
for " runaway servants." At one time a master re
ceived a grant of fifty acres of land for each servant
he brought over. About two hundred servants were
once set free on their arrival in New England, in con
sequence of the scarcity of provisions in the colony !
In 1641 the law allowed any man to harbor ser
vants flying from the tyranny of their masters, until
the master could be judicially examined; notice must
be given to the master and the nearest constable. A
faithful and diligent service, for seven years, en
titled the servant to a dismissal. He must not be
sent off " empty-handed," says the humane statute,
following the Mosaic code in this particular. If a
master maimed or disfigured his servant, he was en
titled to Hberty and to damages also. Still, the law
was not very precise in regard to the treatment of this
anomalous class of persons.
In 1643 " the united colonies of New EnglarJd,"
forgetting the Old Testament when property was at
stake, agreed to surrender runaway servants. In 1650
the law pursued such servants and arrested them at
the public expense ; they were required to make up,
threefold, the time of their absence.
In 1665 the condition of servants in New York is
remarkable. " Under a provision borrowed from the Connecticut code,
fugitive servants might be pursued by hue and cry at the pub
lic charge; but this was presently found too expensive, and the
cost was imposed on the parties concerned. Runaway servants
were to forfeit double the time of their absence, and the cost
of their recapture. All who aided in concealing them were
liable to a fine. Tyrannical masters and mistresses might be
complained of to the overseers, and proceeded against at the
sessions; and servants maimed by their masters were entitled to
11—20

306 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
freedom and damages. During, servitude, they were forbidden
to sell or buy. Any master of a vessel carrying any person out
of the colony without a pass was liable for his debts; and by
a subsequent provision, any unknown person travelling through
any town without a pass was liable to be arrested as a run
away, and detained till he proved his freedom, and paid, by
work and labor, if not otherwise able, the cost of his arrest."
The importation of this class of persons continued
till after the middle of the eighteenth century.
" The colonial enactments for keeping these servants in order,
and especially for preventing them from running away, were
often very harsh and very severe. They were put, for the most
part, in these statutes, on the same level with the slaves, but
their case in other respects was very different. In all the
colonies, the term of indented service, even where no express
contract had been entered into, was strictly limited by law,
and, except in the case of very young persons, it seldom or
never exceeded seven years. On the expiration of that Term,
these freed servants were absorbed into the mass of white in
habitants, and the way lay open before them and their children
to wealth and social distinction. One of the future signers
of the Declarat-on of Independence was brought to Pennsyl
vania as a redemptioner. In Virginia, at the expiration of his
term of service, every redemptioner, in common with other
immigrants to the colony, was entitled to a free grant of fifty
acres of land, and in all the colonies certain allowances of
clothing were required to be made by the late masters."
The subject demands a distinct and entire treatise,
for which we have no space at present ; but the fol
lowing document, copied for us by a friend, from the
Court-records at Salem, throw some light on the age
of which we have been speaking: —
" 10 May 1654 Be it known unto all men by these presents
that I George Dill, master of the ship Goodfellow; have sould
unto Mr. Samuel Symonds two of the Irish youthes I brought
over by order of the State of England, the name of one of
them is William Dalton, the other Edward Welch, to serve him,
his heirs, executors or assignes for the space of 9 years, And
the said Samuel in consideration hereof doth promise & engage
to be paid unto the said master the sum of £26 in corn mer
chantable or live cattle at or before the end of October next,
provided he give good assurance for the enjoying of them."

HILDRETH 307
At the end of seven years the " two Irish youthes "
ran away, or refused to work any longer. It was to
recover the two years' service, or their value, that
the action was brought in 1661. The following is
their reply, or defense. It will be seen that their
names do not agree with the names mentioned by the
Captain. " 1661 To the Honoured Court & Jury now assembled the
humble defence of Wm Downeing & Philip Welch in the ac
tion between them & their Master Wm Symonds; That which
we say in defence of ourselves is that we were brought out
of our own country, contrary to our own will & minds, & sold
here to Mr. Symonds, by ye Master of the ship, Mr. Dill, but
what agreement was made between Mr. Symonds & ye said
Master, was never acted by our consent or knowledge, yet not
withstanding we have endeavoured to serve him the best service
we cloud these 7 conpleat yeares, which is 3 yeares more than
the Spirits * used to sell them for at Barbadoes, when they are
stolen in England, And for our service we have noe calling or
wages but meate & cloathes. Now 7 yeares' service being so
much as is the practice of old England, & thought meet in this
place, & we being 21 yeares of age we hope the Honored Court
& Jury will seriously consider our conditions."
" Whereas it has been Represented to His Maj esty that by
reason of the frequent Abuses of a. lewd sort of people called
Spirits in Seducing many of His Majesty's Subjects to go on
Shipboard, where they have been Seized & Carried by Force to
His Majesty's Plantations in America, & that many idle persons,
who have Listed themselves voluntarily to be Transported
thither & have received money upon their entering into Service
for that purpose have afterwards pretended they were Be
trayed & Carried away against their wills & procured their
friends to prosecute the Merchants who brought them," &c. &c.
" The Testimony op John Ring.
" This deponent saith that he with divers others were stolen
in Ireland by some of ye English soldiers in ye night out of
their beds and brought to Mr. Dill's ship, where the boate
lay ready to receive them and in the way as they went some
others they tooke with them against their consents & brought
* " At the Court held in Whitehall, December 13th, 1682.

308 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
them aboard the said ship, where there were divers others of
their countrymen, weeping & crying because they were stolen
from their friends, they all declaring the same & amongst the
rest were these two men, Wm Downing & Philip Welch,^ &
there they were kept until upon a Lord's day in the morning
ye master set saile & left some of his vessels behind for haste
as I understood. " Sworne in Court 26 June 1661."
There were similar servants in the other colonies.
Of the hundred and five persons who settled in Vir
ginia in 1606, forty-eight were "gentlemen,"
" brought up to esteem manual labor degrading.
There were but twelve laborers, four carpenters, and
four other mechanics, the rest were soldiers and ser
vants." In 1608 one hundred and twenty men of the
same sort arrived in Virginia ; " vagabond gentlemen,
unaccustomed to labor, and disdainful of it, with
three or four bankrupt London jewelers, goldsmiths,
and refiners, sent out to seek for mines." Governor
Smith said of them, that it was better to send out
thirty mechanics than a thousand such men! Ser
vants were indispensable in such a community. In
1613, the Governor of Virginia had for his support
a plantation cultivated by one hundred servants. In
1619 ninety young women, " pure and uncorrupt,"
were sent out to be disposed of as wives for the plant
ers. The price was a hundred pounds of tobacco,
about seventy-five dollars. A similar cargo, the next
year, however, brought only about half that price.
We think that was the last adventure of the sort sent
to Virginia, — a woman for fifty pounds of tobacco
was certainly too cheap.
About the same time, by the order of the king, a
hundred dissolute vagabonds were taken from the jails
and sent to Virginia to be disposed of as servants.
They were known by the name of "jail-birds." In

HILDRETH 309
1643 the law forbade dealing with any servants with
out consent of their masters, and punished such as
married without the master's consent. They once
planned an insurrection in Virginia, which was de
tected beforehand ; and the 13th of September, " the
day the villanous plot should have been put in execu
tion," was declared a perpetual holiday.
" Servants ' sold for the custom,' that is, having no inden
tures, if over nineteen years of age, are to serve five years; if
under nineteen, till twenty-four, their ages to be adjudged by
the county court. Masters are to provide ' wholesome and com
petent diet, clothing, and lodging, by the discretion of the
county court;' nor shall they at any time give immoderate cor
rection, nor 'whip a Christian white servant naked' without
an order from a justice of the peace, under penalty of forty
shillings to the servant, to be recovered with costs, on complaint
to a justice of the peace, 'without the formal process of an
action.' Justices are bound to receive and investigate the com
plaints of all servants 'not being slaves.' Any resistance or
offer of violence on the part of a servant is punishable by an
additional year's servitude. Servants are guaranteed the pos
session of such property as may lawfully come to them by gift
or otherwise, but no person may deal with them except by per
mission of their masters. In case of fines inflicted by penal
laws, unless some one would pay the fines for them, servants
are to be punished by whipping, at the rate of twenty lashes
for every five hundred pounds of tobacco, or fifty shillings
sterling, each stroke being thus estimated at about sixty cents.
Women servants having bastards are to forfeit to their mas
ters an additional year's service, unless the master were the
father, in which case the forfeiture accrues to the church
wardens. In case the father were a negro or mulatto, other
penalties are added, as by a law formerly mentioned. The
provisions for the arrest of runaways, which are sufficiently
stringent, apply equally to slaves and servants, except that out
lying slaves might be killed, and irreclaimable runaways 'dis
membered.' "
Governor Thomas, of Pennsylvania, enlisted the ser
vants, in 1740, into the army, and many of them never
returned to their masters, whom the state indemnified
for their loss. In 1756 the colonists were much of-

BlQ THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
fended because the English government authorized the
enlisting of servants, though a compensation was given
to their masters. In the revolutionary war many of
the soldiers enlisted in the middle and southern States
were " redemptioners," or servants. It was proposed
in Congress to direct a portion of their pay to com
pensate the masters for the loss of their services, but
at the earnest request of Washington the plan was
dropped, and the servants who enlisted were declared
freemen. Since the Revolution we think there have
been no servants of this character.
Some curious anecdotes are preserved of the shifts
resorted to by servants to escape from their condition.
A citizen from Ireland was once " sold to pay his
passage " to America, and bought by a farmer in
New England as a servant. The farmer set him to
read the Bible one Sunday. He held the book bot
tom upwards, and could not read. One day he was
sent by his master into the woods to chop wood; at
night, when he came home, he was asked how much
he had cut ; he said, " about a bushel." On looking,
it appears he cut it up into slivers. When bade to
replenish the fire, he did it with water. He was found
of no value for any of the common work of the farm,
and his master, who lived on the sea-shore, set him to
tend the ducks and geese, to keep them from wander
ing or being destroyed, thinking it well, we suppose,
to set a goose to watch a goose. At night, the ser
vant came home with his charge, and complained that
they must all of them be sick, for, he added, "they
have not sucked their mothers once all day." His
master considered him a fool, and finding him worth
less, refused to keep him. The servant pretended that
he was afraid somebody would kill him unless his mas-

HLLDRETH 311
ter gave him a legal discharge, renouncing all claim
upon him whatever. This was done; and within less
than a week the foohsh servant opened a school in the
very town where he had been bought, and from the
office of schoolmaster rose to high political stations in
New England, and founded a family still proud of his
name. We, cannot pass over the matter of slavery, to
which Mr. Hildreth has directed much attention, and
which is likely to be an interesting subject for some
years to come. At the time of the settlement of
America the idea was beginning to prevail that it was
wrong to hold Christians in bondage, but this ob
jection did not extend to heathens and infidels. It
was prudently discovered that the negroes were the
descendants of Ham, and the inheritors of the curse
of the mythological Noah. Who so fit for bondmen
as the negroes? It conduced to " godliness " to make
them slaves, as well as to " great gain." The same
year in which the Pilgrims came to Plymouth, twenty
negroes were brought to Virginia as slaves for life,
no doubt to the great comfort of the " gentlemen "
there. It is not long before we find them in New
England; not long before Boston is concerned in the
slave-trade, from which she is not yet become free;
for while we are writing this paper, we learn that a
ship from Boston, the " Lucy Anne," has lately been
seized, loaded with five hundred and forty-seven
slaves ! Another vessel from the same port, the " Pi
lot," is also in British custody for the same offense.
The actual seizure of five hundred and forty-seven
slaves in Africa is by no means the most infamous part
of the support which this city furnishes to slavery,
only one of the obvious indications of a spirit well

312 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
known to exist in Boston, and by no means confined to
" illiterate and profane persons." The laws of Mass
achusetts, in 1641, justified enslaving " captives taken
in just wars, and such strangers as willingly sell them
selves or are sold unto us."
In 1662 Virginia revised the rule of the common
law, and declared that children should follow the con
dition of their mother. All the Southern states have
since adopted the same iniquitous provision. In 1663
Maryland made a law that the child of a free white
woman shall follow the condition of the father if he
be a slave; this was repealed a few years later, but
a fine of ten thousand pounds of tobacco was imposed
on the clergymen or the masters and mistresses who
promoted or connived at the marriage of such persons.
In 1667 Virginia declared that Christianity was no
bar to slavery, but the slave should not escape from
bondage by communion and baptism; killing a slave
was declared not felony. Indians " imported by ship
ping," and not Christians, might be slaves for life.
In 1671, there were two thousand " black slaves " in
Virginia, and six thousand " Christian servants," of
whom about fifteen hundred were imported yearly.
In 1682 all negroes, mulattoes, or Indians, brought
into the colony by sea or land, Christians or not,
were declared slaves for life, unless they were of Chris
tian parentage or country. In 1692 an " act for sup
pressing outlying slaves " declares that, if they resist,
run away, or refuse to surrender, " they may be law
fully killed or destroyed with guns, or any other way
whatever." The state was to indemnify the master
for the loss, giving four thousand pounds of tobacco
for a negro. A thousand pounds of tobacco were of
fered to any one who should kill a certain runaway*

HILDRETH 313
the " negro slave Billy." In 1705 laws were passed
to prevent intermarriages between blacks and whites,
and against emancipating slaves. Summary tribunals
were established for the trial of slaves, " without the
solemnity of a jury." They were to be kept in jail,
" well laden with irons." Even in Pennsylvania,
William Penn could not secure the right of equal mar
riage for slaves ! As slaves increased — and about one
thousand were annually imported into Virginia in
1720, and for some time after — the laws became more
rigorous. It was made more difficult to set them free.
South Carolina has always been remarkable for the
rigor of her slave laws. In 1670, the " fundamental
and unalterable constitution " provided that every
freeman " shaU have obsolute power and authority
over his negro slaves." In 1704 we find one James
Moore a " needy, forward, and ambitious man," kid
napping Indians to sell as slaves. Many others did
the same in 1712 on a large scale, taking eight hun
dred at one time, and re-annexing Indian villages. A
law was made the same year making it the duty of
every person to arrest any slave found abroad without
a pass, and give him " moderate chastisement." A
slave guilty of petty larceny, for the first offense, was
to be " publicly and severely whipped ;" for the sec
ond, " one of his ears to be cut off," or " be branded
on the forehead with a hot iron ;" for the third, he was
" to have his nose slit ;" for the fourth, to " suffer
death, or other punishment," at the discretion of the
court. Any two justices of the peace, with three free
holders whom they might summon, formed a court for
the trial of any slave, charged with any crime, from
" chicken-steahng " to insurrection and murder ; and
was competent to sentence the accused to punishment,

314 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
even if it were death, and have it executed forthwith,
on their warrant alone! This mode of trial remains
in force in South Carolina till this day. It was a
capital crime for a slave to run out of the province,
or for a white man to entice him to do so.
"Any slave running away for twenty days at once, for the
first offense was to be ' severely and publicly whipped.' In case
the master neglected to inflict this punishment, any justice
might order it to be inflicted by the constable, at the master's
expense. For the second offense, the runaway was to be
branded with the letter R on the right cheek. If the master
omitted it, he was to forfeit ten pounds, and any justice of
the peace might order the branding done. For the third of
fense, the runaway, if absent thirty days, was to be whipped,
and have one of his ears cut off; the master neglecting to do
it to forfeit twenty pounds; any justice, on complaint, to order
it done as before. For the fourth offence, the runaway, ' if a
man, was to be gelt,' to be paid for by the province, if he died
under the operation; if a woman, she was to be severely
whipped, branded on the left cheek with the letter R, and her
left ear cut off. Any master neglecting for twenty days to
inflict these atrocious cruelties was to forfeit his property in
the slave to any informer who might complain of him within
six months. Any captain or commander of a company, ' on
notice of the haunt, residence, and hiding-place of any run
away slaves,' was 'to pursue, apprehend, and take them, either
alive or dead,' being in either case entitled to a premium of
from two to four pounds for each slave. All persons wounded
or disabled on such expeditions were to be compensated by the
public. If any slave under punishment ' shall suffer in life or
member, which,' says the act, ' seldom happens, no person what
soever shall be liable to any penalty therefor.' Any person
killing a slave out of 'wantonness,' ' bloody-mindedness,' or
'cruel intention,' was to forfeit 'fifty pounds current money,'
or if the slave belonged to another person, twenty-five pounds
to the public, and the slave's value to the owner. No master
was to allow his slaves to hire their own time, or, by a supple
mentary act, two years after, 'to plant for themselves any
corn, pease, or rice, or to keep any stock of hogs, cattle, or
horses.' "
"'Since charity and the Christian religion which we profess,'
says the concluding section of this remarkable act, 'obliges us
to wish well to the souls of men, and that religion may not be

HILDRETH 315
made a pretence to alter any man's property and right, and
that no person may neglect to baptize their negroes or slaves
for fear that thereby they should be manumitted and set free,
'it shall be and is hereby declared lawful for any negro or
Indian slave, or any other slave or slaves whatsoever, to re
ceive and profess the Christian faith, and to be thereunto bap
tized; but notwithstanding such slave or slaves shall receive or
profess the Christian religion, and be baptized, he or they shall
not thereby be manumitted or set free."
" South Carolina, it thus appears, assumed at the beginning
the same bad pre-eminence on the subject of slave legislation
which she still maintains."
At this day, no man in South Carolina can be elected
as representative to the Assembly, unless legally seized
and possessed of ten slaves in his own right.
At first, slavery was not permitted in Georgia; but
many of the settlers of that province were taken from
workhouses, from debtors' prisons, and even worse
places ; " selected from the most helpless, querulous,
and grasping portion of the community," " broken
traders and insolvent debtors," men " found in the end
as worthless as they were discontented and trouble
some." " They were very importunate," says Mr.
Hildreth, " for permission to hold slaves, without
whose labors they insisted lands in Georgia could not
be cultivated."
" ' Most of the early settlers were altogether unworthy of the
assistance they received,' so says Stevens, a recent and judicious
native historian of the colony, who has written from very full
materials. ' They were disappointed in the quality and fertility
of their lands; were unwilling to labour, hung for support upon
the trustees' store, were clamorous for privileges to which they
had no right, and fomented discontent and faction where it
was hoped they would live together in brotherly peace and
charity.' What wonder that men so idle, thriftless, and un
grateful, called loudly for slaves, whose unpaid labours might
support them for life?"
So they had their slavery, and thereby Georgia
attained her present condition and prospects !

316 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
The gradual progress of liberty is remarkable in
New England. Hubbard, with the spirit of a priest,
complains of the " inordinate love of liberty or fear of
restraint, especially in matters of religion," which
prevailed in 1647, and speaks of " all that rabble of
men that went under the name of Independents,
whether Anabapists, Antinomians, Familists, or Seek
ers," with the same theocratic contempt now exhibited
by sectarian bigotry and personal malice, which has
not the power to bite, and only barks at the freemen
of God, who go on their way rejoicing. There are
in New England two visible bulwarks of liberty — the
free school and the free printing press. In 1639 the
first printing press in America was set up at Cam
bridge. However it was kept under a strict censor
ship, and no other was for a long time allowed to> be
set up. The first three things printed are symbolical
of New England ; the " Freeman's Oath " was the
proof-shot of the press, then came an " Almanac
made for New England," then the " Psalms turned in
to Metre," also " made for New England," by men
who knew how to
" Crack the ear of melody, ,
And break the legs of time."
The freedom of the press was not allowed, however,
for a long time. Andros was to allow no printing in
1686 ; King William also forbade it in 1688. In 1719
Governor Shute objected to the printing of an obnox
ious paper by the order of the General Court, declar
ing that he had power over the press, and would pre
vent it. The paper was printed ; the Governor wished
to prosecute the printer, but the Attorney-General
could find no law on which to frame an indictment.
This was by no means the last instance of an attempt

HILDRETH 317
by men " clothed with a little brief authority " to
shackle the freedom of the press. The attempt has
been repeated in Massachusetts in our own day, but
what was once dangerous is now simply laughable.
A donkey bracing himself against a locomotive is not
a very formidable antagonist, yet he might have over
turned the " Ark of Jehovah " when drawn by " two
heifers " with no one to guide them.
In 1682 a printing press was established in Vir
ginia, and the laws of that year were printed. But
the governor, Culpepper, put the printer under bonds
to print nothing tiU his majesty's pleasure should be
known. The next year, King James II forbade any
printing press in the colony, and Virginia had none
till 1729.
In 1687 the third printing press was set up at
Philadelphia. The fourth was at New York, in 1692.
The first newspaper in America was established at
Boston, in 1704, only containing advertisements and
items of news ; a regular newspaper, discussing public
affairs, was begun here in 1722, conducted by James
Franklin ; " but it perished for want of support," says
Mr. Hildreth, " ominous fate of the first free press in
America ! "
The records of Boston contain this entry, under date
of April 13, 1635 : " It was then generally agreed
upon, that our brother Philemon Purmont shall be in
structed to become schoolmaster for the teaching and
nurturing of children with us." It does not appear
that he kept a free school. In 1638 Harvard College
was established. Private benefactions and public gifts
helped endow this first collegiate institution in Amer
ica. In 1642 the General Court passed a law making
it the duty of the selectmen to see that every child

318 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
was taught " perfectly to read the English tongue ;"
a fine of twenty shillings for each neglect was im
posed. Thus was an attempt made to render education
universal, and, in 1647, a law was passed making it al
so free; every town of fifty families was to have a
teacher to instruct all the children in common branches,
and each town of a hundred families was commanded
to " set up a grammar school " where lads might be
" fitted for the University." At that time Massachu
setts contained about twenty thousand inhabitants,
and the entire property of the whole people, the valua
tion of the colony, could hardly amount to more than
two or three millions of dollars. This is the first at
tempt in the world to provide by law for the public
education of the people on such a scale. The Mass
achusetts system was soon adopted at Plymouth and
New Haven. In this law we find an explanation of
much of the prosperity of New England, and the in
fluence she has exerted on America and the world.
Another important thing in our history is the trade
of the country. New England early manifested the
Yankee fondness for trade and manufactures. In
1634 there were watermills at Roxbury and Dorches
ter, windmills in other places. Vessels were built, the
" Blessing of the Bay," and the " Rebecca," and a
trade began with New York, with Virginia, and the
West Indies. In 1675 the little ships of New England
stole along the coasts of America, trafficing with
Maryland, Virginia, Carolina, Antigua, and Barba
does, or boldly stemmed the Atlantic wave, sailing
to England, Holland, Spain, or Italy. The jealousy,
the fear and hate with which New England enter
prise, on land or sea, was met in Old England by the
merchants and the government of Britain would be

HILDRETH 319
astonishing at this day, if we did not see the same
bigotry and toryism reproduced in New England it
self at the present time. But we have not space to
dweU on this theme.
It is curious to see how early the habit of self-reli
ance got established in New England. Every man
was a soldier, every church member a citizen in full.
Soon, all men were able to read and write. Necessity
at first forced them to rely on " God, and their own
right arm." By and by, when the mother country
interferred, she found a child not accustomed to sub
mission. But we must pass away from this theme, and pass
over many other matters of interest touched upon by
Mr. Hildreth in this work, and speak of his book in
general, and in special. It strikes us that, on the
whole, the history of the colonial and provincial period
is better and more happily treated than that of the
Revolution. Everywhere we see marks of the same
intellectual vigor which distinguishes the former writ
ings of Mr. Hildreth. There is a strength and fresh
ness in his style. He writes in the interest of mankind,
and not for any portion thereof. He allows no local
attachment, or reverence for men or classes of men, to
keep him from telling the truth as he finds it. He
exhibits the good and evil qualities of the settlers of
the United States with the same coolness and impar
tiality. His work is almost wholly objective, — giving
the facts, not his opinions about the facts. He shows
two things as they have not been exposed before, —
the bigoted character of the settlers of New England,
and the early history and gradual development of
slavery in the South. His book is written in the spirit
of democracy, which continually appears in spite of
the author.

320 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
We must say something of its faults of matter and
of form. The division into chapters, it seems to us,
is not uniformly well made; sometimes this division
disturbs the unity of the subject. He gives us too
Httle of the philosophical part of history ; too little,
perhaps, of the ornamental. He lacks the pic-
turesqueness of style which makes history so attractive
in some authors. He does not give the student his
authorities in the margin, as it seems to us he ought
to do. His dates are not always to be relied upon.
We notice some errors, the results of haste, which
we trust he will correct in a second edition. Thus,
he says that Locke maintained that men's souls, " mor
tal by generation, are made immortal by Christ's pur
chase." It is well known that this was the opinion of
Dodwell, who makes baptism a condition sine qua non
of immortality, but we have never found the doctrine
in Locke,
In Volume II. he omits some important particulars.
The provincial troops, who comprised the entire land
forces, were deprived of all share of the prize money,
which amounted to one million, pounds. The land
forces were entitled to the greater part of it but got
none ; the expense of these forces remained a long time
a heavy burden on the colonies, and especially on
Massachusetts. Commodore Warren and the naval
forces kept the whole of the prize money, which was
contrary to all law, usage, and equity.
He calls Lord Grenville " Bute's chancellor of the
exchequer." George Grenville was chancellor of the
exchequer, but was never a lord. Bute was never in
the ministry. George Grenville was not of the party
called " king's friends," as Mr. Hildreth intimates.
Dean Tucker is called " author of the Light of Na-

HILDRETH 321
ture," which was written by a country gentleman re
joicing in the name of Abraham Tucker, with a liter
ary alias, Edward Search.
" The private sentiments of Lord North were not
materially different from those of Chatham." They
differed in almost every material point, — as to the
right of taxation, and the expediency of asserting it
by force.
The bridge spoken of was in Salem, not between
Salem and Danvers; it was not a company of militia
under Colonel Pickering, but a party of citizens.*
The praise of Arnold appears excessive. He was
hardly " one of the most honored [officers] in the
American army." He was distinguished for courage
more than conduct, and not at all for integrity.
He speaks of an intercepted letter, which " seemed
to imply a settled policy, on the part of France, to
exclude the Americans from the fisheries and the
Western lands." Mr. Sparks, in his Life of Frank
lin, has successfully vindicated the French court from
the charge of ill faith in these negotiations.^
He rehes on John Adams' letter to Cushing as au
thority for an odious sentiment ascribed to Mr. Adams.
This letter was a forgery, and was so pronounced by
Mr. Adams himself, in a letter written at the close
of his administration, dated the 4th of March, 1801,
and published extensively in the newspapers of that
period. It is in the Columbian Centinel.
These are shght blemishes, which may easily be cor
rected in a new edition. On the whole, this history
must be regarded as a work of much value and im
portance. It is written in the American spirit, in a
*Vol. 3, p. 66
t Ibid, p. 418.
11—21

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
style always brief but always clear, without a single
idle word. We look with high expectations for the
volume which will bring the history down to our own
times.

VII
MACAULAY'S HISTORY OF ENGLAND
Perhaps there is no period in the annals of man
kind of more interest to Englishmen and Americans
than the one comprised in the plan of Macaulay's
history, from the accession of James II till near the
present time, and certainly no one standing in so
much need of a good historian. We know of no good
history of England for the last one hundred and sixty
years, since the termination of Hume's. When it was
understood that Macaulay had undertaken his work,
it was a subject of general congratulation. All were
pleased that so important and difficult a work had
fallen to the lot of perhaps the only man of the age
who was supposed to have the learning and genius
required for the task.
Mr. Macaulay is well known as the most popular
and able reviewer of the present or perhaps of any
past time. Many of his articles in the Edinburgh
Review are of permanent value, and have been re
published here in a separate work. There may
be articles in that Review that display more profound
and exact knowledge in some departments, but there
are none so eagerly sought for, none that combine so
much varied and extensive information on subjects of
general interest, presented in so popular and captivat
ing a style.
It is rare that any man combines so many essential
qualifications and so many accidental advantages for
writing a history of England. In addition to great
323

324 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
learning and talent as an author, he is eminently a
practical man, well acquainted with the world and its
affairs. His public life for many years as a mem
ber of Parliament and a part of the time one of the
Ministry and of the Cabinet, has made him intimately
acquainted wth politicians and statesmen, and given
him an opportunity of knowing from his own experience
how the business of government is carried on. We
believe, too, that he had the reputation of being one
of the best speakers in the House of Commons, and
combines the powers of speaking well and writing
well, so rarely found united since the days of Cicero.
This work is more entertaining, and contains more
of what we wish to know, than any other history of
the times; though it appears to us that the author
is sometimes liable to the charge of prolixity, and
dwells too long in illustrating a proposition and in nar
ration and description. The characters of eminent
men are delineated with great skill and much life, but
are sometimes drawn out to an immoderate length.
He seems desirous to give a view so full and complete
of every part of his subject, as not only to prevent
the possibility of being misunderstood, but also to
save the reader all the trouble of thinking or making
any conclusion for himself. Nothing can be more
opposite to the manner of Tacitus, though they agree
in one respect, in fondness for point and antithesis.
His style is clear and pointed, as well as beautiful
and brilliant. Perhaps the splendor is not always
genuine, and sometimes, contrary to the rhetorical
maxim, resembles that of tinsel rather than the bright
ness of polished steel.
The extent and minuteness of his knowledge of facts
are indeed wonderful, and we know not where to find

MACAULAY 325
anything Hke it in any readable English history.
His impartiality, a quality so essential to the histo
rian, in his account of the different religious sects and
political parties, is very conspicuous. The Church of
Rome and the Church of England, Presbyterians, In
dependents, and Quakers, are brought in review be
fore him, and their errors and faults exposed with
a bold and unsparing hand. We think he endeavors
to preserve the same impartiality between the Cavaliers
and Roundheads, and the Whigs and Tories. But we
imagine that the zealous partisans of all the religious
sects wiH be dissatisfied with his account of their con
duct and principles, and that no political party will
be entirely satisfied, unless it be the moderate, aris
tocratic Whigs.
If we were to object at all to his views of parties
and sects, it would be that he may not have done full
justice to the religious or political principles of the
Independents, the only sect of that day that seems
to have had any just notions of religious freedom or
toleration. It was the Independents alone who pre
vented the Presbyterians, at the termination of the
Civil War, from estabhshing a system of religious in
tolerance and persecution as odious as that from which
they had just been delivered. Cromwell, Vane, Sel-
den, and Milton were for liberty of conscience and
toleration in religious worship. The Presbyterians
wished to succeed the ecclesiastical tyrants whom the
joint arms of the Independents and Presbyterians had
recently overthrown. Milton had just reason to com
plain that " New Presbyter is but old
Priest writ large."

326 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
The first three chapters, including the greater part
of the first volume, are introductory, intended to pre
pare the reader for beginning the history with the
reign of James II. The first chapter contains a
rapid sketch of English history from the earliest times
to the Restoration, or accession of Charles II. He
dwells a little more at length on the contest between
Charles and the parliament, the Civil War, the ad
ministration of Cromwell, and the Restoration.
The second chapter is devoted to the reign of
Charles II, a knowledge of which is indispensable to
a good understanding of the reign of James, and of
the revolution which hurled the Stuarts from the
throne of England, and condemned them to perpetual
exile. The third chapter contains a description at length
of the times when the crown passed from' Charles II
to James, and a comparison between that*^and its
present condition. It contains a view of the very great
advance which has been made in almost' dU the parti
culars thought most desirable in national prosperity
and the well-being of individuals, including a high
degree of physical, moral, and intellectual improve
ment. V,
This description has 'been mentioned as being out of
place in a history, but we think it the most important
as well as entertaining in the whole work, the one
we should be most unwilling to spare. -.a Volteire justly
complains that " the history of Europe in his time was
grown to an endless register of marriages, genealo
gies, and disputed titles, which render the narrative
obscure and unentertaining, at the same time that they
stifle the memory of great events, together with the
knowledge of laws and manners, objects more worthy

MACAULAY 327
of attention." Whatever may be the defects of his
historical productions, Voltaire has the great merit
of leading the way in the attention now commonly
paid by historical writers to laws, manners, and cus
toms, to the progress of the liberal and useful arts,
and especially to the condition of the people. The at
tention of the reader is no longer exclusively directed
to kings and princes, ministers, ambassadors, and gen
erals, as if all he rest of the world were of no conse
quence to the historian or reader.
Mr. Macaulay has on the whole, we think, been
very successful in this account, and has given a very
picturesque description of the condition of England
one hundred and sixty years ago, and a very favorable
one of England at present. We are not disposed to
caU in question the general fidelity of these pictures,
but we think the former is somewhat overcharged, and
the latter may, perhaps, be deemed a Httle flattering.
Indeed, we think it must be apparent to most readers,
that some exaggeration in description is not very un
common with Macaulay. We do not mention this as
detracting from the general merit of the work, and if
there is occasionally any exaggeration in his descrip
tions, or error in his conclusions, we think that the
author, by a fuU and accurate statement of all the
facts that can be ascertained, generally affords the in
telligent reader the means of forming a correct opinion
for himself. Some traces are occasionally visible of
the rhetorician and of the eloquent debater in the
House of Commons; sometimes he discusses questions
in the style of an advocate for one party, but in these
the decision is commonly that of the calm and im
partial historian.
The following is the character of Cranmer, the

328 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
principal founder of the English church and one of
its chief martyrs, and considered the leader of the
Protestant party.
"The man who took the chief part in settling the conditions
of the alliance which produced the Anglican Church was
Thomas Cranmer. He was the representative of both the par
ties, which, at that time, needed each other's assistance. He
was at once a divine and a statesman. In his character of
divine he was perfectly ready to go as far in the way of
change as any Swiss or Scottish reformer. In his character
of statesman he was desirous to preserve that organization
which had, during many ages, admirably served the purposes
of the bishops of Rome, and might be expected now to serve
equally well the purposes of the English kings and of their
ministers. His temper and his understanding eminently fitted
him to act as mediator. Saintly in his professions, unscrupu
lous in his dealings, zealous for nothing, bold in speculation, a
coward and a time-server in action, a placable enemy and a
lukewarm friend, he was in every way qualified to arrange the
terms of the coalition between the religious and the worldly
enemies of popery.
" To this day, the constitution, the doctrines, and the services
of the church retain the visible marks of the compromise from
which she sprang. She occupies a middle position between
the churches of Rome and Geneva. Her doctrinal confes
sions and discourses, composed by Protestants, set forth prin
ciples of theology in which Calvin or Knox would have found
scarcely a word to disapprove. Her prayers and thanksgivings,
derived from the ancient Liturgies, are very generally such
that Bishop Fisher or Cardinal Pole might have heartily
joined in them. A controversialist who puts an Arminian
sense on her articles and homilies will be pronounced by candid
men to be as unreasonable as a controversialist who denies that
the doctrine of baptismal regeneration can be discovered in
her Liturgy.
" The Church of Rome held that episcopacy was of divine
institution, and that certain supernatural graces of a high
order had been transmitted by the imposition of hands through
fifty generations, from the eleven who received their commis
sion on the Galilean Mount to the Bishops who met at Trent.
A large body of Protestants, on the other hand, regarded
prelacy as positively unlawful, and persuaded themselves that
they found a very different form of ecclesiastical government
prescribed in Scripture. The founders of the Anglican Church

MACAULAY 329
took a middle course. They retained episcopacy, but they did
not declare it to be an institution essential to the welfare of a
Christian society, or to the efficacy of the sacraments. Cran
mer, indeed, plainly avowed his conviction that, in the primitive
times, there was no distinction between bishops and priests,
and that the laying on of hands was altogether unnecessary."
This view of the doctrines and services of the church
reminds one of the saying of Lord Chatham, that
" the Church of England has a Calvinistic creed, an
Arminian clergy, and a Popish Liturgy." Accord
ing to Bishop Hare, the principal difference between
the Church of Rome and the Church of England is,
that " the one is inf alhble, and the other never in the
wrong." In respect to the divine origin of Episcopacy
and the apostolic succession, the English church now
approaches nearer to that of Rome than in the days
of Cranmer.
The present orthodox behef of the high church
men we beheve to be that of the Church of England,
with its hierarchy, its archbishops, bishops, deans, and
inferior clergy, affords the nearest resemblance to the
primitive church in the time of the apostles.
The Church of England has been always strongly
attached to the sovereign, its supreme head. The ex
travagance of this attachment and the slavish doctrines
taught by the clergy are thus stated by Macaulay.
" The Church of England was not ungrateful for the protec
tion which she received from the government. From the first
day of her existence she had been attached to monarchy; but,
during the quarter of a century which followed the Restoration,
her zeal for royal authority and hereditary right passed all
bounds. She had suffered with the house of Stuart. She had
been restored with that house. She was connected with it by
common interests, friendships, and enmities. It seemed impos
sible that a day could ever come when the ties which bound
her to the children of her august martyr would be sundered,
and when the loyalty in which she gloried would cease to be

330 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
a pleasing and profitable duty. She accordingly magnified in
fulsome praise that prerogative which was constantly employed
to defend and to aggrandize her, and reprobated, much at her
ease, the depravity of those whom oppression, from which she
was exempt, had goaded to rebellion. Her favorite theme was
the doctrine of non-resistance. That doctrine she taught with
out any qualification, and followed out to all its extreme con
sequences. Her disciples were never weary of repeating that
in no conceivable case, not even if England were cursed with
a king resembling Busiris or Phalaris, who, in defiance of law,
and without the pretence of justice, should daily doom hun
dreds of innocent victims to torture and death, would all the
estates of the realm united be justified in withstanding his
tyranny by physical force. Happily, the principles of human
nature afford abundant security that such theories will never
be more than theories. The day of trial came, and the very
men who had most loudly and most sincerely professed this
extravagant loyalty were, in almost every county of England,
arrayed in arms against the throne."
" The restored church contended against the prevailing im
morality, but contended feebly, and with half a heart. It was
necessary to the decorum of her character that she should ad
monish her erring children. But her admonitions were given in
a somewhat perfunctory manner. Her attention was elsewhere
engaged. Her whole soul was in the work of crushing the
Puritans, and of teaching her disciples to render unto Caesar
the things which were Caesar's. She had been pillaged and op
pressed by the party which preached an austere morality. She
had been restored to opulence and honor by libertines. Little
as the men of mirth and fashion were disposed to shape their
lives according to her precepts, they were yet ready to fight
kneedeep in blood for her cathedrals and palaces, for every
line of her rubric, and every thread of her vestments. . . .
It is an unquestionable and most instructive fact, that the
years during which the political power of the Anglican hier
archy was in the zenith, were precisely the years during which
national virtue was at the lowest point."
The immorality, profligacy, and total want of
principle among the higher classes, in the reign of
Charles II, and especially of the most active and
leading politicians, seem almost incredible. We have
a striking, and, we suppose, a pretty correct description
of the general character of the public men in England

MACAULAY 331
at the Restoration, which, to a great extent, was
applicable for more than half a century afterwards.
" Scarcely any rank or profession escaped the infection of the
prevailing immorality: but those persons who made politics their
business, were perhaps the most corrupt part of the corrupt so
ciety; for they were exposed not only to the same noxious influ
ences which affected the nation generally, but also to a taint of a
peculiar and most malignant kind. Their character had been
formed amid frequent and violent revolutions and counter-revo
lutions. In the course of a few years they had seen the ecclesi
astical and civil polity of their country repeatedly changed. They
had seen an Episcopal church persecuting Puritans, a Puritan
church persecuting Episcopalians, and an Episcopal church per
secuting Puritans again. They had seen hereditary monarchy
abolished and restored. They had seen the Long Parliament
thrice supreme in the state and thrice dissolved amid the curses
and laughter of millions. They had seen a new dynasty rapidly
rising to the height of power and glory, and then, on a sudden,
hurled down from the chair of state without a struggle. They
had seen a new representative system devised, tried, and aban
doned. They had seen a new House of Lords created and
scattered. They had seen great masses of property violently
transferred from Cavaliers to Roundheads, and from Round
heads back to Cavaliers. During these events, no man could be
a stirring and thriving politician who was not prepared to
change with every change of fortune. It was only in retire
ment that any person could long keep the character either of a
steady Royalist or of a steady Republican. One who, in such
an age, is determined to attain civil greatness, must renounce
all thoughts of consistency. Instead of affecting immutability
in the midst of endless mutation, he must always be on the
watch for the indications of a coming reaction. He must seize
the excct moment for deserting a falling cause. Having gone
all lengths with a faction while it was uppermost, he must ex
tricate himself from it when its difficulties begin; must assail it,
must persecute it, must enter on a new career of power and
prosperity in company with new associates. His situation nat
urally develops in him to the highest degree a peculiar class
of abilities and a peculiar class of vices. He becomes quick
of observation and fertile of resource. He catches without
effort the tone of any sect or party with which he chances
to mingle. He discerns the signs of the times with a sagacity
which to the multitude appears miraculous; with a sagacity
resembling that with which a veteran police officer pursues the

332 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
faintest indications of crime, or with which a Mohawk war
rior follows a track through the woods. But we shall seldom
find, in a statesman so trained, integrity, constancy, or any of
the virtues of the noble family of Truth. He has no faith in
any doctrine, no zeal for any cause. He has seen so many
old institutions swept away that he has no reverence for pre
scription. He has seen so many new institutions from which
much had been expected produce mere disappointment, that
he has no hope of improvement. He sneers alike at those
who are anxious to preserve and those who are eager to reform.
There is nothing in the state which he could not, without a
scruple or a blush, join in defending or in destroying. Fidelity
to opinions and to friends seems to him mere dulness and
wrong-headedness. Politics he regards, not as a science of
which the object is the happiness of mankind, but as an ex
citing game of mixed chance and skill, at which a- dextrous and
lucky player may win an estate, a coronet, perhaps a crown,
and at which one rash move may lead to the loss of fortune
and of life. Ambition, which in good times and in good minds
is half a virtue, now, disjoined from every elevated and
philanthropic sentiment, becomes a selfish cupidity scarcely less
ignoble than avarice. Among those politicians who, from the
Restoration to the accession of the House of Hanover were
at the head of the great parties in the state, very few can be
named whose reputation is not stained by what in our age would
be called gross perfidy and corruption. It is scarcely an ex
aggeration to say that the most unprincipled public men who
have taken part in affairs within our memory, would, if tried
by the standard which was in fashion during the latter part
of the seventeenth century, deserve to be regarded as scrupulous
and disinterested."
Robert Spencer, Earl of Sunderland and ancestor
of the present Duke of Marlborough and of Earl
Spencer, was one of the most thorough-going politi
cians of this class. He twice changed his religion to
please the court, was concerned in many of the worst
measures of Charles and James, and was a successful
courtier and favorite minister of William.
"Sunderland was Secretary of State. In this man the po
litical immorality of his age was personified in the most lively
manner. Nature had given him a keen understanding, a rest
less and mischievous temper, a cold heart, and an abject spirit.

MACAULAY 333
His mind had undergone a training by which all his vices had
been nursed up to the rankest maturity. At his entrance into
public life, he had passed several years in diplomatic posts
abroad, and had been, during some time, minister in France.
Every calling has its peculiar temptations. There is no in
justice in saying that diplomatists, as a class, have always been
more distinguished by their address, by the art with which they
win the confidence of those with whom they have to deal, and
by the ease with which they catch the tone of every society
into which they are admitted, than by generous enthusiasm
or austere rectitude; and the relations between Charles and
Louis were such that no English nobleman could long reside in
France as envoy, and retain any patriotic or honorable senti
ment. Sunderland came forth from the bad school in which he
had been brought up, cunning, supple, shameless, free from all
prejudices, and destitute of all principles. He was, by heredi
tary connection, a Cavalier; but with the Cavaliers he had
nothing in common. They were zealous for monarchy, and
condemned in theory all resistance; yet they had sturdy Eng
lish hearts, which would never have endured real despotism.
He, on the contrary, had a languid, speculative liking for Re
publican institutions, which was compatible with perfect readi
ness to be in practice the most servile instrument of arbitrary
powers. Like many other accomplished flatterers and negoti
ators, he was far more skilful in the art of reading the char
acters and practising on the weaknesses of individuals than in
the art of discerning the feelings of great masses and of fore
seeing the approach of great revolutions. He was adroit in in
trigue; and it was difficult even for shrewd and experienced
men, who had been forewarned of his perfidy, to withstand
the fascination of his manner, and to refuse credit to his
professions of attachment; but he was so intent on observing
and courting particular persons that he forgot to study the
temper of the nation. He therefore miscalculated grossly with
respect to all the most momentous events of his time. Every
important movement and rebound of the public mind took him
by surprise; and the world, unable to understand how so
clever a man could be blind to what was clearly discerned by
the politicians of the coffee-houses, sometimes attributed to
deep design what were, in truth, mere blunders."
The causes assigned by Macaulay had no doubt
much influence in producing the decline of public and
private virtue, but yet seem hardly sufficient to ac
count for the great immorality said to be so generally

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
prevalent. Hume says that " never was a people less
corrupted by vice and more actuated by principle
than the English at the beginning of the Civil War.
At the close of the reign of Charles II it would seem
that the proposition might be almost reversed."
There is probably some exaggeration in both cases ;
but there can be no doubt of a great decline in public
and private morals, and a great prevalence of immor
ality and corruption at the latter period.
We suppose it to be true that there has been a
very great change for the better in the moral and
political character of the public men in England since
the reign of Charles II. The improved morals in
private life, on which Macaulay dwells with some com
placency, the diffusion of intelligence, and the much
greater force of public opinion, have had a very bene
ficial influence on the conduct of the English politi
cians and statesmen. This improvement may be con
sidered as one of the most favorable symptons of the
times in England.
The kings of the house of Stuart seem to have
been an incorrigible race, incapable of discerning the
signs of the times or of improving by prosperity or ad
versity. Called by the English law of succession to the
noblest inheritance in the world, they supposed their
right to the throne was derived from Heaven, not
from the consent of the people; that they were in
vested by God with absolute power, for the exercise
of which they were accountable to him alone. In a
word that they had
"The right divine of kings to govern wrong;"
a right which they strenuously attempted to put in
practice so long as they had the power.
James I had some learning, with much pedantry,

MACAULAY 335
and endeavored to prove from reason and Scripture
the divine and absolute power of the throne. The
Duke of Sully pronounced him to be the wisest fool
in Europe.
Charles I had more capacity, firmness, and perse
verance than his father, and was more bent upon the
establishment of arbitrary power. His design in
cluded the American colonies as well as his dominions
in Europe. Only six years after he had granted the
charter of Masachusetts he determined to revoke it and
established a commission at the head of which was
Archbishop Laud, with absolute authority over the
colonies in aU cases, civil and religious. This board
or commission were authorized to make laws and or
dinances in all cases, especially for the support of
the Episcopal clergy, by tithes, oblations, and other
profits accruing, to make and unmake governors, to
constitute such civil and ecclesiastical tribunals and
courts of justice, with such powers as they should
judge proper, and to revoke any charters or letters
patent prejudicial to the crown.
Had Charles been able to carry this plan into ex
ecution we should have had our High Commision and
Star Chamber in America, and not a vestige of civil
or religious liberty would have been suffered to re
main. The controversy between the king and parlia
ment, which broke out soon after, gave the king and
archbishop sufficient occupation at home, and saved
the liberties of New England. If England, as most
of her writers say, owes her freedom to the Puritans
and Long Parliament, it is not less true as to her
American colonies.
The character of Charles II is drawn with much
force and vivacity, and we suppose in its true colors.

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
This most worthless and profligate prince was for a
time more popular than any of his predecessors.
There is one trait in his character, however, not men
tioned by Macaulay, we mean his special regard for
daring and atrocious villains.
The case of Blood, who attempted to assassinate
the Duke of Ormond, the first nobleman in the king
dom, and most zealous friend and supporter of the
Stuart family, is a signal instance. In his attempt
Blood almost succeeded. He had committed other
capital crimes, besides the robbery of the crown and
regalia from the Tower. Yet this audacious criminal
was not only pardoned by Charles, but became a fav
orite companion of the king and an influential courtier,
whose interest was solicited by applicants for court
favors, and was rewarded by Charles with the grant
of a considerable estate in Ireland.
Morgan, the most noted of all pirates or buccaneers
in the West Indies, was distinguished by Charles with
the honor of knighthood.
The infamous and savage Colonel Kirke affords an
other instance. Charles near the close of his reign
appointed Kirke, who had been notorious for his
tyranny and cruelties at Tangier, to be governor of
New England, with absolute authority. This was
soon after Massachusetts had been illegally deprived
of her charter, so that there would have been no
security against the barbarity of Kirke. But James,
when he came to the crown, did not wish to part with
one whose disposition was so congenial with his own,
and who was so well fitted for his arbitrary and cruel
designs. Instead of Kirke, Sir Edmund Andros was
sent as governor to New England, a tyrant indeed,
but not quite so atrocious as Kirke.

MACAULAY 337
As to James II, his conduct in Scotland and in
England showed a love of arbitrary power and a de
light in persecution and cruelty. A bigoted papist
himself he instituted a savage persecution against
Scottish Presbyterians and Puritans for not conform
ing to the Church of England. In this persecution
thousands perished by the sword, famine, or imprison
ment, and many thousand families were utterly ruined.
And what was the object of this persecution? Not
to convert them to what he believed to be the true re
ligion, but to make them change from one false re
ligion to another that he believed to be equally false.
The same remark appHes in some degree to his brother
Charles in the persecutions of the dissenters in Eng
land, as he was secretly a Roman Cathohc. Per
haps, however, it may be doing them some injustice
to suppose that they were actuated by any worse mo
tives than other persecutors, though a little more in
consistent. As we believe aU persecution arises from
bad motives we do not feel certain that Charles and
James were any worse in this respect than their con
temporaries of the established church, who instigated
and were actively engaged in carrying on these per
secutions. But for their conduct in church and state both
Charles and James may have some excuse in the doc
trines of divine right, passive obedience, and non-re
sistance, so diligently inculcated by the church as we
have just seen, and also by the Parliament and the
University of Oxford. To a sovereign inclined to
tyranny and persecution there caii be no stronger
temptation than the assurance that he can indulge his
bad passions with impunity. This assurance the
church, the Parliament, and the University of Oxford
zealously endeavored to furnish.
II— 22

338 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
The first Parliament chosen after the Restoration
passed an act that the power of the sword was solely
in the king, and declared that in no extremity what
ever could the Parliament be justified in resisting him
by force.
By another act all magistrates and officers of cor
porations were required to declare on oath their be
lief that it was not lawful upon any pretence whatever
to take arms against the king, and their abhorrence
of the traitorous position of taking arms by the king's
authority against his person, or against those com
missioned by him. A motion to insert the word law
fully before " commissioned " was rej ected.
The University of Oxford in full convocation passed
a decree " against certain pernicious books and dam
nable doctrines destructive to the sacred persons of
princes, their state and government, and all human
society." The doctrines condemned consist of twenty-seven
propositions taken from the works of Milton, Bu
chanan, Owen, Baxter and several others. One of
these damnable propositions is, " that when kings sub
vert the constitution of their country, and become ab
solute tyrants, they forfeit their right to the govern
ment, and may be resisted." This and other similar
propositions, they declare to be " impious, seditious,
scandalous, damnable, heretical, blasphemous, and in
famous to the Christian religion." They forbid the
students to read the writings of those authors, and or
der their books to be burnt.
One would suppose that the Parliament, the church,
and University of Oxford were rife for slavery.
Charles and James had some excuse for taking them
at their word.

MACAULAY 339
The history of this period has a peculiar interest
for Americans, as being essentially connected with
their own. The revolution of 1688 was not less a de
liverance from arbitrary power for New England than
for Old. The tyranny of Sir Edmund Andros had
become so insupportable that he was deposed and im
prisoned before the success of the revolution was
known here.
But though the Revolution was a great blessing to
the colonies, yet some of them had much reason to
complain of the government under the new settle
ment. Massachusetts could not obtain a restoration
of her charter, though deprived of it by a judgment
acknowledged to be illegal and unjust. Sir Edmund
Andros, so noted as a tyrant in Massachusetts, was
rewarded by being sent out as governor of Virginia.
The Habeas Corpus Act, so essential to freedom, was
passed by the General Court of Masachusetts, but
was disaUowed and repealed by the committee of plan
tations, at the head of which was the famous Lord
Somers. It seems to have been the opinion of this
great constitutional lawyer that the English act of
Habeas Corpus did not extend to the colonies, and
that they could not have this security of freedom
except from the bounty of the crown.
The character of WiUiam of Orange, the great
hero of the Revolution, the idol of the Whigs, and in
former times the detestation of the Tories, is drawn
at great length and in the most favorable colors.
He seems, indeed, with some faults and disagreeable
qualities, to have been on the whole the best and most
able of the great public men of the age. He was tol
erant and liberal in his views of religion and church
establishments, a great merit in that age. A wise

340 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and far-sighted statesman, with an invincible courage
and perseverance in a contest which was the cause not
only of England and Holland, but of the greater part
of Europe against the ambition of Louis XIV. Ma
caulay in this case, as well as some others, has availed
himself of important sources of information which
do not seem to have been known to any other historian,
and attributes to him more amiable qualities than
William was supposed to possess.
A very different picture is given of him by the
Tories, which we quote merely as showing the ex
travagance of party zeal. Dr. Johnson, according to
Boswell, pronounced William to be the most worthless
of all scoundrels. But then it is to be recollected that
the Doctor had an extraordinary veneration for
Charles II. Smollet's character of William contains
more point and vivacity than is often found in his
history, and probably shows the sentiments of the ultra
Tories of that age. The following is Smollet's view
of the government of William:
" Certain it is he involved these kingdoms in foreign con
nections which, in all probability, will be productive of their
ruin. In order to establish this favorite point he scrupled not
to employ all the engines of corruption by which the morals
of the nation were totally debauched. He procured a par
liamentary sanction for a standing army, which now seems to
be interwoven in the constitution. He introduced the per
nicious practice of borrowing upon remote funds, an expedient
that necessarily hatched a brood of usurers, brokers, con
tractors, and stock-jobbers to prey upon the vitals of their
country. He entailed upon the nation a growing debt and a
system of politics big with misery, despair, and destruction.
To sum up his character in a few words — William was a
fatalist in religion, indefatigable in war, enterprising in poli
tics, dead to all the warm and generous emotions of the human
heart, a cold relation, an indifferent husband, a disagreeable
man, an ungracious prince, and an imperious sovereign."

MACAULAY 341
The account of William Penn's intimacy with
James, and his concern in some acts of oppression by
the king, his courtiers, and court-ladies, will excite
much surprise, and probably resentment in some quar
ters. If the charges are true, it is proper they should
be made known. If they are unfounded, the Quakers
and Pennsylvanians are abundantly able to vindicate
his character. His reputation would bear a consider
able reduction, and yet leave him one of the best
among the distinguished politicians of his age.
Macaulay says it had been the practice of every
English government to contract debts. What the
Revolution introduced was the practice of honestly
paying them.
This process of honestly paying the national debts
has been extremely slow in its operation. At the
Revolution the national debt was little more than one
million sterhng, it is now about eight hundred millions.
It is true that the interest has been punctually paid,
the pubhc credit is good, and any creditor who chooses
may receive payment by transferring his claim to an
other. The debt, however, still remains a burden on
the property and industry of the nation. Hume, in
his essay on Public Credit says, that it would scarcely
be more imprudent to give a prodigal son a credit in
every banker's shop in London, than to empower a
statesman to draw bills in this manner upon posterity.
" The establishment of a public credit fruitful of
marvels, which would seem incredible to the statesmen
of any former age " is enumerated among the bless
ings of the new settlement. This is rather a delicate
way of treating the national debt. To the states
men of any former age the ability to contract such
a debt, and the folly of doing it, might have seemed

342 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
equally incredible. If nations contract debts they
should honestly pay them. But we can hardly deem
it a cause of congratulation that the government have
been able to incur this enormous debt, with an annual
interest of thirty millions, " so burdensome, still pay
ing, still to owe," and to mortgage it upon the lands,
property, and industry of the nation for ever; if not
for ever, at least for a duration to which the eye of
man can see no limit.
The national debt has been mentioned as one of the
great evils produced by the Revolution, as a part of
the price the nation had to pay for the new settlement
made by discarding the Stuarts and calling in William,
and to defray the expense of the wars necessary to
support him on the throne.
Unfortunately, the ministry and moneyed class
found their own private interests promoted by thus
anticipating the incomes of the future generations.
The ministry, to avoid the odium of imposing the
taxes really necessary, or because they wanted a fund
for influence and corruption, were willing to borrow
money on terms profitable to the lenders, and leave it
to their successors to provide for the payment. Wash
ington, in his farewell address, with his characteristic
wisdom and justice, cautions the people of the United
States against " ungenerously throwing upon posterity
the burden which we ourselves ought to bear."
As our author, in stating the purpose and objects
of his work, must be supposed to express his meaning
with some accuracy, we will, at the risk of being
thought hypercritical, make a remark on the expres
sion applied to the British navy. " A maritime power,
before which every other maritime power, ancient or
modern, sinks into insignificance." This is another

MACAULAY 343
of the glories of England, the boast of every Eng
lishman. Comparisons are apt to be odious, and some
discretion is required to manage them without giving
offense. It would be idle to deny the great power of
the British navy, and that its strength is superior to
every other; but we doubt the propriety or prudence
of this boast; nations, like individuals, do not like to
be reminded of their insignificance, and neither France,
Russia, nor America will admit the correctness of the
estimate here made by Macaulay of their naval
power. A short time prior to the last war with England,
it was said in Parliament, that a single English sloop
of war or frigate (we forget which), was able to
cope with the whole American navy. This was soon
found to be an error. In case of any future war
between the two countries (which may heaven avert),
the American navy would be found not entirely in
significant. De Tocqueville, the distinguished author
and statesman, who of all foreign writers has given on
the whole the best account of our country, its institu
tions and prospects, devotes a chapter to what he calls
the commercial greatness of America, and closes with
this paragraph:
" I think that the principal features in the destiny of a na
tion, as of an individual, are generally indicated by their early
youth. When I see with what spirit the Americans carry on
¦commerce, the facilities they enjoy, and the success they have
met with, I cannot avoid believing that they will one day be
come the first maritime power on the globe. They are destined
to acquire the dominion of the seas, as the Romans were to
conquer the world."
Now, we confess that we do not entirely Hke this,
and do not wish that our country, or any other,
should be any stronger at sea than is necessary for its

344 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
own security and the defence of its just rights at
home and abroad.
Macaulay seems much of an optimist in politics.
Whatever happens is for the best, if not for the pres
ent, at least in the long run. The reign of the sov
ereigns commonly deemed the worst proved to be the
greatest blessings. The talents and virtues of the
first Norman kings had nearly proved fatal to Eng
land, but the follies and vices of John were her sal
vation. Again, if the administration of James I had
been able and splendid, it would probably have been
fatal to the country.
Under the reign of his successor, Charles I, there
was another narrow escape. The laws and liberties of
England, on the brink of destruction, were happily
saved by the wanton and criminal attempt of Charles
to force upon the Scots the English liturgy and es
tablished church. Another and final deliverance from
tyranny by the folly and madness of James II. If
the king had not attacked the church, the institution
most venerated by Englishmen, he would probably
have been quietly permitted to prosecute his plan of
establishing arbitrary power in the state.
This seeming propensity for paradox reminds one
of Gibbon's remark upon the clergy, that to a philo
sophic mind their vices are far less dangerous than
their virtues. A proposition which, by the way, we
think is contradicted by all ecclesiastical history.
There is, however, some plausibility in these views of
Macaulay, and in the instances mentioned and per
haps many others they may be substantially just.
How happy for a nation that, when brought to the
brink of ruin, it has a perennial inexhaustible fountain
cf salvation in the follies, vices, and crimes of its
rulers !

MACAULAY 345
This disposition to look on the favorable side of
things appears often throughout the work. Whether
the church or the laity have the ascendency, it is all
for the good of the nation, and she owes a great debt
of gratitude both to Popery and Protestantism.
" It is difficult to say whether England owes more to the
Roman Catholic religion or to the Reformation. For the amal
gamation of races and for the abolition of villanage she is
chiefly indebted to the influence which the priesthood in the
middle ages exercised over the laity. For political and in
tellectual freedom, and for all the blessings which political
and intellectual freedom have brought in their train, she is
chiefly indebted to the great rebellion of the laity against the
priesthood." The Long Parliament merits the lasting gratitude
of EngHshmen for their resistance to Charles I, and
thus saving the liberties of the country. The par
liament that restored Charles II without any condi
tions to limit his power seized the golden opportunity
which, if lost, would have long been regretted by the
friends of liberty, of placing on the throne this profli
gate monarch. After the two reigns of Charles and
James, comprising nearly thirty years of oppression,
persecution, and almost every kind of misgovernment
at home, besides a vassalage to France the most dis
graceful in the annals of England, another parlia
ment rescued the nation from Popery and tyranny by
the total and final expulsion of the Stuarts.
There seems much reason to doubt the correctness
of this view of the Restoration. Macaulay says that
" It has been too much the practice of writers zealous
for freedom, to represent the Restoration as a dis
astrous event, and to condemn the folly or baseness
of that Convention which recalled the royal family
without exacting new securities against mal-adminis-
tration."

346 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Mr. Fox, in his fragment of the History of the
Reign of James II, severely condemns the conduct of
those who at the Restoration made no scruple to lay
the nation prostrate at the feet of a monarch, without
a single provision in favor of the cause of liberty.
Charles would have been glad to accept the crown on
any terms. It must have been a strange crisis, indeed,
that rendered it necessary for the salvation of the
people to place such a man as Charles upon the throne
without a moment's delay, and without imposing any
limitation on the royal prerogative.
Our author gives a description at considerable length
of the state of England at the accession of James II,
and compares it with the condition of England at
present. The comparison, of course, is very much
in favor of its present state, and the contrast is prob
ably greater in almost every respect than most read
ers could have supposed. The great physical, moral,
and intellectual improvement in every department, if
truly represented, as we must presume was intended,
is indeed a just cause of congratulation and thank
fulness. The political, social, and industrial system of Eng
land since the Revolution is probably better fitted than
any system that has been tried, in the old world at
least, for very many of the objects thought most de
sirable in national prosperity. It has been especially
favorable to the acquisition of great wealth and rapid
progress in the great departments of industry, in agri
culture, commerce, manufactures, and the mechanic
arts, and in working the various mines, a very im
portant branch in England.
The wealth of the great landholders, merchants,
manufacturers, and the moneyed interest, is adequate

MACAULAY 347
to any interest or enterprise on the largest scale.
With abundant capital, with labor at a low rate to
any extent wanted, and often in excess, skillfully or
ganized and directed, the advance in every depart
ment of business and the increase of wealth are, we
believe, altogether without example.
The population of England and Wales at that
time is supposed to have been somewhat more than
five millions, and less than one-third of its present
amount. The inhabitants of London, who are now
at least nineteen hundred thousand, were then prob
ably a little more than half a million.
In the reign of Charles II, after London no town
in the kingdom contained thirty thousand inhabitants,
and only four provincial towns contained so many as
ten thousand. This statement we suppose may be true,
but it is very surprising, especially when we consider
the number of cities in the United States containing
thirty thousand and upwards, and the great number
containing more than ten thousand. Massachusetts
alone has twice the number of towns containing ten
thousand inhabitants.
The army and navy of Charles II were small com
pared with military and naval establishments in Eng
land at present. The whole annual expense of the
army, navy, ordnance, effective and non-effective ser
vice, was then about seven hundred and fifty thousand
pounds. Now it is more than twenty times that
amount. It must be acknowledged that the government of the
Stuarts was a very cheap one in a pecuniary view,
compared with any the English have had since. Of
all the advances made in the rapid march of improve
ment in England since the Revolution, the greatest

348 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
advance has been in taxation and public expenditure!
If the well-being of a nation depended on the
amount of its wealth, however unequally distributed,
then England would be the happiest country in the
world. But we believe the happiness of a people de
pends less on the amount than on the general diffusion
of property, so as to afford a comfortable HveHhood
and the means of education and improvement to the
laboring classes. If this be so, there is much cause
for regret as well as congratulation in the present
condition of Great Britain.
There are some principles in the English political
and social system that are passed over in the work be
fore us without much notice, which seem to us to merit
consideration both as to their present effects and fu
ture tendency.
The historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, in his admirable chapter on the Roman or
Civil Law, says that " the insolent prerogative of
primogeniture was unknown to the Romans. The two
sexes were placed on a just level, and all the sons and
daughters were entitled to an equal portion of the
patrimonial estate."
Among the Athenians the sons all shared equally the
paternal inheritance. The daughters seem to have
been left in a great measure, if not altogether, to the
mercy or discretion of their brothers. In case there
were no sons the daughters inherited equally.
The law of primogeniture was not known to the
Anglo-Saxons, but was introduced into England with
the feudal system by the Norman conquest. This
principle, by which the oldest son alone inherits all the
landed or real property, has been in force in England
ever since, and has contributed more than anything

MACAULAY 349
else to form the government and social system as they
exist at the present day. It is the foundation and se
curity of the aristocracy, of their power and influence
in the state, and the advantages of their social posi
tion. Primogeniture not only prevents the division of
great estates, but in connection with other causes is
continually diminishing the number of landed pro
prietors. It often happens that by the failure of heirs
in great families, or the course of descent, or by pur
chase, that two or three great estates are united, and
once united are never again divided.
This process is remarkably illustrated in the case of
the present Duke of Sutherland. As this example
shows better than any mere description could do how
a considerable number of even great estates may be
united in one, we quote from the London Quarterly
Review the following account of the Sutherland Estate
and Improvements. The complacency with which the
reviewer dweUs on this accumulation, and his aristo
cratic tone and style, are somewhat amusing.
" The estate attached to the earldom of Sutherland (one of
the oldest dignities in this empire) was supposed at the time
when the late countess married Lord Gower, afterwards Mar
quis of Stafford, and finally created Duke of Sutherland, to
comprise no less than 800,000 acres, a vast possession, but from
which its owners had never derived more than a very small
revenue. The Countess, a woman of remarkable talents, was
enthusiastically attached to her ancestral district, and felt
for its inhabitants of all orders, as was natural after a con
nection lost in the night of ages, during which her house had
enjoyed the support of their clansmen and vassals in many a
struggle and danger. She had the spirit and heart of a genuine
chief tainess ; and the name of the Ban Mhoir-fhear Chattaibh
— the Great Lady of the Country of the Clan Chattan — will
be proudly and affectionately remembered in the Highlands of
Scotland many a year after the graceful Countess and Duchess
is forgotten in the courts and palaces of which she was for a

350 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
long period one of the most brilliant ornaments. To her Eng
lish alliance, however, her lasting fame in her own district will
be mainly due. Her lord inherited one very great fortune in
this part of the kingdom, and ultimately wielded the resources
of another not less productive; and though, as Mr. Loch's book
records, no English nobleman ever did more for the improve
ment of his English estates, he also entered with- the warmest
zeal into his lady's feelings as to her ancient heritage. He
added to it by purchase various considerable adjoining es
tates, which fell from time to time into the market, and finally,
in 1829, one neighboring mass of land, the whole estate or
country of Lord Reay, which alone comprised not much less
than 500,000 acres. It appears that from 1829 the whole
northern territory of the Duke must have amounted to nearly,
if not quite, 1,500,000 acres, a single estate certainly not in
these days equalled in the British empire, and this in the
hands of the same peer who enjoyed also the English estates
of the Gowers and Levesons, with the canal property of the
Bridgewaters." Here is the process on a great scale of extinguishing
both large and small estates. This shows how landed
proprietors are rapidly diminished in number, and
enormous estates or principalities formed. In two
generations, by marriage, by purchase, by inheritance
and bequest, five very large and several considerable
estates are united in one. In Scotland to one great
estate of 800,000 acres is added another of 500,000,
which besides several others very considerable in ex
tent. All this comes into the hands of the same peer
who has three very great estates in England. The
estate in Scotland alone is more than twice as large as
the state of Rhode Island, and comprises in extent,
though not in value, between a thirtieth and fortieth
part of the territory of the island of Great Britain.
- According to our author, at the accession of James
II the number of small landed proprietors who culti
vated their own estates was, so far as can be ascer
tained from the best statistical writers of that age,

MACAULAY 351
not less than one hundred and sixty thousand,
who with their families made up more than a seventh
part of the whole population. These small estates
are now nearly all extinct. At that time the number
who cultivated their own land was greater than the
number of those who farmed the land of others. Now
it is estimated that not one hundredth part of the land
in England is cultivated by the owner.
The enormous wealth produced by commerce and
manufactures, instead of occasioning any division of
the great landed estates, has had a directly opposite
tendency. The rich merchant, manufacturer, banker,
or fortunate speculator invests a part of his wealth in
land, and as the very large estates are rarely for sale,
he buys the smaller ones whenever they can be ob
tained, perhaps in several different counties. When
a number of small or moderate or even large estates
are thus formed into one they are seldom or never
separated. This seems to be a melancholy, disastrous change
in the social system of England, but we believe most
of the British political economists not only see no cause
for alarm in this extinction of the smaller landed
properties, but consider it as one cause of the great
agricultural improvements, and the great increase of
national wealth. A few, however, among whom is
John Stuart Mill, the author of the work on Political
Economy, consider the English system as affording
a ground for apprehension, and view with some com
placency the condition of the French agricultural
population, four-fifths of whom are said to cultivate
their own land. But whether for good or evil, we
suppose there can be no doubt of the fact that by the
operation of the causes mentioned, and perhaps of

352 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
others, the number of landed proprietors has been for
the last one hundred and sixty years continually dimin
ishing, that nearly all the land is held by a compara
tively small number of owners, and that the diminution
is still going on as rapidly as ever. Indeed, accord
ing to all accounts, the process of the accumulation
of large landed properties and the extinction of smaU
ones is proceeding with a continually increasing
velocity. "Mobilitate viget, viresque acquirit eundo."
During the last few years we have heard much of
the reforms in the English government, the progress
of liberal principles, and the increasing power of
popular opinion. It is supposed by many that the
influence of the aristocracy is on the decline, that the
common people have gained as the nobility and privi
leged orders have lost, so that the advantages of Eng
lish institutions are shared less unequally than for
merly among the different classes of the community.
Popular opinion has ho doubt much greater influ
ence on the measures of government and the conduct
of men in office than during the last century. What
ever changes have been made to enlarge the political
power of the people, and to relieve them from unneces
sary and oppressive burdens, is to be ascribed chiefly
to this cause. The privileged orders have parted with
no portion of their power until they were convinced
it was no longer possible to keep it. Notwithstand
ing these concessions to the popular demands, we
think there is reason to doubt whether the aristocratic
principle pervading the political and social institutions
of England has been much, if at all, weakened. On
the other hand, in several important respects the aris
tocracy appears stronger than ever.

MACAULAY 853
The EngHsh government, at least ever since the
revolution in 1688, has been practically an aristocracy
of which the sovereign is the nominal head. Lord
Brougham remarks that England is the most aris
tocratic nation in Europe, and a glance at Eng
Hsh institutions will show how the aristocratic principle
runs through them aU.
The Reform Bill has enlarged the number of voters,
and some changes have been made in favor of the
popular principle in municipal corporations. But the
aristocracy have the entire control of all the offices of
honor and emolument in church and state, in the army
and navy, at home and abroad.
The foUowing extract from a late number of the
Edinburgh Review presents a striking and probably as
far as it goes a just view of the political and social
state of England.
"To a superficial glance at the condition of our own coun
try nothing can seem more unlike any tendency to equality of
condition. The inequalities of property are apparently greater
than in any former period of history. Nearly all the land is
parcelled out in great estates among comparatively few fami
lies; and it is not the large but the small properties which are
in process of extinction. An hereditary and titled nobility,
more potent by their vast possessions than by their social
precedency, are constitutionally and really one of the great
powers of the state. To form part of their order is what
every ambitious man aspires to as the crowning glory of a
successful career. The passion for equality, of which M. de
Tocqueville speaks almost as if it were the great fever of
modern times, is hardly known in this country, even by name.
On the contrary, all ranks seem to have a passion for inequality.
The hopes of every person are directed to rising in the world,
not to pulling the world down to him. The greatest enemy of
the political conduct of the House of Lords submits to their
superiority of rank as he would to the ordinances of nature,
and often thinks any amount of toil and watching repaid by a
nod of recognition from one of their number." *
* Edinburgh Review, No. CXLV.
II— 23

354 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
In the army the officers are taken from the nobility
and gentry with hardly an exception. Commissions
are generally obtained by purchase, and sometimes by
the gift of the commander-in-chief. The price is be
yond the ability of any but the rich, and rarely has
any officer risen from the ranks. Should a rich par
venu take a fancy to a military life and buy a com
mission, woe to the unlucky wight. His treatment
from the other officers would soon make him glad to
sell or resign a place where he is considered an in
truder. The officers of the navy are generally taken
from the same class.
The pay and prize-money in the army and navy
are graduated on the same aristocratic scale. At the
capture of Havana in 1762 the distribution of the
prize-money was as follows. Admiral Pococke com
manding the naval forces had for his share upwards
of £122,000; the captains, £1,600; lieutenants, £234;
petty officers, £17 ; sailors and marines between three
and four pounds. Lord Albemarle, commander of the
land forces, had the same as the Admiral ; the field
officers, £564 ; captains, £164 ; private soldiers, £4, Is,
8d. There was however, much complaint that this dis
tribution was not conformable to the former practice.
The distribution of the prize-money to the English
army at the capture of Paris after the battle of Water
loo was made by proclamation at London, and was
probably agreeable to the established rules of the ser
vice. To the Duke of Wellington, £61,000.
General Officers, £1,274 10s lOd.
Field Officers, £433 4s 4d.
Captains, £90 7s 3d.
Subalterns, £34 14s 9d.

MACAULAY 355
Sergeants, Corporals, etc., £14 4s 4d.
Private Soldiers, £2 lis 4d.
This is the partnership of the giant and the dwarf.
The commander gets all the honor and profits, the
soldier the losses and blows. This is apt to be the
case in all wars; and party contests are too often
the " madness of many for the gain of a few."
The proportion between the pay of the officers and
soldiers in the armies of the ancient republics, com
pared with the practice in all modern nations, is very
curious. When Xenophon, after the retreat of the ten thou
sand, engaged himself and six thousand of the Greek
army in the service of a Thracian prince, the terms of
the pay were, to each soldier one daric a month; each
captain, two darics; and to Xenophon, the general
and commander, four darics. Among the Romans,
Polybius says the pay of a centurion was only double
that of a private soldier. It appears from Demos
thenes that the pay of an Athenian ambassador in his
time was not more than that of a common soldier.
The annual income of the Lord Chancellor of Eng
land was formerly as much as £20,000, and besides
he had many lucrative offices at his disposal. We be
lieve it has been reduced by the Whig government to
£14,000, with a retiring pension of £5,000. The sal
aries of the Judges are from £5,500 to £10,000 a
year. We do not mention these instances of salaries
as extravagant, under the existing circumstances.
They are probably not higher than is required by the
nature of the government, and the state of English
society. In the church the bishops, archbishops, and other
dignitaries, enjoy very ample revenues, from one or

356 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
two thousand to twenty thousand pounds a year.
These, with some exceptions, are given to the rela
tives of the nobility and gentry, younger brothers and
cousins. The majority of the clergy seem sufficiently
removed from the temptations of wealth. In about
five thousand parishes, a few years since, there was
no resident clergyman, and the religious services were
performed, as far as they were performed at all, by
curates. Of this portion of the clergy the compensa
tion varies from ten to a hundred pounds annually, in
few instances exceeding the latter sum.
The bishops often amass large fortunes. Bishop
Tomline, the private tutor of the late William Pitt,
was said to have left an estate of £700,000, and we not
unfrequently hear of a dignitary of the Church in
England, and especially in Ireland, leaving at his de
cease from one to several hundred thousand pounds.
The late reform of the church has introduced a greater
equality in the salaries of the bishops and archbishops,
varying from £4,500 to £20,000.
In respect to> the church, however, we have no idea
that any attempt to abolish or diminish tithes would be
of any service to the tenants or afford any relief to the
people in general. The whole benefit would go to the
landlords. There is much reason in the sentiment of
Burke, that a Bishop of Durham or Winchester may
as well have £10,000 a year as an earl or a squire,
although it may be true that so many dogs and horses
are not kept by the former, and fed with the victuals
which ought to nourish the children of the poor peo
ple. In the reformation of the church by Henry
VIII the confiscation of a greater part of the church
property served only to enrich the crown and a few
greedy courtiers. The estates of several among the

MACAULAY 357
most wealthy of the nobility and gentry in England, it
is well known, were derived from the plunder of the
abbeys, monasteries, and convents. Such an origin of
a great estate as the Duke of Bedford's, so eloquently
described by Burke in his Letter to a noble Lord, is not
peculiar to the Russell family.
The rich plunder expected from the great wealth
of the church was no doubt one of the main causes
of the reformation in England, so far as relates to
Henry VIII and his courtiers, especially the latter.
The motive assigned by the poet Gray, with much wit
as well as gallantry, for the conduct of the great re
former of the church, was the primary, but not the
only one.
" 'Twas love that taught this monarch to be wise,
And gospel light first beamed from Bullen's eyes."
Henry's love for the property of the rich abbeys
and monasteries proved far more lasting thai) his af
fections for Anne Bullen, and his reforms Were con
tinued long after the unfortunate queen ceased to in
fluence her imperious husband.
The lucrative civil offices are shared by the aris
tocracy and their dependents, except in a few in
stances where extraordinary skiU or industry is re
quired, and which must be had wherever they can be
found. The mercantile, manufacturing, and moneyed in
terests have long had great influence in the policy and
measures of the British government. Though the
representatives of these classes have always been in
number a minority in parliament, yet from their su
perior activity and sagacity with regard to their own
interest, they have frequently obtained undue advan
tages from the government, and are on the whole much

B58 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
more favored in the public burdens than the agricul
turists. The rich merchants, manufacturers, and
bankers may be considered either as members or as
allies and supporters of the aristocracy.
The House of Lords is now far superior to that
assembly, when, about eighty years ago, it was called
by Lord Chesterfield the Hospital of Incurables. This
is owing chiefly to continual recruits of the most dis
tinguished commoners, who have, since the accession of
George III, tripled the number of the Upper House.
In point of talent, wealth, personal influence, and
weight of character, it probably stands much higher
than at any former period. Take from the House
of Lords the families that have been ennobled during
the last sixty years, and though its legal and consti
tutional power would be the same, its real power and
influence would be comparatively insignificant.
These continual accessions from the ranks of the
commons are the vivifying principle of the nobility,
giving it health, strength, wealth, talent, and influ
ence. The leading commoners, the most distinguished
men in political life, in the law, army, navy, and
church, and in the landed, moneyed, commercial, and
manufacturing interests, do not wish to diminish the
power or privileges of an assembly of which they may
hope to be one day members, and which at any rate
they consider indispensable to the continuance of the
present political system.
One of the best founded complaints against the Eng
lish government is the neglect to provide for the edu
cation of the common people. No public provision is
made for this object, at least none worth mentioning,
except so far as it may be supposed to come within
the duties required by law or custom from the clergy

MACAULAY 359
of the established church. While so much is doing in
Prussia and several other countries on the continent at
the public expense, though much has been said and
written in England in favor of a general system of
education, we hardly recollect any measure of the gov
ernment for this purpose except the grant a few years
since of £30,000 for the education of teachers.
It may be supposed of course that the same neg
lect would extend to the English colonies and depend
encies or whatever territories were added by conquest
or otherwise to the British empire. In Ireland and
Wales their old institutions for education were broken
up by the English at the Conquest, and no new sys
tem established, and the mass of the people left in
ignorance to this day. For the pubhc system in New
England we are not indebted to the English govern
ment or institutions, but to the piety and wisdom of
our Puritan ancestors.
We are much inclined to doubt whether, in any
country where a privileged order of men have in
fact the control of the government any public system
for the education of the people ever has been, or is
likely to be, carried into practice. In a republic with
out any privileged class enlightened men feel a com
mon interest in educating the people so far as to make
them good citizens and qualify them for the duties
which ordinary men may be called on to perform in
such a community. The general diffusion of knowl
edge is considered one of the best securities for the
peace and prosperity of the country. In a monarchy
where the sovereign has the entire power, such a sys
tem of general education may be formed and car
ried into execution, as in Prussia and several of the
states of Germany. Where the monarchical or the

360 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
democratic element has the real ascendency the gov
ernment may feel an interest in educating the people.
Perhaps the case of Scotland may be thought an
exception; but in Scotland the system of general edu
cation was established by the Presbyterians in the time
of the Solemn League and Covenant, from the influ
ence of popular freedom and religious enthusiasm. It
was repealed at the Restoration, but the Scots ob
tained the re-establishment of it at the revolution of
1688. We believe education one of the most essential du
ties which society owes to its members. But what is a
good education, and what wiH best fit them for the
duties they may be called on to discharge, and the place
they may probably fill, is a very important question.
The governing powers in England have not yet de
termined that any system is to be adopted, or that any
general one is expedient; and looking at the continu
ance and stability of their present political institu
tions, it may not be so easy a question as we imagine.
For instance, what education is best for an English
sailor who may be impressed and compelled to serve
many years under the discipline of a British man of
war, with little or no chance of promotion ; or for the
common soldier, who in an army officered by gentlemen
can very rarely rise above the ranks ; or for the labor
ing classes in their present condition? No education
can remedy most of the evils which are felt by the
laboring classes. Education cannot give them employ
ment, food, or clothing, and perhaps would only make
them discontented with the inevitable hardships of
their condition. There is very little reason to suppose
that the government have any such object in view as
educating the common people at the public expense.

MACAULAY 361
According to M. de Tocqueville an aristocratic gov
ernment has a very great superiority over all others in
the ability with which its foreign relations are man
aged. He adduces the example of the Romans and
the English in support of this opinion. An aris
tocracy, he says, is a steadfast and enlightened man
who never dies.
There may be much truth in this, but we think in
respect to England, as much of her success is to be as
cribed to national character and fortunate situation
as to the wisdom of the aristocracy. England in her
foreign relations and in all controversies with other
powers has unrivaled advantages. Her insular situa
tion and naval strength give her means of defense and
annoyance possessed by no other country. Every
other great nation of Europe has seen a foreign army
in its territory and in possession of its capital. But
since the Norman conquest no attempt to invade Eng
land has succeeded, except in case of a civil war or
disputed succession to the crown, where a great por
tion of the people favored the enterprise.
This security has rendered Englishmen in a great
degree strangers to the calamities of war except as they
appear in the shape of taxes. To their minds war has
been associated with the triumphs of victory, the dis
play of British power and valor, the firing of the Park
and Tower guns, the thanks of both houses of par
liament, with honors and rewards for the successful
naval or military commanders. The slaughter of the
battle field, the sufferings of the wounded, the groans
of the dying, the burning of towns, the multitudes
driven from their sweet and cheerful homes to perish
by cold, hunger, or disease, have in times past made
Httle impression on their imagination. With the Eng-

362 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
lish as with all other nations success will for a time
render any war popular however unjustifiable. It is
not till they begin to feel the losses and burdens of a
war that they are sensible of its impolicy or injustice,
and wish for peace.
This geographical position so happy for the Eng
lish, we have thought has sometimes been unfortunate
for other nations, as it has enabled and disposed Eng
land to inflict on them the calamities of war without
any serious danger of their being brought home to her
own island. In the American Revolutionary War it is
not probable that so many towns would have been wan
tonly burnt, and so much private property destroyed,
if these evils could have been retaliated upon their
authors.
r Government is constituted for the good of the whole
society and of every member. The EngHsh govern
ment like all other governments and social systems
must be estimated not by any theory or imaginary
standard of perfection, but by its effects on the well-
being of the people. We must judge of the tree by
its fruits. Mr. Fox said his defense of the British
constitution was not that it was perfect or tallied with
the theories of this man or that man, but that it pro
duced substantial happiness to the people, and if this
ground were taken away he knew not what defense to
make. We suppose this to be the true and only sat
isfactory ground on which any political institution or
form of society can be defended.
Macaulay looks on the favorable side of things, and
sees nothing but progress and improvement, though he
hears much complaint of decline and ruin. The na
tion in his view is sound at heart, has nothing of age
but its dignity, combined with the vigor of youth. He

MACAULAY'
thinks the nation is going on in a course of improve
ment, preserving what is good in its institutions, and
reforming what is bad in a peaceable constitutional
way. This is undoubtedly the true mode of reform.
But the changes of civil government are not confined
to acts of parliament or measures of government.
Time, says Bacon, is the greatest of innovators.
Time and the course of events have made the English
government and social system what they now are, and
may be silently working greater changes than any min
istry or political agitators.

VIII
BUCKLE'S HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION
This is the most important work, in its line, from
a British hand, which the world has seen for many a
year. The theme is one of the greatest in the world.
The author has treated it better, with more learning
and profound comprehension, than any of his English
predecessors. Who is Mr. Buckle? We know not.
The name is new ; this is his first work, as he thus tells
us : " To my mother I dedicate this, the first volume
of my first work," — a pious and appropriate dedica
tion, which promises other things to come.
No Englishman has written a more elaborate book
in this century. It is learned also, though not so
comprehensive in its erudition as we might wish. The
list of " authors quoted " occupies fifteen pages, and
comprises about six hundred titles and perhaps three
thousand volumes. Half as many more are referred
to in the copious and well-studied notes, which enrich
the volume. Notwithstanding the imposing array
which this catalogue presents at the first glance, its de
ficiencies, in a writer who thinks so meanly of the
labors of his predecessors, are more remarkable than
its seeming completeness. Not to speak of ancient
writers, of whom only three are referred to, no men
tion is made of Grotius, Prideaux, Vico, Creuzer, Du
Cange, Duchesne, Malte-Brun, Becker, W. v. Hum
boldt, Wachler, Hegel (Phil. d. Gesch.), Muller (J.
v. and C. O.), Fichte (Grundz. d. gegenw. Zeitalt.),
Schelling (Phil. d. Myth.), Boeckh, Wachsmuth, Eich-
364

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 365
horn, Savigny, Raumer, Heeren (Gesch. d. Syst. d.
Eur. Stoat.), Thierry, and a host of others whose
writings bear more or less directly on the subject of
this volume. The author speaks in the highest terms
of the works of German philosophers, but names but
four or five German books in his catalogue, none of
which are the works of the masters in the philosophy
of history.
This volume is but half of the Introduction to the
History of Civilization in England. How many vol
umes the history itself shall contain we are not told.
It is so bulky that we fear it will not immediately be
reprinted here. The great cost of the original wiU
prevent it from circulating much in a country where
a laboring man may buy his week's reading for a quar
ter of a dollar. But its contents are so valuable that
we shaU make a careful analysis of the most important,
though perhaps not the most interesting parts, and
lay it before our readers, with some additional com
ments of our own. The paper will consist of two
parts, — an abstract of the work itself, and some criti
cisms thereon.
The volume contains fourteen chapters; the first
five are general, and relate to the development of man
kind under various circumstances friendly or hostile
thereto, to the method of inquiry, and the influence of
various causes upon civilization. The sixth is a transi
tional chapter, in which the author leads his readers
over from his general laws to their particular appli
cations. The other eight treat mainly of the develop
ment of civilization in England and France.
In Chapter I he tells us that history is the most
popular branch of knowledge; more has been written
on it than on any other, and great confidence is felt in

366 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
its value.- It enters into all plans of education, ma
terials of a rich and imposing appearance have been
collected, political and military annals have been com
piled; and much pains taken with the history of law,
religion, science, letters, arts, useful inventions, and
of late with the manners and customs of the people.
Political economy has become a science ; statistics treat
of the material interests of mankind, their moral pecu
liarities, the amount of crime, and the effect of age, sex,
and education thereupon. We know the rate of mor
tality, marriages, births, deaths, the fluctuation of
wages, the price of needful things. Physical geog
raphy has been studied in all its details ; all food has
been chemically analyzed, and its relation to the body
pointed out. Many nations have been studied in all
degrees of civilization. Put all these things together,
they seem to be of immense value.
But the use of these materials is less satisfactory;
the separate parts have not been combined into a whole,
while the necessity of generalization is admitted in all
other great fields of inquiry, and efforts are made
therein to rise from particular facts to universal laws,
this is seldom attempted in the history of man.
" Any author who, from indolence of thought or from natural
incapacity, is unfit to deal with the highest branches of knowl
edge, has only to pass some years in reading a certain number
of books, and then he is qualified to be an historian; he is able
to write the history of a great people, and his work becomes
an authority on the subject which it professes to treat. The
establishment of this narrow standard has led to results very
prejudicial to the progress of our knowledge. Owing to it his
torians, taken as a body, have never recognized the necessity
of such a wide and preliminary study as would enable them to
grasp their subject in the whole of its natural relations; hence
the singular spectacle of one historian being ignorant of politi
cal economy, another knowing nothing of law, another nothing
of ecclesiastical affairs and changes of opinion; another neg-

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 367
lecting the philosophy of statistics and another physical science;
although these topics are the most essential of all, inasmuch
as they comprise the principal circumstances by which the
temper and character of mankind have been affected and in
which they are displayed."
Accordingly, in the whole literature of Europe there
are only three or four really original books, which con
tain a systematic attempt to investigate the history of
man in the scientific manner belonging to other de
partments. Yet in the last hundred years there has
been a great gain, and the prospects of historical lit
erature are more cheering than ever before; but
scarcely anything has been done towards discerning
the principles which govern the character and destiny
of nations. " For all the higher purposes of human
thought, history is still miserably deficient, and pre
sents that confused and anarchical appearance natural
to a subject of which the laws are unknown, and even
the foundation unsettled." Auguste Comte, " who
has done more than any man to raise the standard,"
contemptuously notices " the incoherent compilation of
facts hitherto called history." The most celebrated
historians are manifestly inferior to the great men of
science, none of them is at all entitled to be compared
with Kepler and Newton. Yet the study of history
requires the greatest talents on account of the com
plication of its phenomena, and the fact that nothing
can be verified by experiment.
Hence the scientific study of the movements of mind,
compared with that of the movements of nature, is still
in its infancy. So in physics, the regularity of events
and the possibility of predicting them are always
taken for granted, while the regularity of history is
not only not so taken, but is often denied. It is said in
the affairs of men there is something mysterious and

368 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
providential, which hides their future from us, and
so history has never become a science, bub only an em
pirical narrative of facts. But the question comes:
Is it so? Are the actions of men and societies gov
erned by fixed laws, or are they the result either of
blind chance or of supernatural interference?
In regard to all events there are two doctrines which
represent different stages of civilization: 1. that
every event is single and isolate, the result of blind
chance ; or 2. that all events are connected, and so
each is the result of necessity.* An increasing percep
tion of the regularity of nature destroys the doctrine
of chance, and replaces it by necessary connection.
Out of these two doctrines of chance and necessity
come the dogmas of free-will and predestination.
As soon as a people has accumulated an abundance
of the means of living, some men will cease to work;
the most of those who are free from labor seek only
pleasure, but a few endeavor to acquire knowledge and
diffuse it. Some of the latter will study their own
. minds ; such of them as have great ability will found
new philosophies and rehgions, which often exercise
an immense influence over the people who receive them.
But these great thinkers are affected by the character
of their age, which accordingly appears in their phi
losophy and religion. Thus the doctrine of chance in
the outer world corresponds to, and occasions, that of
free-will in the inner world; while the doctrine of
necessary connection in nature corresponds to that of
predestination in man. Predestination is founded on
the theological hypothesis that all is regulated by
supernatural interference. Among the Protestants
this doctrine, accompanied with that of the eternal
* He means Necessitudo, we take it, not Necessitas.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 369
damnation of the non-elect, acquired influence through
the dark and powerful mind of Calvin, and among
Catholics from Augustine, who seems to have borrowed
it from the Manicheans ; but it is a barren hypothesis,
lying out of the province of human knowledge, and
so it cannot be proved either false or true. Free-wiU
is connected with Arminianism, and founded on the
metaphysical hypothesis that all happens by chance ; it
rests on the supremacy of human consciousness, a
dogma supported only by the assumption, 1. that
there is an independent faculty called consciousness;
and 2. that its dictates are infallible. But the first
has not been proved; the second is unquestionably
false, for though consciousness be infallible as to the
fact of its testimony, it is fallible as to its truth. The
present uncertainty in regard to the matter of con
sciousness shows that metaphysics will never be raised
to a science by the ordinary method of observing merely
individual minds ; but that its study can be success
fully prosecuted only by the deductive application of
laws, which must be discerned by historical induction
from the whole of those great phenomena which the
human race presents. Homer, Shakespeare, and other
great poets have hitherto been the best investigators of
the human mind ; but they occupied themselves mainly
with the concrete phenomena of life, and if they ana
lyzed, as is probable, they concealed the steps of their
process. " The believer in the possibility of history is not required
to hold either to predestination or free-will, only to admit that,
when we perform an action, we perform it in consequence of
some motive or motives; that those motives are the result of
some antecedents, and that, therefore, if we were acquainted
with the whole of the antecedents and with all the laws of
their movements, we could with unerring certainty predict the
whole of their immediate results."
II— 24

370 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Now, as men's actions are determined by outward
things, those actions must be uniform, and the same
results must always follow from the same circum
stances. All the progress and decline of men must
come from the action of external phenomena on the
mind, or that of the mind on the phenomena. On the
one side is nature, the world of matter obeying its
own laws ; on the other, man obeying his laws. By
their mutual action each modifies the other. A philo
sophical history can be made only on the knowledge
of this action and mutual modification of man by na
ture and nature by man. The problem of the his
torian is to discover the laws of this twofold modifica
tion. First, he must inquire whether man affects na
ture most, or nature man ; that is, whether physical
phenomena are more affected by man than man by
physical phenomena, or the opposite. That which is
most active and powerful should be studied first, for
being the most conspicuous, it is easiest known, and
when its laws are generalized, the unknown to be ac
counted for will be smaller than if the opposite course
be pursued. But before he enters on that work the
historian will prove the regularity of mental phe
nomena, not by deduction from an assumed hypothe
sis, either metaphysical or theological, but by induction
from almost innumerable facts, extending over many
centuries, gathered and put into arithmetical tables, —
the clearest of all forms, — by government officials, who
had neither prejudice nor theories to support.
The actions of men are of these two classes, virtues
or vices. If it can be shown that the vices vary ac
cording to changes in surrounding society, then it is
clear the virtues vary also in like manner, though in
versely. But if there be no such variations, then it

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 371
must follow that men's actions depend on personal
caprice, free-will, and the like, on what is peculiar to
the individual.
At first thought, it would appear that of all vicious
or virtuous actions the crime of murder was the most
arbitrary and irregular. But experience shows that
it is committed with regularity, and bears as uniform a
relation to certain circumstances, as the movement of
the tides or the rotation of the seasons. Thus it was
observed that from 1826 to 1844 the number of per
sons accused of crime in all France was on the whole
about equal to the male deaths in Paris, but the annual
amount of crime in France fluctuated less than that
of male deaths in Paris ; the same regularity was ob
served in each separate class of crimes, all obeying the
same law of uniform and periodical repetition. In
other countries, also, variations of crime are less than
those of mortality.
Suicide seems the most arbitrary and capricious of
all murders, but this also observes a constant law.
The average annual number of suicides in London is
about 240. It varies from 213 to 266. In 1846
there was a great railway panic, the suicides rose to
266; in 1847 there was a slight improvement, and
the suicides fell to 256; in 1848 there were 247; in
1849, 213 ; and in 1850 they rose again to 229. This
crime, like many others, depends somewhat on the sea
son of the year, and is more common in summer than
in winter.
Facts of this kind " force us to the conclusion, that
the offenses of men are the result not so much of the
vices of the individual offender as of the state of so
ciety into which he is thrown." And this induction
cannot be overthrown by any of those hypotheses with

372 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
which metaphysicians and theologians have perplexed
the study of past events. This is the great social
law, that the moral actions of men are the product of
their antecedents, not of their volition. But, like
other laws, it is subject to disturbances proceeding
from minor forces, which meet the larger at particular
points, and cause aberrations. But these discrepancies
are trifling. Hence " we may form some idea of the
prodigious energy of those vast social laws, which,
though constantly interrupted, seem to triumph over
every obstacle, and which, when examined by the aid
of large numbers, scarcely undergo any sensible per
turbation." Marriage has a fixed relation to the price of corn;
in England the experience of a century has proved
that instead of having any connection with personal
feelings, marriages " are simply regulated by the aver
age earnings of the great mass of the people, so that
this immense social and religious institution is not only
swayed, but is completely controlled by the price of
food or the rate of wages."
The aberrations of memory also follow^ a general law.
At London and Paris the same proportionate number
of persons drop undirected letters into the post-office.
These things are so plain, that in less than a hundred
years sjt will be as hard to find an historian who denies
the regularity of the moral world, as it now is to find
a philosopher who denies the uniformity of nature.
This regularity of human actions and its dependence
on certain conditions is the basis for scientific history.
In Chapter II Mr. Buckle states the influence of
physical agents on the organization of society and the
character of individuals. The most powerful agents
are food, soil, climate, and the general aspects of na-

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 373
ture. The latter excites the imagination, and so some
times produces superstition, which is the great obstacle
to progressive knowledge, and imparts ineffaceable
peculiarities to the national religion. The three for
mer affect the general organization, and cause those
large and conspicuous differences between nations
which are often ascribed to some fundamental differ
ence in the various races into which mankind are di
vided. But these ethnological differences are alto
gether hypothetical, while those caused by climate,
food, and soil are not only real, but also capable of a
satisfactory explanation. He condenses these three
into one general term, Physical Geography, and tells
the effect it produces.
1. The accumulation of wealth must always be the
first great social improvement, for without that there
is neither taste nor leisure for the acquisition of knowl
edge. In an ignorant people, — and all must start
ignorant, — this accumulation will be regulated solely
by the physical peculiarities of the country, that is,
by the fertility of the soil, and by the energy and
regularity of the work bestowed upon it. This latter
depends entirely on the climate, which directly affects
man's power of work, by enervating or invigorating the
laborer, and also indirectly influences the regularity
of his habits. Thus, in Northern countries cold and
darkness interrupt out-door work, and the laboring
people are more prone to desultory habits ; hence the
national character becomes more fitful and capricious
than it would be under a better climate. The Swedes
and Norwegians differ greatly from the Spanish and
Portuguese in government, laws, religion, and man
ners, but all four agree in a certain instability and
fickleness of character. This peculiarity, common to

374 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
them all, is caused by the climate, which in the South
ern countries interrupts toil by heat and drought, and
in the Northern by darkness and cold. This effect of
climate has not been noticed by Montesquieu, Hume,
and Charles Comte, the three most philosophical writers
on climate.
No nation has ever been civilized through its own
efforts, unless it had a favorable soil or climate. Thus
in Asia civilization has always been confined to that
tract which extends from the south of China to the
west coast of Asia Minor, Phoenicia, and Palestine,
while the barren country in the North has been peopled
by rude wandering tribes, who are always kept in pov
erty by the nature of the soil ; but yet, when they mi
grate thence, they found great monarchies, in China,
India, and Persia, and equal the civilization of the most
flourishing peoples. In Arabia the Arabs have always
been a rude, uncultivated people, their soil compelling
them to poverty ; but when established in Persia, Spain,
and the Punjaub, their character seems to undergo a
great change. In the sandy and barren parts of
Africa, — the vast plain which occupies the centre and
North, — the people are always barbarians, entirely un
cultivated, acquiring no knowledge, because they can
accumulate no wealth. But in Egypt the overflow of
the Nile makes the country fertile, wealth was rapidly
accumulated, the cultivation of knowledge quickly fol
lowed, and the land became the seat of a civilization
which, though grossly exaggerated, forms a striking
contrast to the barbarism of the other nations of Africa,
none of which could work out their progress or emerge
from the ignorance to which the penury of nature con
demned them.
In the ancient world, — Asia and Africa, — the fer-

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 375
tihty of the soil had more influence than climate in civ
ilization. But in Europe climate is the more powerful
of the two. In the former case the effect depends on the
relation of the soil to its produce, that is, of one part of
nature to another ; in the latter, the effect depends on
the relation between the climate and the laborer, that
is, between nature and man. The first is the less com
plicated relation, and came earlier into action, and
hence civilization began in Asia and Africa, and not
in Europe. But that form of civilization which de
pends on the fertility of the soil is not so valuable or
permanent as that which depends on climate, for all ef
fectual human progress depends less on the bounty of
nature than on the energy of man which a favorable
climate develops. And while the productive powers of
nature are limited and stationary, the powers of man
are unlimited. We have no evidence which authorizes
us to put even an imaginary limit to the human intel
lect. So a favorable climate, which stimulates labor,
is a more valuable agent of civilization than fertility of
soU, which feeds men with its almost spontaneous
bounty. The next thing to consider is the distribution of
wealth, — what portion shall belong to the laboring
classes, what to such as labor not. In a very early
stage of society, the distribution of wealth, like its crea
tion, is wholly determined by physical laws, which are
so active as to have kept a vast majority of the inhabi
tants of the fairest portion of the globe in constant
poverty. An inquiry into the distribution of wealth,
therefore, is an inquiry into the distribution of power,
and will throw light on the origin of social and poli-
cal inequality. Wealth will be distributed between the
laborers, the more numerous class, who produce it, and

376 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the non-laborers, the contrivers, the less numerous, but
more able class, who direct the energy of the others.
The laborers' share is called wages; the contrivers'
share is profits. Wages will depend on the number
of laborers, and that on the cheapness of food; so, in
a country where food is cheap, laborers will abound and
wages be low. Therefore an inquiry into the physical
laws on which a nation's food depends is of the greatest
importance. The food of man produces two and only two effects
necessary to his existence, — 1. to supply the animal
heat, and 2. to repair the waste of tissues. The first
purpose is accomplished by non-azotized substances
containing carbon, but no nitrogen; the second, by
azotized * substances in which nitrogen is always found.
In hot climates men require but little non-azotized
food, for the climate keeps up the temperature ; and
less azotized food than in cold ones, — for, as they ex
ercise less, the body has less waste to repair. So the in
habitants of hot countries will require less food than
those of cold ones, and population will increase with
corresponding rapidity. But the inhabitants of colder
countries consume not only more food than those of
warm countries, but more animal, carbonized, or non-
azotized food, which is more costly than is the other
kind, for it is not, like vegetables, thrown up by the
soil, but consists of the bodies of powerful and often
ferocious animals, and is procured only with great la
bor. So, when the coldness of the climate compels
men to use carbonized or animal food, even in the
infancy of society the men are bolder, more adven
turous, than the vegetable-eaters of warm climates,
gratuitously fed by the bounty of nature. Thus there
is a constant tendency for wages to be low in warm

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 377
countries, and high in cold ones. In hot climates food
will be abundant, population will increase rapidly, and
wages be low; while in cold countries the opposite re
sult wiU follow.
In Asia, Africa, and America, all the ancient civiliza
tions were seated in hot climates, where food was
cheap, the wages low, the profits high, and the la
borer depressed. In Europe civilization arose in a
colder climate, where food was dearer, wages conse
quently higher, profits lower, and the laborers in a
better condition. The Irish are the only great
European people fed on cheap food; and the conse
quences presently appeared in the rapid increase of the
laborers, their low wages, and miserable squalid con
dition, though in a country which has greater natural
resources than any other in Europe. The matter of
food and wages may be thus summed up: when the
wages are invariably low, the distribution of political
power and social influence will also be very unequal.
Civihzation is old in India. The climate requires
men to feed on vegetable, non-azotized food, on rice,
the most nutritive of all the grains. Food is cheap,
laborers abundant, wages low, profits high, in the
shape of rent of land and interest of capital, the labor
ing people much depressed, the ruhng class rich, in
solent, and despotic. It has been so these three
thousand years, as appears from the ancient laws and
maxims which determine the condition of the work
ing man.
These laws of fertility, soil, food, and climate are so
invincible that, wherever they have come into play,
they have kept the laborers in perpetual subjection;
the people have no voice in the management of the
state, no control over the wealth they have created ;

378 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
they have always been tame and servile, their history
recites no instance of their turning upon their rulers,
no war of classes, no popular insurrections, not one
great popular conspiracy, no revolutions among the
people. Similar causes were at work in Egypt, in
Peru, in Mexico, and produced the same results as
in India: the date, the banana, and the maize were to
the latter what rice was to the former. In all these
countries civilization depended on the fertility of the
soil, food was cheap, laborers abundant, wages low,
profits high, the working class poor and enslaved, the
rulers rich, insolent, and despotic. We have not space
to follow the author in the interesting details of this
part of his work, but only remark, in passing, that
he does not seem to be entirely familiar with the ab
original civilization, and is sometimes mistaken in his
statements ; but his grand inductive generalization re
mans secure.
He thus sums up the result for Asia, Africa, and
America : —
" The great physical laws which, in the most flourishing coun
tries out of Europe, encouraged the accumulation of wealth,
but prevented its dispersion, secured to the upper classes a
monopoly of one of the most important elements of social and
political power. The result was, that in all those civilizations
the great body of the people derived no benefit from Jhe na
tional improvements; hence, the basis of the progress being very
narrow, the progress itself was very insecure. When, there
fore, unfavorable circumstances arose from without, it was
but natural that the whole system should fall to the ground.
In such countries society, being divided against itself, was un
able to stand. And there can be no doubt that, long before
the crisis of their actual destruction, these one-sided and
irregular civilizations had began to decay. So that their own
degeneracy aided the progress of foreign invaders, and secured
the overthrow of those ancient kingdoms which, under a sounder
system, might have been easily saved."

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 379
In Europe civilization depended less on the fertility
of the soil, giving man its cheap spontaneous bread,
more on the climate, which stimulated him to vigorous
and regular activity, demanded a more costly food, and
so prevented the too rapid increase of population.
As a natural consequence, in Europe alone a permanent
civihzation has been established, and society so or
ganized as to include all the different classes ; and
though the scheme is not yet sufficiently large, it
leaves room for the welfare of each, and so secures the
progress of all.
Having thus disposed of the influence of food, soil,
and climate, which directly affect the material interests
of man in the accumulation and distribution of wealth,
he next examines that of the general aspects of nature
which affect his intellectual interests in the accumula
tion and distribution of knowledge. The aspects of
nature may be divided into two kinds, — such as affect
the imagination by exciting feeling, terror, or great
wonder, and such as affect the understanding, and ex
cite men to study the details and causes of the
phenomena about them. In all civilizations hitherto
the imagination has been active to excess. This ap
pears from the superstitions of the ignorant, and the
poetic reverence for antiquity which blinds the judg
ment of the educated and limits their originality. It
is possible that the understanding may in turn tyran
nize over the imagination. All the great early civilza-
tions of Asia, Africa, and America were situated within
the tropics, where nature is most dangerous to man, and
its aspects most sublime and terrible, both in the con
stant phenomena, such as mountains, and the oc
casional, such as earthquakes, tempests, hurricanes, and
pestilences, which powerfully affect the imagination.

380 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
This general statement is illustrated by examples of
the superstitions generated by earthquakes and pesti
lences. The illustrations are not happy, they are al
most puerile. He thus generalizes his conclusions:
" There are certain natural phenomena which excite
the imagination, incline man to superstition, and hinder
the progress of knowledge. These phenomena are
much more numerous out of Europe than in it," and
give a peculiar character to literature, religion, and art.
To prove this, he compares the productions of a typi
cal Asiatic with a typical European country, India
with Greece, — : both " flagrant instances."
The literature of India shows the most uncontrolled
ascendency of the imagination. There is little prose
composition ; works on grammar, law, history, medicine,
mathematics, geography, and metaphysics are nearly
all poems. The matter corresponds to the form ;
imagination, luxuriant even to disease, runs riot on
every occasion. This appears in great national works,
the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Puranas, and
in geographical and chronological systems ; in the ex
aggerated respect for past ages, which is " repugnant
to every maxim of reason, and is merely the indulgence
of a poetic sentiment in favor of the remote and un
known." " It gave theologians their idea of the
primitive virtue and simplicity of man, and of his sub
sequent fall from that high estate." It " diffused a
belief that in old times men were not only more vir
tuous and happy, but also physically superior in the
structure of their bodies," and lived to a greater age
than is possible for their degenerate children. Thus
the Hindoos say that in the most flourishing periods
of antiquity the average age of common men at death
was 80,000 years, and of holy men 100,000 years ; but

BUCKLE'S CP7ILIZATI0N 381
some early poets lived about half a million, and one
king — his title is too long for our space — lived
8,400,000, of which he reigned 6,300,000. To glorify
the Institutes of Menu, which are really less than three
thousand years old, the native authorities declare they
were miraculously revealed to man more than 2,000,-
000,000 years ago. The same characteristics ap
pear in the Indian rehgion. Its mythology, like that
of every tropical country, is based upon terror of
the most extravagant kind. The most terrible deities
are also the most popular. The same thing appears in
the Indian art, which is an expression of the monstrous.
Now .in Greece the aspects of nature were quite dif
ferent, nay, almost opposite; they gave a healthy
stimulus to the imagination and the understanding,
which led to the elevation of man. The Indians had
more respect for super-human powers, and turned men
to the unknown and mysterious ; the Greeks had more
respect for human powers, and turned to the known
and available. This peculiarity appears in the litera
ture, rehgion, and art of Greece, which are so well
known that we need not follow Mr. Buckle in the de
tails of his learned and careful comparison. The
Greek literature was the first in which a systematic
attempt was made to test all opinions by human reason,
and vindicate the right of man to judge for himself on
matters of supreme importance.
In Chapter III he examines " the method employed
by metaphysicians for discovering mental laws."
Studying the whole of human history, he finds that, out
of Europe, the tendency has been to subordinate man
to nature, but in Europe to subordinate nature to man.
So he divides civilization into two' parts, non-European
and European. To understand the first, we must be-

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
gin with the study of nature, the stronger force, while
to comprehend the European civilization, which is
characterized by a diminishing influence of physical
agents and an increasing influence of mental agents,
we must begin with man, who continually and progres
sively overmasters nature, so that the average duration
of life becomes greater, the number of dangers thereto
is lessened; the curiosity of men is keener, and their
contact closer, than at any former period, and a more
just distribution of wealth has taken place than in other
countries. It is only in Europe that man has succeeded
in taming the energies of nature, and compelling them
to minister to him. He has extirpated ferocious
beasts, overcome famine and the most frightful
diseases, bridged the rivers, tunneled the mountains,
reclaimed land from the sea, and fertilized the barren
spots of the earth. The most advanced nations of
Europe owe comparatively little to the original forces
of nature, which had unlimited power over aU other
civilizations. European civilization differs from all others in this.
It is characterized by the " diminishing influence of
physical laws," — he means forces, — " and an increas
ing influence of mental laws." The proposition will
be proved in future volumes, but will be admitted in
advance, he thinks, by all who attend to these two
fundamental propositions: 1. that the forces of nature
have never been permanently increased, and never will
be; and 2. that the forces of man continually become
more powerful by the acquisition of new means, either
to control the manageable operations of nature, or
to avoid dangers from those consequences which we
can foresee when we cannot prevent them.
To discover the laws of European civilization, we

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 383
must first know the laws of mind, which will afford
the ultimate basis of history. The metaphysicians
claim to have done this work; so it is necessary to as
certain the value of their researches, the extent of
their resources, and the validity of their method. The
metaphysical method consists in each observer's study
ing his own mind, while the historical method consists
in studying many minds. The metaphysical method
is one by which no discovery has ever yet been made
in any branch of knowledge, as it is impossible for the
metaphysician to isolate his mind from disturbing
forces, and his method does not allow him to enlarge
his survey, so as to correct the individual disturbance
by the general fact gathered from many particulars.
Besides, there is yet another difficulty. There are
two applications of this metaphysical method; with
one the inquirer begins by examining his sensations,
with the other by examining his ideas. Hence there
are two classes of metaphysicians, the sensationalists
and the idealists, who adopt different methods and ar
rive at opposite conclusions ; the further they advance,
the more they differ; they are at open war in every
department of morals, philosophy, and art. They
know no other method; no other apphcation of it is
possible, and so they cannot reconcile their an
tagonistic conclusions. Meaning by metaphysics
" that vast body of literature which is constructed on
the supposition that the laws of the human mind can
be generalized solely from the facts of individual con
sciousness," Mr. Buckle says, " If we except a very
few of the laws of association, and perhaps I may add
the modern theories of vision and touch,'' — he refers to
Berkeley, Hume, Hartley, and Brown, — " there is not
to be found in the whole compass of metaphysics a sin-

384 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
gle principle of importance, and at the same time of
incontestable truth." This defect in the conclusions
comes from the fault in the method; metaphysicians
first raise a cloud, and then complain they cannot see.
Metaphysics can be successfully studied only " by an
investigation of history so comprehensive as to enable
us to understand the conditions which govern the move
ments of the human race."
In Chapter IV. he compares the moral and intelec-
tual forces or agencies, — he calls them laws, — and in
quires into the effect of each on the progress of society.
In this investigation he tries to avoid the method of
the metaphysician, who derives his knowledge of men
from the study of his own consciousness, exceptional,
perturbed, and abnormal as it may be ; and follows that
of the naturalist, who takes so large a number of facts
that the individual perturbations are but an infinitesmal
quanitity, and thence induces his general laws.
The progress of mankind, he says, is twofold : moral,
relating to our duties, and intellectual, relating to our
knowledge. This double increase of knowledge and
virtue is essential to civilization. To be willing to
perform our duty, is the moral part of progress ; to
know how to perform it, the intellectual. It is possible
that there is a progressive increase of man's natural
powers, intellectual and moral; but the fact has not
yet been proved, and we have no decisive ground for
saying that natural faculties would be greater in a
child born in the most civilized part of Europe than
in one born in the wildest region of a barbarous coun
try. We have no proof, he thinks, of the existence
of hereditary talents, vices, or virtues, hereditary mad
ness and disease. There is no progress of capacity,
only of opportunity.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 385
The moral powers — that is, in our philosophy, the
power to know duty and the will to do it — have an
extremely smaU influence over the progress of civiliza
tion. The great dogmas of morals, which are " the
sole essential of morals," have been known for thousands
of years, not a jot nor tittle has been added to them,
while there is a continual increase in the knowledge
of intellectual truths. The most cultivated Europeans
do not know a single moral truth not known to the
ancients, while the moderns have made most important
addition to every department of ancient knowledge,,
and have created new sciences which the boldest think
ers of old times never thought of. So it is plain man's
progress depends on the intellectual, which is the
progressive agent, not on the moral, which is but sta
tionary. Besides, intellectual achievements are permanent;
they are put in the terms of science, and, in immortal
bequests of genius, become the heirlooms of mankind.
But good moral deeds are less capable of transmission,
less dependent on previous experience, and cannot well
be stored up for future men. So, though moral ex
cellence be more amiable than intellectual, it is less ac
tive, less permanent, and less productive of real good.
The effects of the most active philanthropy, the most
disinterested kindness, reach but few, do not last long,
and the institutions they found soon fall to decay.
The more we study, the more we shall
" see the superiority of intellectual acquisition over moral feel
ing. There is no instance on record of an ignorant man, who,
having good intentions, and supreme power to enforce them,
has not done far more evil than good. And whenever the in
tentions have been very eager, and the power very extensive,
the evil has been enormous. But if you can diminish the sin
cerity of that man, if you can mix some alloy with his mo
ll— 25

386 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
tives, you will likewise diminish the evil which he works.
If he is selfish, as well as ignorant, it will often happen that
you may play off his vice against his ignorance, and, by excit
ing his fears, restrain his mischief. If, however, he has no
fear, if he is entirely unselfish, if his sole object is the good
of others, if he pursues that object with enthusiasm, upon a
large scale, and with disinterested zeal, then it is that you
have no check upon him; you have no means of preventing the
calamities which, in an ignorant age, an ignorant man will be
sure to inflict."
To prove this discouraging proposition, he cites the
case of religious persecutors, who are not bad men,
nor bad-intentioned men, but only ignorant of the na
ture of truth, and of the consequences of their own
actions. It was the most moral of the Roman Em
perors, Aurelius and Julian, who persecuted the
Christians ; and in Spain, " the Inquisitors were re
markable for an undeviating and incorruptible in
tegrity." Religious persecution is the greatest evil man ever
inflicts on man ; " all other crimes are of small account "
compared to this. It is intellectual, and not moral,
activity which has ended it. The practice of war is the
next great evil, and in diminishing that, the moral feel
ings have had no share at all, for the present moral
ideas relating to war were " as well understood and
as universally admitted in the middle ages, when there
was never a week without war, as they are now, when
war is deemed a rare and singular occurrence." It is
intellectual, and not moral, actions which have done
this great work. For every addition to knowledge in
creases the power of the intellectual class, and weakens
the military class. It is a significant fact, that the
recent Continental war was begun by Russia and Tur
key, the two most barbarous nations in Europe.2 The
military predilections of Russia are not " caused by a

BUCKLE'S CD7ILIZATI0N 387
low state of morals, or by a disregard of religious du
ties," but by ignorance; for as the intellect is little
cultivated, the military class is supreme, and all ability
is estimated by a military standard.* In England,
a love of war, as a national taste, is utterly extinct;
this result has not come from moral instinct or moral
training, but from the cultivation of intellect, and the
rise of educated classes, who control the military. As
society advances the ecclesiastical spirit and the military
spirit never fail to decline. Thus, while in Greece some
of the most celebrated poets, orators, philosophers, and
statesmen were also warriors, since the sixteenth cen
tury Europe has not produced ten soldiers who were
distinguished either as thinkers or writers. " Crom
well, Washington, and Napoleon are perhaps the only
first-rate modern warriors " who were competent to
govern a kingdom and command an army.t
Three things havei weakened the power of the mili
tary class, — the invention of gunpowder, the discov
eries of political economy, and the application of steam
to the purposes of travel. We have no space for an
analysis of his argument here.
Hitherto Mr. Buckle's remarks have been general,
and belong to what may be called the universal part of
transcendental history; but in Chapter V he turns
his attention more especiaUy to England. He selects
this as a typical country, — an instantia flagrans, —
in which the universal laws of human development are
interfered with less than elsewhere, and where for some
* In sustaining bis assertions here, Mr. Buckle should take
comfort from the somewhat celebrated preamble of our Con
gress in 1846, "Whereas war exists by the act of Mexico,"—
she being the less intellectual power of the two.
f His contrast here of Marlborough and Wellington is well
put, and worth remembering.

388 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
centuries the people have not been much troubled by the
two great disturbing forces, the authority of govern
ment and the influence of foreigners. England has
borrowed nothing by which the destinies of nations
are permanently altered, and affords the best example
of the normal march of society, and the undisturbed
operation of those agencies which regulate the fortunes
of mankind.
Germany and the United States are not typical
countries, like England. In the first, the philosophers
are at the head of the civilized world, but the people
are more prejudiced, ignorant, superstitious, and un
able to guide themselves, than the people of England
or France. The great authors write books for each
other, not for the people, and the dull, plodding class
remains uninfluenced by the knowledge of the great
thinkers, and uncheered by the fire of their genius.*
" In America we see a civilization precisely the reverse of
this; ... a country of which it has been truly said, that
in no other are there so few men of great learning, and so
few of great ignorance. In Germany the speculative classes
and the practical classes are altogether disunited; in Amer
ica they are altogether fused. In Germany nearly every year
brings forward new discoveries, new philosophies, new means
by which the boundaries of knowledge are to be enlarged. In
America such inquiries are almost entirely neglected; since the
time of Jonathan Edwards, no great metaphysician has ap
peared, little attention has been paid to physical science [ !],
and with the single exception of jurisprudence scarcely any
thing has been done for those vast subjects on which the Ger
mans are incessantly labouring. The stock of American knowl
edge is small, but it is spread through all classes; the stock of
German knowledge is immense, but it is confined to one class."
The progress of European civilization depends on
the accumulation and distribution of knowledge; and
*This sweeping remark of Mr. Buckle is founded probably
on his impressions of Southern Germany. It is not true of
Prussia or of Saxony.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 389
so he must take a country in which knowledge is both
normally accumulated and diffused. These condi
tions are happily united in England, which he will
portray as the central and heroic figure in the historic
group, but sketch in the other nations who play the
special and subordinate parts in this great drama of
civilization. He will study Germany for the laws of
accumulation of knowledge, America for those of its
diffusion ; France for the political form of the pro
tective spirit, Spain for its religious form. Thence
he wiU induce the general laws, and in subsequent vol
umes of the history itself apply them deductively to
England. The progress of a nation depends partly on the
method its thinkers pursue in their investigations,
whether it be deductive or inductive. The Germans
favor the first, the Americans the last. The English
thinkers are inductive, the Scotch deductive : — Simson,
Stewart, Hutchinson, Adam Smith, Hume, Ferguson,
Mill, aU pursue the deductive method. No country
possesses a more original and inquisitive literature than
Scotland ; but in none equally enlightened does so much
of the superstition of the middle ages still continue.
There is hostility between the speculative and practical
classes. By religion he means the theological ideas and the
ritual service, by literature " everything which is writ
ten," and by government, not the complex of institu
tions, laws, and modes of administration, but simply
the privileged classes who rule officially. He says a
nation's progress does not depend on its religion, litera
ture, or government. This proposition he defends at
length; a nation's religion, literature, and government
are only effects of its civilization, not also causes

390 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
thereof; no progressive country voluntarily adopts a
retrogressive religion, no declining country ameliorates
its religion. Savages are converted to Christianity
only by becoming civilized. A religon too much in
advance of a people can do no present service, but
must bide its time. Thus the Hebrews continually re
lapsed from the monotheism which Moses taught.
The Romans with rare exceptions were an ignorant and
barbarous race, ferocious, dissolute, and cruel; poly
theism was their natural creed ; they could not compre
hend the sublime and admirable doctrines of Christian
ity, arid after that seemed to have carried all before
it, and received the homage of the best part of Europe,
it was soon found that nothing was really effected.
Superstition but took a new form; men worshipped
the Virgin Mary instead of Cybele. The Catholic
religion is to Protestantism what the dark ages are to
modern times. Accordingly, the most civilized coun
tries should be Protestant. In general, it is so; but
sometimes a foreign force fixed the religion of the peo
ple, which does them small service. Thus Scotland and
Sweden are Protestant countries, but more marked
with superstition, intolerance, and bigotry than Catho
lic France. The French have a religion worse than
themselves; the Scotch have one better than them
selves ; and in both cases the characteristics of the peo
ple neutralize those of their creed, and the national
faith is altogether inoperative.
" Literature in itself is but a trifling matter." Its
value depends on its communicating real knowledge,
that is, an acquaintance with physical and mental laws.
To look upon an acquaintance with literature as one
of the objects of education is to make the end sub
ordinate to the means. Hence there are " highly edu-

BUCKLE'S CP7ILIZATI0N 391
cated men," so called, whose advance in knowledge has
been retarded by the activity of their education.
They are burdened with prejudices, which their read
ing only renders more inveterate ; for Hterature is not
only full of wisdom but of absurdities also, so the bene
fit of literature will depend on the skill and judgment
with which books are selected and studied. Europe
would have made more rapid progress in the seventh
and eighth centuries if all knowledge of the alphabet
had been lost. For the noble works of antiquity
thereby preserved were not used at all, and letters
helped only to spread the superstitious regard men
so much delighted in at that time.
Government is still less the ally of progressive civil-
zation ; for " no great political improvement, no great
reform, either legislative or executive, has ever been
originated in any country by its rulers." Able think
ers find out the abuses, devise the remedy, convince
and persuade the people, and force the rulers to adopt
the improvement; and then the people are expected
to admire the wisdom of the rulers ! Thus, the repeal
of the Corn Laws in England was not the work of the
ministry in ParHament, but of the political economists,
who proved that protective restrictions were absurd;
and thus the repeal of the Corn Laws became a mat
ter, not of party or of expediency, but merely of
knowledge; when the diffusion of knowledge reached
a certain point the laws must fall. Besides, aU great
reforms consist in undoing an old wrong, not in en
acting a new right ; the tendency of modern legislation
is to restore things to that natural channel whence pre
ceding legislation turned them away. The ruling
classes have interfered so much with the. development
of mankind, and done so much mischief, that it is won-

892 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
derful civilization could advance at all. In Eng
land for the last two centuries they had less power
than elsewhere, but have yet done such a great amount
of evil as forms a melancholy chapter in the history
of the human mind; excepting certain laws necessary
to preserve order and prevent crime, nearly all has
been done amiss. All the most important interests
have been grievously damaged by the rulers' attempt
to aid them ; thus, the effort to protect trade nearly
ruined trade itself, which would have perished had it
not violated the laws by smuggling. The economical
evils of this protective system, its injuries to trade,
are surpassed by its moral evils, the increasing of crime.
The attempt to protect religion increased only
hypocrisy and heresy, — he might have added cruelty
and atheism ; the effort to keep down the rate of inter
est on money has always raised that interest. Still,
more, all the great Christian governments have made
strenuous efforts to destroy the liberty of the press,
and prevent men from expressing their thoughts in
politics and religion, the most important of aU sub
jects. Even in England the rulers tax paper, and
make the very thoughts of men pay toU.
" It is truly a frightful consideration that knowledge is to be
hindered, and that the proceeds of honest labour, of patient
thought, and sometimes of profound genius, are to be dimin
ished, in order that a large part of their scanty earnings may
go to swell the pomp of an idle and ignorant court, minister
to the caprice of a few powerful individuals, and too often
supply them with the means of turning against the people re
sources which the people called into existence."
In England the rulers have less power than else
where; and the progress has been more regular, more
rapid, and less violent and bloody. She has shown
the world " that one main condition of the prosperity

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 393
of a people is this, that its rulers shall have very little
power, and exercise that little very sparingly."
So the growth of European civilization is not due
to religion, literature, or government, but only to the
progress of knowledge, which depends on the number
of truths known, and the extent to which they are
known, — the accumulation and distribution of knowl
edge. In Chapter VI Mr. Buckle treats of the origin of
history, and the state of historical literature during
the middle ages. In this history of history he finds
that, in the last three centuries, historians have shown
an increasing respect for man's mind, and have more
than ever attended to the condition of the people and
the diffusion of knowledge. His sketch of the progress
of history from the oral ballad, up through all stages
of monkish absurdity, is amusing and curious. We
must pass it by, however, to speak of what seems more
essential to the understanding of his positions.
In Chapter VII he gives an outline of the History
of the English Intellect, from the middle of the six
teenth to the end of the eighteenth century. To es
cape from the melancholy condition of the dark and
middle ages, there must be an increase of doubt.
Knowledge is the condition of progress, doubt of
knowledge. Scepticism is " hardness of belief," an
increased application and diffusion of the laws of evi
dence and the rules of reasoning. " In physics, it is
the necessary precursor of science; in politics, of
liberty; in theology, of toleration," — and, he might
have added, of truth.
"To scepticism we owe that spirit of inquiry which, during
the last two centuries, has encroached on every possible sub
ject, has reformed every department of practical and specu-

394 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
lative knowledge, has weakened the authority of the privileged
classes, and thus placed liberty on a surer foundation, has
chastised the despotism of princes, has restrained the arrogance
of nobles, and has even diminished the prejudices of the
clergy." No single fact has so extensively affected the dif
ferent nations as the duration, amount, and diffusion
of their scepticisms. In Spain, by means of the In
quisition, the church prevented the publication of
sceptical opinions ; there knowledge and civilization are
stationary. But scepticism first began in England and
France, and was most widely diffused ; and there " has
arisen that constantly progressive knowledge to which
these two great nations owe their prosperity."
Mr. Buckle then shows the growth of doubt in
England, and as its consequence the increase of re
ligious toleration, and the decline of the old ecclesiasti
cal spirit. It is the authority of the secular classes
which has forced toleration on the Christian clergy.
Elizabeth at first balanced the Catholics and Pro
testants, allowing neither party the preponderance; in
the first eleven years of her reign no Roman Catholic
was put to death for religion, and afterwards, though
men were undoubtedly executed for their opinions, yet
none dared state their religion as the cause of their
execution. Jewel's Apology was written in 1561 ; Hooker's Ec
clesiastical Polity in 1594 ; Chillingworth's Religion
of Protestants in 1637 : each is typical of its time ; —
in Jewel, ecclesiastical authority is the basis, and
reason the superstructure; in Hooker, reason is the
basis, and authority the superstructure; while with
Chillingworth authority disappears, and " the whole
fabric of religion is made to rest upon the way in
which the unaided reason of man shaU interpret the

BUCKLE'S CrvTLIZATION 395
decrees of an omnipotent God." This fundamental
principle was adopted by the most influential writers
of the seventeenth century, all of whom insisted on the
authority of private judgment. The ecclesiastical
spirit declined ; able men devoted their talents to science.
"What used to be considered the most important of all ques
tions is now abandoned to men who mimic the zeal without
professing the influence of those really great divines whose
works are among the glories of our early literature." "The
ological interests have long ceased to be supreme, and the af
fairs of nations are no longer regulated according to ecclesi
astical views."
Sir James Mackintosh said, that unless some revolu
tion, auspicious to priestcraft, should replunge Europe
in ignorance, " church-power will certainly not survive
the nineeenth century."
" In England, where its march has been more rapid than
elsewhere, this change is very observable. In every other de
partment we have had a series of great and powerful thinkers,
who have done honor to their country, and have been the ad
miration of mankind. But for more than a century we have
not produced a single original work in the whole field of con
troversial theology."
For more than a century no valuable addition has
been made to that immense mass of divinity which con-
tinuaUy loses something of its interest among think
ing men. Both military and ecclesiastical power de-
chne before the progress of civilization.*
* In his summing up on this point the author gives the fol
lowing explanation of his use of the word scepticism. "By
scepticism I merely mean hardness of belief, — so that an in
creased scepticism is an increased perception of the difficulty
of proving assertions; or, in other words, it is an increased
application, and an increased diffusion, of the rules of reason
ing, and of the laws of evidence. This feeling of hesitation,
and of suspended judgment, has in every department of
thought been the invariable preliminary to all the intellectual

396 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
In the reign of James I. and Charles I. great at
tempts were made to restore the fading power of au
thority ; but the dead could not be revived. Even the
Puritans were more fanatical than superstitious.
We have not space to examine Mr. Buckle's pro
found investigation into the reign of Charles II., when
so severe a blow was struck at the tyranny of the church
and of the nobles. In those few years clerical property
was made amenable to Parliamentary taxation ; the
clergy were forbidden to burn a heretic, or make a sus
pected person criminate himself in the trial. It was
fixed that all money bills must originate with the
House of Commons ; that the Peers have no original
jurisdiction, only appellate, in civil cases. The pre
rogatives of purveyance and pre-emption were abol
ished, and the king could not vex the property of his
subjects ; the Habeas Corpus Act made their persons
also secure ; general impeachments fell to the ground,
and the liberty of the press became a fixed fact ; the
feudal incidents which the Norman conquerors had im
posed, military tenures, wardships, fines for alienation,
forfeiture for marriage by reason of tenure, aids, hom
ages, escuages, primer-seisins, and other mischievous
subtilties, all went to common ruin. This was done in
the age of Charles II.: the king was incompetent, the
court profligate, the ministers venal, — all these in the
pay of France; there were unprecedented insults from
revelations through which the human mind has passed; and
without it there could be no progress, no change, no civiliza
tion. In physics it is the necessary precursor of science; in
politics, of liberty; in theology, of toleration. These are the
three leading forms of scepticism; it is therefore clear that in
religion the sceptic steers a middle course between atheism and
orthodoxy, rejecting both extremes, because he sees that both
are incapable of proof."

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 397
abroad, frequent conspiracies at home, a great fire and
a great plague in London!
" How could so wonderful a progress be made in the face
of these unparalleled disasters? These are questions which our
political compilers are unable to answer, because they look
too much at the peculiarities of individuals, and too little at
the temper of the age in which those individuals live. Such
writers do not perceive that the history of every civilized coun
try is the history of its intellectual development, which kings,
statesmen, and legislators are more likely to retard than to
hasten; because, however great their power may be, they are,
at best, the accidental and insufficient representatives of the
spirit of their time, and because, so far from being able to
regulate the movements of the national mind, they themselves
form the smallest part of it, and, in a general view of the
progress of man are only to be regarded as the puppets who
strut and fret their hour upon a little stage; while beyond
them, and on every side of them, are forming opinions and
principles which they can scarcely perceive, but by which, alone,
the whole course of human affairs is ultimately governed."
Even the vices of the rulers served the people's cause.
" All classes of men soon learned to despise a king who was
a drunkard, a libertine, and a hypocrite; and who, in point of
honor, was unworthy to enter the presence of the meanest of
his subjects."
His reckless debaucheries made him abhor all re
straint, and to dishke the clerical class, whose profes
sion at least presupposes more than ordinary purity.
From the love of vicious indulgence, he disliked the
clergy ; and he conferred the highest dignities of the
church on feeble or insincere men, who could not defend
what they really believed, or did not believe what they
reaUy professed. Such were Juxon, Sheldon, and
Sancroft, Archbishops of Canterbury, and Frewen,
Stearn, and Dolben, Archbishops of York. But
Jeremy Taylor, who married the king's illegitimate
sister, daughter of Joanna Bridges, and Barrow, both
men of great talents and unspotted virtue, were treated

398 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
with neglect. In consequence of this filling great
ecclesiastical offices with little, and sometimes wicked
men, and banishing the noble men to obscure positions,
the power of the church continued to decline, and re
ligious liberty to increase. The clergy attempted to
retrieve their power, by reviving the doctrine of passive
obedience and divine rght; but this only increased the
opposition of the people. The Anglican clergy were
friendly to James II. before he came to the crown,
using all their strength to defeat the bill which ex
cluded him from the succession. They rejoiced in his
elevation. They sustained him while he persecuted the
dissenters, but when he issued his Declaration of In
dulgence, which nullified the Test and Corporation
Acts, the established clergy broke from him, and dis
solved this " conspiracy between the crown and the
church." They looked on, in silence, while the king
proposed to turn a free government into a despotism.
They saw Jeffreys and Kirke torture their fellow-sub
jects, the jails crowded, the scaffolds running with
blood. They were well pleased that Baxter should be
thrown into prison, and Howe driven into exile. They
insisted on passive obedience to a Lord's Anointed,
because these victims opposed the church. But when
James attempted to protect men hostile to their church,
the guardians of the temple flew to arms. They re
fused to obey the order, united with the dissenters, and
overturned the throne. The only time when the church
made war upon the throne was when the crown declared
its intention of tolerating, and in some degree of pro
tecting, the rival religions of the land. When James
subsequently promised to favor their order, they re
pented of their work. They opposed William, " that
great man, who, without striking a blow, saved the

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 399
country from the slavery with which it was threatened."
They continued to intrigue for the restoration of the
dethroned tyrant, because his successor was the friend
of religious liberty. The power of the Church con
tinued to decline.
" Under two of the most remarkable men of the eighteenth
century, Whitfield, the first of theological orators, and Wesley,
the first of theological statesmen, there was organized a great
system of religion, that bore the same relation to the Church of
England that the Church of England bore to the Church of
Rome." " In the eighteenth century the Wesleyans were to the
Bishops what in the sixteenth century the Reformers were to
the Popes."
But after the death of their great leaders the
Methodists produced no man of original genius, and
since Adam Clarke none of their scholars has had a
European reputation. In the time of William the dis
senters were estimated as about one twenty-third part
of the population; in 1786 they were one-fourth; in
1851 they were two-fifths of the whole.
The advance of the sceptical spirit, and the triumph
of rehgious liberty, are shown by yet other things,
¦ — the separation of theology from morals and poli
tics. The one was effected late in the seventeenth cen
tury, the other before the middle of the eighteenth;
and both were begun by the clergy themselves. Cum
berland would construct a system of morals independent
of theology ; Warburton taught that, in dealing with
religion, the state must look to expediency, not revela
tion; Hume, Paley, Bentham, and Mill have carried
their doctrines much further. The Catholics are al
ready admitted to Parliament, the Jews will soon be
there. The power of clerical oppression was still
further weakened by the great Arian controversy,
"rashly instigated by Whiston, Clarke, and Water-

400 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
land," by the Bangorian controversy, by Blackburne's
work on the confessional, the dispute on miracles, the
exposure of the gross absurdities of the Fathers, the
statements of Gibbon relative to the spread of
Christianity, — " important and unrefuted," — the " de
cisive controversy between Porson and Travis respect
ing the text of the heavenly witnesses," and the " dis
coveries of geologists, in which not only was the fidelity
of the Mosaic cosmogony impugned, but its accuracy
was shown to be impossible."
This spirit of inquiry reached classes hitherto shut
out from education. In the eighteenth century, for
the first time, schools were established for the lower
classes on the only day they had time to attend them,
and newspapers on the only day they had time to read
them ; circulating libraries first appeared in England ;
printing began to be established in the country towns.
Then, too, for the first time, were efforts made to
popularize the sciences ; literary reviews began then ;
book-clubs, debating-societies among tradesmen, date
from the same period. It was not till 1769 that the
first public meeting assembled in England where an
attempt was made to enlighten Englishmen respecting
their political rights.* Then the proceedings of the
courts of law and parliament were published, and poli
tical newspapers arose. The great political doctrines
that persons, not land or other property, should be
represented, was then promulgated, and the people for
the first time were called on to decide the great ques
tions of religion, which they were not consulted on
before.t The word " independence," in its modern
* For the author overlooks the political preaching of the
Puritans. f For the author overlooks the theological preaching of the
Puritans.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 401
acceptation, does not occur till the beginning of the
eighteenth century. Authors began to write in a
lighter and simpler style, which all men could under
stand. Literary men found a wider public, and were
no longer dependents on the caprices of the privileged
class. Our author then traces the reaction against this
spirit of civilization, and thinks it fortunate that,
after the death of Anne, — a weak and silly woman,
— the throne was long filled by the two Georges,
" aliens in manners and in country, one of whom spoke
our language but indifferently, and the other not at
all," " and both profoundly ignorant of the people
they undertook to govern." The crown and the clergy
could not work together to resist the progress of man
kind. But the reactionary movement was greatly
aided by the character of George III. ; despotic and
superstitious, he sought to extend the prerogative and
strengthen the church. Here is the picture of that
monarch, such as our fathers looking across the ocean
saw him.
" Every liberal sentiment, everything approaching to reform,
nay, even the mere mention of inquiry, was an abomination in
the eyes of that narrow and ignorant prince. Without knowl
edge, without taste, without even a glimpse of one of the sci
ences or a feeling for one of the fine arts, education had done
nothing to enlarge a mind which nature had more than usually
contracted. Totally ignorant of the history and resources of
foreign countries, and barely knowing their geographical posi
tion, his information was scarcely more extensive respecting
the people over whom he was called to rule. In that immense
mass of evidence now extant, and which consists of every de
scription of private correspondence, records of private con
versation and of public acts, there is not to be found the slight
est proof that he knew any one of those numerous things which
the governor of a country ought to know; or, indeed, that he
was acquainted with a single duty of his position, except that
mere mechanical routine of ordinary business, which might
II— 26

402 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
have been effected by the lowest clerk in the meanest office in
his kingdom."
During the sixty years of his reign Pitt was the
only great man he willingly admitted to his councils;
and he must forget the lessons of his illustrious father,
and persecute his party to death. George III. looked
on slavery as a good old custom, and Pitt dared not
oppose it. The king hated the French, and Pitt
plunged the nations in a needless, wicked, and costly
war. He corrupted the House of Lords by filling it
with country gentlemen remarkable for nothing but
health, and lawyers who rose to office chiefly through
the zeal with which they favored the king and re
pressed the people.
Mr. Buckle gives a nice and discriminating account
of Burke, " one of the greatest men and the greatest
thinkers who has ever devoted himself to the practice
of English politics." We have seen no picture so
just of this great man when sane, and also when mad
ness had made him the most dangerous of lunatics.
But we must pass it by, and also his account of the
American Revolution, and the reaction in England oc
casioned by the troubles in France.
Chapter VIII relates the history of the French in
tellect from the middle of the fifteenth century to the
reign of Louis XIV. It is one of the most learned,
original, and instructive chapters in the book. Great
events pass before us, and also great men, — Henry IV.,
Montaigne, Richelieu, Descartes, and their famous
contemporaries. But we have no time to look at them.
Chapter IX is devoted to the " History of the Pro
tective Spirit and Comparison of it in France and
England." We must submit a short analysis of its
contents.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 403
Modern civilization began to dawn in the tenth and
eleventh centuries; in the twelfth it had reached all
the nations now civilized. The people began to rebel
against the clergy, who had once protected them against
the military rulers. This is the starting-point of
modern, civihzation. Then the clergy began sys
tematically tc punish men for heresy ; inquisitions, tor
turing, burnii _^s, and the like, became general. Then
began an unci ising struggle between the advocates of
inquiry and 1 le advocates of tradition. Then the
feudal system \ egan, and set the example of a large
public polity in which the clerical body as such had
no place. Accordingly there came a struggle between
feudality and the church. European aristocracy be
gan, and in the organization of society took the place
of the church. William the Conqueror brought feu-
dahsm to England, but made each vassal dependent on
the king, not merely on his feudal superior; while in
France the great lords and their vassals were inde
pendent of the king. Hence arose the great differ
ence between the English and French aristocracy. The
former, being too feeble to resist the king, allied them
selves with the people to uphold their common right
against the king; the people acquired a tone of inde
pendence and lofty bearing with the habits of self-
government, and founded their great civil and political
institutions. In France the great lords resisted the
people. Hence, when the feudal system declined in the
fourteenth century, in one country the French king
took the authority, and power became more and more
centralized, while the English people took it in the
other, and power became progressively diffused.
When evil days set in, and the invasions of despotism
have begun, Hberty will be retained, not by those who

404 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
show the oldest deeds and longest charters, but by those
most inured to independence, and most regardless of
that insidious protection which the upper classes throw
around them. Men can never be free unless they are
educated to freedom, and that training is by institu
tions, not books, — by self -discipline, self-reliance, self-
government. The protective spirit was strong enough in France
to resist the Reformation, and preserve to the clergy
the forms of this ancient supremacy ; in England it
was opposed by the great nobles, — who are to politics
what the priests were to religion, — but carried by the
people. At the accession of Elizabeth there was an
intimate connection between the English nobles and the
Catholic clergy ; she therefore must choose her ministers
from the commoners, hence came the two Bacons, the
two Cecils, Knollys, Sadler, Smith, Throgmorton, and
Walsingham, — the most eminent statesmen and
diplomatists of her reign. The Pope taunted her with
excluding the ancient nobility and raising obscure peo
ple to honor; the rebellion of 1569 was the rising of
the great families of the North against " the upstart
and plebeian administration of the queen." At first
James and Charles tried to revive the power of the
two great protective classes, the nobles and the clergy ;
but they could not execute their michievous plans, for
there arose what Clarendon called " the most pro
digious, the boldest rebellion that any age or country
ever brought forth." This was an outbreak of the
democratic spirit, the political form of a movement of
which the Reformation was the religious form.
In Chapter X Mr. Buckle makes a comparison be
tween the English Rebellion and the contemporary
Fronde, and shows that the energy of the protective

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 405
spirit in France caused the failure of the latter. In
France the people, not accustomed to self-government,
intrusted the conduct of this rebellion to great noble
men; in England they took the matter into their own
hands, and carried it through.
Chapters XI and XII treat of the age of Louis
XIV and his successor, of the protective spirit ap
plied to literature, of the consequences of the alliance
between the intellectual and the governing classes, of
the reaction against this spirit, and of the distant
preparations for the French Revolution. Both chap
ters are well studied, rich in learning, in critical judg
ment on men and things, and full of original opinions.
No writer, we think, has given so just an account of
the good and ill of Louis XIV, and surely none of the
progress of the French mind during that period. We
are compelled to pass them over. No man has given
so careful and exact an account of the character of
Voltaire, and the good services he rendered to the
world. In Chapters XIII and XIV Mr. Buckle discusses
the historical literature of France from the end of the
sixteenth to the end of the eighteenth century, and
the proximate causes of the French Revolution after
the middle of the eighteenth century. They are
learned, exact, and profound. But we have no space
for an analysis.
The plan of Mr. Buckle's book is quite faulty, both
confused and defective. When he began to print, we
doubt if he knew exactly what he would do. At first
he appears to intend writing a Universal History of
Civilization ; he lays down his rules accordingly, and
begins his work. But finding at length the difficulties
greater than he imagined, he says he has abandoned

406 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
his original scheme, and reluctantly determined to
write, not the history of the civilization of mankind,
but that of a single country; and accordingly selects
England as the best type of normal developments.
He has no preface or special introduction to this
volume. He does not, at the outset, tell his readers
what he intends to do, on the whole, and how many vol
umes he designs to regale them with; and then dis
tribute the work into its several parts, and lay before
us a plan of the entertainment, with a bill of fare,
showing what we are to feast upon, and when each spe
cial dish is to appear. In various parts of the volume
he hints at his plan, rather vaguely intimating what
he intends to do. Thus the introduction is scattered
piecemeal throughout a volume of nearly a thousand
pages. On his title the book is called " History of Civiliza
tion in England," but the " running-title," at the head
of each page, is " General Introduction," of which it
seems this volume is but a part, — one or two more on
the same preliminary theme being hinted at. Only the
first six chapters are, properly speaking, Introductory
to the History of Civilization; the rest are the actual
History of Civilization in England and France.
The volume is divided only into chapters, not also
into books, and the arrangement of the chapters is
not very good ; so the author is often forced to repeat
what had been sufficiently said before. As the work
is not completed, perhaps it would be excessive to ask
for an index, — such as generous Mr. Macaulay so
kindly throws in with his magnificent composition ; but
we think the reader of so big a book has a right to
claim a copious table of contents at the beginning, and
a descriptive " heading " on each of the nine or ten

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 407
hundred pages. But Mr. Buckle gives us neither the
one nor the other. Besides, the titles of the chapters
do not always sufficiently indicate the contents.
But these faults can be easily corrected in the next
edition, which is sure to be called for when the public
recovers from this painful but healing panic. We
would modestly hint to the author the following scheme
for his grand work.
A Preface, setting forth the purpose of the work
and its probable extent. The volume itself might thus
be divided into Books and Chapters. Book I. Trans
cendental History. Chap. I. Resources and Purposes
of the Historian; Chap. II. Regularity of Human
Actions, and the Causes thereof; Chap. III. Influence
of Physical Forces on the Development of Man, on
the Organization of Society and the Character of In
dividuals ; Chap. IV. Examination of the Metaphys
ical Method of Investigating the Spiritual Faculties
of Man; Chap. V. Comparison of the Power of the
Moral and Intellectual Faculties, — their relative In
fluence on the Civihzation of Mankind ; Chap. VI. The
Effect of Rehgion, Literature, and Government on
that Civihzation.
Book II. Origin of Historical Literature in general,
and its Progressive Development in Europe, from the
Decline of the Classic Nations to the end of the Middle
Ages. Book III. Outline of the Intellectual History of the
English, from the end of the Middle Ages till the end
.of the Eighteenth Century.
Book IV. Intellectual and Moral History of the
French, from the end of the Middle Ages to the end
of the Eighteenth Century. Chap. I. General Out
line thereof, till the Accession of Louis XIV.; Chap.

408 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
II. General History of the Protective Spirit, and a
Comparison of its Special Effects in France and Eng
land; Chap. III. Comparison between the French and
English Rebellions of the Seventeenth Century ; Chap.
IV. Reign of Louis XIV,— Effect of the Protective
Spirit on Literature, and of the consequent Union of
the Intellectual and the Governing Classes ; Chap. V.
Reaction against the Protective Spirit, — Remote
Preparation for the French Revolution ; Chap. VI.
Progressive Developments of Historical Literature in
France, from the end of the Middle Ages to the end
of the Eighteenth Century; Chap. VII. Proximate
Causes of the French Revolution, after the middle of
the Eighteenth Century.
We do not say this is the best possible arrangement
of the valuable matter which Mr. Buckle spreads out
before us, but one better than the present ; and likely
to save some confusion, and to spare both writer and
reader some repetitions which now embarrass the de
velopment of his great thoughts.
There is a little confusion in his use of terms. Thus
he uses the word law when he means force, power, or
even a special human faculty. We take it, a law
is not a force (or power), but the constant mode of
operation in which that force acts: it is the manner
of a cause, not the cause of a manner. He often
speaks of the progress of mankind or a nation, but
does not tell what it consists in. Speaking generally,
we suppose the progress of mankind may be summed
up in these three things: — 1. The development of
man's natural faculties. 2. The consequent acquisi
tion of power over the material world. 3. The or
ganization of men into small or large companies hav
ing corporate unity of action for the social whole, and.

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 409
individual freedom for the personal parts. It would
be an improvement if the author would favor us with
a definition of Civilization, which might properly be
made in the Preface.
The author's style is clear and distinct, not ambi
tious or ornamented. We often pause to admire a
great thought, a wide and felicitous generalization, or
a nice account of some special detail, nay, to question
the truth of a statement of fact, or of a philosophic in
duction ; we never stop to puzzle over a difficult sen
tence. Now and then he rises to eloquence, — the
elevation of his language coming from a moral, and
not a merely intellectual cause. We do not always
agree with the argument, but remember no instance
in which he uses a sophism, or practices any trick on
the mind or emotions of his readers ; he never throws
dust in their eyes. Sometimes the evidence he offers is
obviously inadequate to convey the writer's certainty
to the reader ; then he confesses the fact. We remem
ber no ill-natured line in all the book, no ungenerous
sentiment. It is written in the special interest of no
class, nation, or race, but in the general interest of
mankind. We must now mention in detail some things which
seem to require a little further notice at our hands.
He says we are enabled to compare the condition
of mankind in every stage of civilization, and under
every variety of circumstance. We think the collec
tion of facts is not yet quite adequate to convey an
idea of the lowest stage. Man's existence may be di
vided into six periods, — the wild, savage, barbarous,
half-civilized, and enlightened. Scholarly men know
little of the first; for many years it has not been a
favorite subject of research. Lafitau, Monboddo,

410 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Meiners,3 and others, have collected important facts ;
many more still lie unused in the works of travelers,
geographers, and naturalists. Within a few years
Colonel Sleeman related some exceedingly interesting
particulars which came under his notice in India 4 ; we
refer to the children brought up by the wolves in
Hindustan, and subsequently reclaimed. Captain Gib
son of New York has told some things highly im
portant if true.5 Scholars know little of the condi
tion of the wild men who are below the savage, though
now and then one of that class is exhibited in our
great towns as a show. But, as mankind started from
this primeval condition, it becomes important to study
those tribes which have advanced least from it, and
such isolated persons as Colonel Sleeman speaks of,
who occur from time to time even in Germany and
France, and to gather together the facts scattered
in the works of ancient and modern writers, from
Herodotus to the travelers in the American interior.
The cannibals of Polynesia may shed much light on
the historical development of the human race. Writ
ers make great mistakes through their ignorance of
the primitive condition of mankind.
Mr. Buckle says we cannot make experiments in
civihzation, and thereby determine either facts of
man's nature or laws of his developments, and thus
it is more difficult to master human history. This is
true, but at this day so many human experiments are
taking place spontaneously that a philosopher need
hardly ask for more, even if he had power to make
them directly. Thus we have all the five great races
before us,- — to adopt that convenient division, — liv-'
ing separately in some places, and mingling their
blood in others. There are nations in all the six

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 411
stages of development, except the lowest, and perhaps
some even in that condition or very near it ; it is a wide
range from the Dyaks of New Guinea to the Royal
Academy of London. There are five great forms of
civilized religion still in the full tide of experiment, —
the Brahminic, Buddhistic, Jewish, Christian, and Mo
hammedan, — not to mention Mormons. Catholicism
and Protestantism stand side by side in Christendom;
there are many Protestant sects experimenting on man
kind. The three great forms of government, and
many transitional forms, may be studied in their
actual works. The experiment of labor is tried in
many forms, from slavery to entire unrestricted free
dom. Polyandry still prevails as an institution in
Siberia and other parts of Asia, — nay, in all the great
towns of the world as a profession; what is the in
stantial life of the tribe in Tartary, as it once was
in Scotland, is the exceptional life of the individual
harlot in London and Boston. Polygamy can be stud
ied in Turkey and Utah, where it is a lawful institu
tion, and in many places in its unlawful forms. In
the United States we have three races of men, Ethi
opian, American, Caucasian, here living separate, or
there minghng their blood. In one part of the Union
the public takes great pains to educate and foster the
laboring people; in another, the public makes it penal
to educate them.6 There are few experiments a philos
opher would wish made with mankind which mankind
is not making without his advice. We think, however,
of two not yet attempted. One is to allow women
the same political rights as the men ; the other, to put
honest men in political office. Neither has been tried
as yet.
Mr. Buckle denies that there is any original differ
ence in the faculties of different races of men.

412 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" Original distinctions of race are altogether hypothetical."
" We have no proof of the existence of hereditary talents,
vices, or virtues; we cannot safely assume that there has been
any permanent improvement in the moral or intellectual facul
ties of man, nor have we any decisive ground for saying that
these faculties are likely to be greater in an infant born in
the most civilized part of Europe than in one born in the wild
est region of a barbarous country."
We are surprised at this statement, coming from a
man of such a comprehensive mind, and one so exceed
ingly well read in many departments of human
thought. Looking at the matter on a large scale, it
seems to us that the difference in the natural endow
ment of different races is enormous. All the great,
permanent, and progressive civilizations are Caucas
ian. The Mongolian in China is no longer progres
sive ; no other race has reached the enlightened state.
All the six forms of civilized religion, Brahminic, He
brew, Buddhistic, Classic (Greek and Roman), Chris
tian, Mahometan, are Caucasian. All the great works
of science, literature, poetry, eloquence, and the fine
arts are from the same race. So are all the liberal
governments,- — the democracies, repubhcs, aristocra
cies, limited monarchies. No other race ever got be
yond a despotism Hmited by fear of assassination.
Surely the inductive philosophy would compel an in
quirer to infer an original difference of faculties in
the races themselves. What odds betwixt even the
Greeks and the Romans, the French and English, the
Irish and the Scotch ! In America, the original differ
ence of faculties in the African, the Indian, and the
Caucasian springs into the mind as readily as the dif
ference of color comes up before the eye. The obsti
nate and ferocious Indian will fight, he will not be a
slave. He may be broken, not bent. The pliant and
affectionate African seldom fights, and rarely takes

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 413
vengeance, and is easily sent into slavery. The In
dian boy and girl refuse education or take it unkindly.
How many experiments have been made in Massachu
setts and New York ! They all came to nothing.
Look at the matter on a smaller scale. The indi
vidual inheritance of qualities we had thought was
abundantly made out in the case of man, as of the
humbler animals. The same historic face runs in the
family for generations, the same qualities appear.
Genius appears to be an exception to this. Writers
on phrenology we thought had proved this long ago.
We can hardly suppose Mr. Buckle ignorant of any
important work, but this matter of inheritance has
been lately discussed with great learning by M. Pros
per Lucas.*
We find national character as the result of three
factors. There is a geographical element, an ethno
logical element, and an institutional element. Mr.
Buckle admits only two, the geographical and insti
tutional. If, in the middle ages, the Angles, Saxons,
Danes, and Norsemen had settled in France instead
of England, and there mixed their blood, does any one
think this Teutonic people would have now the same
character which marks the Celtic French? What a
difference between the Spanish and English settlements
in America! Is there no odds in the blood? What a
difference between the Greeks of the age of Pericles
and the mongrel people — part Greek, but chiefly Ro
man, Celt, and Slav — who occupy the same soil to
day ! CHmate, soil, aspect of nature, is still the same :
what an odds in the men!
* In his Traiti philosophique et physiologique sur V HiridiU
Naturelle. Paris. 1850. 2 vols. 8vo.

414 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
"Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild,
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields;
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled,
And still his honeyed wealth Hymettus yields;
There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress builds,
The free-born wanderer of thy mountain air;
Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds,
Still in his beams Mendeli's marbles glare;
Art, Glory, Freedom fail, but Nature still is fair."
The difference between the mythology of India and
Greece, we think, was caused more by the ethnology of
the people than the geography of their lands.
Mr. Buckle assumes that the Swedes and Spanish
are a fickle people, inconstant and unstable, and finds
the cause of that peculiarity in their climate, which
renders out-door work irregular. We have found no
proof of national fickleness in either people.
He gives a terrible portrait of the destructive deities
of the Hindoos. Siva is represented as a hideous be
ing, encircled by a girdle of snakes, with a human skull
in his hand, and wearing a necklace composed of human
bones. He has three eyes ; the ferocity of his temper
is marked by his being clothed in a tiger's skin, over
his left shoulder the deadly cobra di capello raises its
head. Dourga his wife has a body of dark blue, while
the palms of her hands are red with blood: she has
four arms, one holding the skull of a giant ; the hands
of victims are round her waist; her tongue lolls out
from her mouth; her neck is adorned with a ghastly
row of human heads, which hang dangling there.
Mr. Buckle attributes this horrible deity to the effect
of the aspect of nature, filling the mind with terror,
and forcing it to call up " shrieks and shapes and
sights unholy." But, alas ! these Hindoo conceptions
of God are less hideous than the Deity set forth by
our own Jonathan Edwards. No Hindoo could be-

BUCKLE'S CIVILIZATION 415
lieve in eternal damnation. Siva and Dourga would
have shrunk from the thought of tormenting new-born
babies for ever and ever.
Mr. Buckle speaks of the regularity of crime, the
certainty of its annual amount. But he fails to notice
some other important facts connected with crime.
Such offenses as theft, violence to the person, beating
of women, and the like, are confined, almost entirely,
to the poorest class of the community. A more care
ful inquiry shows that the criminals of this class either
have a bodily organization which impels them to crime,
or else have been exposed in early life to influences of
education which incline them that way ; so that with
many crime is either organized in them, or institution-
ized upon them.*
What we most object to in Mr. Buckle's transcen
dental history is his estimate of the moral powers ; he
thinks they have little to do with the progress of man
kind. He says there is a twofold progress, moral and
inteUectual; to be wilHng to perform our duty is the
moral part, to know how to perform it is the intellec
tual part; the influence which moral motives or the
dictates of the moral instinct have exercised over the
progress of civilization, is exceedingly small, while the
intellect is the real mover in man's progress.
Here we differ widely from him. It seems to us
that a man must know his duty, be willing to perform
it, and also know how to perform it; and that there
has been a continual progress in these three things.
He says, quoting from Sir James Mackintosh, morals
have hitherto been stationary, and are likely for ever
* What Seneca says of man in general, is mainly true of these
unfortunates. "Fata nos ducunt; et quantum cuique restet,
prima nascentium hora disposuit. Causa pendet ex causa,
privata ac publica longus ordo rerum trahit."— De Prov., V. 6.

416 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
to continue so. But if we read history aright there
has been a continually increasing knowledge of natural
right, a continual spread of knowledge among larger
and larger masses of people ; and more and more are
animated by moral motives, the desire to do a known
right. He says the great moral systems were the same
three thousand years ago as they are now; we think
this statement greatly deceptive. Take an example.
Did the Hebrew law say, " Thou shalt love thy neigh
bor " ? It restricted neighborhood to men of the same
country. When Jesus explained the word as meaning
whoso needed the aid a man could give, he represented
a great moral progress since the law was written.
" Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself :" these
words are adequate to express the moral feelings of a
good man to-day, as well as when first uttered; but
how much more they include now than then ! removal
of the causes of poverty, drunkenness, crime; protec
tion to the deaf and dumb, the blind, the crazy, and
the fool. There has been no change in the multi
plication-table since the days of Pythagoras, there will
be no change of it ; but the knowledge of it has been
spread among many millions, that knowledge has been
applied to many things he never thought of, and there
has been a great development of the mathematical
faculty in mankind.
Mr. Buckle says the influence of a man of great
morality is short in time, and not extensive in space.
In both statements he is mistaken. For the good man
directly incites others to imitate and surpass his ex
cellence; the tradition of it remains long after he is
dead, and spreads over all the civilized world. Be
sides, the moral idea becomes an institution or a law,
and then is a continual force in the new civilization

BUCKLE'S CD7ILIZATI0N 417
itself. A moral feeling can be organized, as well as
an inteUectual idea. The law forbidding murder,
theft, the slave-trade, piracy, and a thousand other
offenses, was a moral feeling once. So a hospital, an
almshouse, a school, a college, was once only the " dic
tate of the moral instinct." He says, " The deeper
we penetrate into the question, the more clearly shall
we see the superiority of intellectual acquisitions over
moral feeling." He should invert the sentence. He
says the Spanish Inquisitors were highly moral men,
no hypocrites, but remarkable for an undeviating and
incorruptible integrity ; with conscientious energy
" they fulfilled their duty." Now it is quite clear that
the leaders of the Spanish church were men of large
inteUect, carefully cultivated, learned, adroit, familiar
with the world. But we should say they were men
of very little morahty. The conscience, the power to
discern right, was so little developed, that, if they
were learned, they did not know it was wrong to tear
a girl to pieces on the rack, because she could not be
heve that the Pope was infallible. We should not say
a man's mind was well developed who did not know
that one and one make two; should we say a man's
conscience is well developed who does not know it is
wrong thus to torture a girl?
He says, " The stock of American knowledge is
small, but it is spread through all classes." If by
knowledge he means " an acquaintance with physical
and mental laws," it is not true that the amount is
small in comparison with other countries, though ac
quaintance with Hterature is certainly quite rare.
But when he says " little attention has been paid to
physical science," we think him much mistaken. He
thinks philosophical inquiries are "almost entirely
11—27

418 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
neglected." It is not quite true. If no great meta
physician has appeared since Jonathan Edwards, as
he truly says, how many has England produced since
Berkeley? Dr. Hickok's " Rational Psychology " is a
more profound book than that of Jonathan Edwards.7
Three things go to make a great metaphysician ; power
of psychological analysis ; intuitive power to perceive
great truths, either by a synthetic judgment a priori
or by a comprehensive induction from facts of con
sciousness or observation, power of deductive logic.
Jonathan Edwards was great only in the last, and
least of all. America is more devoted to practical
affairs, and certainly has done little in metaphysics.
But from the death of Newton, in 1727, till the end
of that century, how little England did in mathe
matics ! We wish it were true that knowledge is so
widely diffused as he says. But, alas ! there are four
million slaves who know nothing, and as many " poor
whites " who know little. We shall not pursue these
criticisms. " Ubi plura nitent in carmine, non ego paucis
Offendar maculis, quas aut incuria fudit,
Aut humana parum cavit natura."
Mr. Buckle has given us one of the most important
contributions which any Englishman has yet made to
the philosophy of human history. We wish we had
adequate space to point out its excellences in detail;
but the analysis and the extracts we have given must
suffice for the present. We congratulate the author
on his success. We are sure the thoughtful world
will give him a thoughtful welcome, and if his fu
ture volumes, which we anxiously look for, shall equal
this, he is sure of a high place in the estimation of
mankind.

IX
HENRY WARD BEECHER
There are more than thirty thousand preachers in
the United States, whereof twenty eight thousand are
Protestants, the rest Catholics, — one minister to a
thousand men. They make an exceeding great army,
— mostly serious, often self-denying and earnest.
Nay, sometimes you find them men of large talent,
perhaps even of genius. No thirty thousand farm
ers, mechanics, lawyers, doctors, or traders have so
much of that book-learning which is popularly called
" Education." No class has such opportunities for influence, such
means of power ; even now the press ranks second to
the pulpit. Some of the old traditional respect for
the theocratic class continues in service, and waits
upon the ministers. It has come down from Celtic
and Teutonic fathers, hundreds of years behind us,
who transferred to a Roman priesthood the allegiance
paid to the servants of a deity quite different from
the Catholics. The Puritans founded an ecclesiastical
oligarchy which is by no means ended yet; with the
most obstinate "liberty of prophesying" there was
mixed a certain respect for such as only wore the
prophet's mantle ; nor is it wholly gone.
What personal means of controlling the public the
minister has at his command! Of their own accord
men " assemble and meet together," and look up to
him. In the country the town-roads center at the
meeting-house, which is also the terminus a quo, the
419

420 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
golden mile-stone, whence distances are measured off.
Once a week the wheels of business, and even of pleas
ure, drop into the old customary ruts, and turn
thither. Sunday morning all the land is still. La
bor puts off his iron apron and arrays him in clean hu
man clothes, — a symbol of universal humanity, not
merely of special toil. Trade closes the shop; his
business-pen, well wiped, is laid up for to-morrow's
use ; the account-book is shut, — men thinking of their
trespasses as well as their debts. For six days, aye,
and so many nights, Broadway roars with the great
stream which sets this way and that, as wind and tide
press up and down. How noisy is this great chan
nel of business, wherein humanity rolls to and fro,
now running into shops, now sucked down into ceUars,
then dashed high up the tall, steep banks, to come
down again a continuous drip and be lost in the gen
eral flood ! What a fringe of foam colors the margin
on either side, and what gay bubbles float therein, with
more varied gorgeousness than the Queen of Sheba
dreamed of putting on when she courted the eye of
Hebrew Solomon ! Sunday this noise is still. Broad
way is a quiet stream, looking sober or even dull; its
voice is but a gentle murmur of many waters calmly
flowing where the ecclesiastical gates are open to let
them in. The channel of business has shrunk to a
little church-canal. Even in this great Babel of com
merce one day in seven is given up to the minister.
The world may have the other six, this is for the
church ; — for so have Abram and Lot divided the field
of time, that there be no strife between the rival
herdsmen of the church and the world. Sunday morn
ing time rings the bell. At the familiar sound, by
long habit born in them, and older than memory, men

BEECHER 421
assemble at the meeting-house, nestle themselves de
voutly in their snug pews, and button themselves in
with wonted care. There is the shepherd, and here
is the flock, fenced off into so many little private pens.
With dumb, yet eloquent patience, they look up list
less, perhaps longing, for such fodder as he may
pull out from his spiritual mow and shake down be
fore them. What he gives they gather.
Other speakers must have some magnetism of per
sonal power or public reputation to attract men, but
the minister can dispense with that; to him men an
swer before he calls, and even when they are not sent
by others are drawn by him. Twice a week, nay,
three times, if he will, do they lend him their ears
to be filled with his words. No man of science or
letters has such access to men. Besides, he is to speak
on the grandest of all themes, — of man, of God, of
religion, man's deepest desires, his loftiest aspirings.
Before him the rich and the poor meet together, con
scious of the one God, Master of them all, who is no
respecter of persons. To the minister the children
look up, and their pliant faces are moulded by his
plastic hand. The young men and maidens are there,
— such possibility of life and character before them,
such hope is there, such faith in man and God, as
comes instinctively to those who have youth on their
side. There are the old: men and women with white
crowns on their heads ; faces which warn and scare
with the ice and storm of eighty winters, or guide and
charm with the beauty of fore-score summers, — rich in
promise once, in harvest now. Very beautiful is the
presence of old men, and of that venerable sisterhood
whose experienced temples are turbaned with the rai-

422 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ment of such as have come out of much tribulation,
and now shine as white stars foretelling an eternal
day. Young men all around, a young man in the
pulpit, the old men's look of experienced life says
" Amen " to the best word, and their countenance is a
benediction. The minister is not expected to appeal to the self
ish motives which are addressed by the market, the
forum, or the bar, but to the eternal principle of
right. He must not be guided by the statutes of
men, changeable as the clouds, but must fix his eye
on the bright particular star of justice, the same
yesterday, to-day, and forever. To him office, money,
social rank and fame are but toys or counters which
the game of life is played withal; while wisdom, in
tegrity, benevolence, piety are the prizes the game is
for. He digs through the dazzling sand, and bids
men build on the rock of ages.
Surely, no men have such opportunity of speech
and power as these thirty thousand ministers. What
have they to show for it all? The hunter, fisher,
woodman, miner, farmer, mechanic, has each his spe
cial wealth. What have this multitude of ministers to
show ? — how much knowledge given, what wise guid
ance, what inspiration of humanity? Let the best
men answer.
This ministerial army may be separated into three
divisions. First, the church militant, the fighting
church, as the ecclesiastical dictionaries define it.
Reverend men serve devoutly in its ranks. Their
work is negative, oppositional. Under various ban
ners, with diverse and discordant war-cries, trumpets
braying a certain or uncertain sound, and weapons
of strange pattern, though made of trusty steel, they

BEECHER 423
do battle against the enemy. What shots from an
tique pistols, matchlocks, from crossbows and cat
apults, are let fly at the foe ! Now the champion at
tacks "New Views," " Ultraism," "Neology," "In
novation," " Discontent," " Carnal Reason " ; then he
lays lance in rest, and rides valiantly upon " Uni-
tarianism," "Popery," "Infidelity," "Atheism,"
Deism," " Spiritualism " ; and though one by one he
runs them through, yet he never quite slays the evil
one;> — the severed limbs unite again, and a new mon
ster takes the old one's place. It is serious men who
make up the church militant, — grim, earnest, valiant.
If mustered in the ninth century, there had been no
better soldiers nor elder.
Next is the church termagant. They are the scolds
of the church-hold, terrible from the beginning hith
erto. Their work is denouncing; they have always
a burden against something. Obsta decisis is their
motto, — " Hate all that is agreed upon." When the
" contrary-minded " are called for, the church ter
magant holds up its hand. A turbulent people, and
a troublesome, are these sons of thunder, — a brother
hood of universal come-outers. Their only concord
is disagreement. It is not often, perhaps, that they
have better thoughts than the rest of men, but a
superior aptitude to find fault; their growling proves,
" not that themselves are wise, but others weak." So
their pulpit is a brawling-tub, " full of sound and
fury, signifying nothing." They have a deal of
thunder, and much lightning, but no light, nor any
continuous warmth, only spasms of heat. Odi pre-
sentem laudare absentem, — the Latin tells their story.
They come down and trouble every Bethesda in the
world, but heal none of the impotent folk. To them,

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" Of old things, all are over old,
Of new things, none is new enough."
They have a rage for fault-finding, and betake them
selves to the pulpit as others are sent to Bedlam.
Men of all denominations are here, and it is a deal
of mischief they do, — -the worst, indirectly, by mak
ing a sober man distrust the religious faculty they
appeal to, and set his face against all mending of
anything, no matter how badly it is broken. These
Theudases, boasting themselves to be somebody, and
leading men off to perish in the wilderness, frighten
every sober man from all thought of moving out of
his bad neighborhood or seeking to make it better.
But this is a small portion of the ecclesiastic host.
Let us be tolerant to their noise and bigotry.
Last of all is the church beneficent or constructant.
Their work is positive, — critical of the old, creative
also of the new. They take hold of the strongest of
all human faculties, — the religious, — and use this
great river of God, always full of water, to moisten
hill-side and meadow, to turn lonely saw-mills, and
drive the wheels in great factories, which make a
metropolis of manufactures, — to bear alike the lum
berman's logs and the trader's ships to their appointed
place ; the stream feeding many a little forget-me-not,
as it passes by. Men of all denominations belong to
this church catholic; yet all are of one persuasion,
the brotherhood of humanity, — for the one spirit loves
manifoldness of form. They trouble themselves little
about sin, the universal but invisible enemy whom the
church termagant attempts to shell and dislodge ; but
are very busy in attacking sins. These ministers of
religion would rout drunkenness and want, ignorance,
idleness, lust, covetousness, vanity, hate, and pride, —

BEECHER 425
vices of instinctive passion or reflective ambition. Yet
the work of these men is to build up ; they cut down
the forest and scare off the wild beasts only to re-
'place them with civil crops, — cattle, corn, and men.
Instead of the howling wilderness, they would have
the village or the city, full of comfort and wealth
and musical with knowledge and with love. How
often are they misunderstood ! Some savage hears the
ring of the axe, the crash of falling timber, or the
rifle's crack and the drop of wolf or bear, and cries
out, " A destructive and dangerous man ; he has no
reverence for the ancient wilderness, but would abolish
it and its inhabitants ; away with him ! " But look
again at this destroyer, and in place of the desert
woods, lurked in by a few wild beasts and wilder men,
behold, a whole New England of civilization has come
up! The minister of this Church of the Good Sa
maritans delivers the poor that cry, and the father
less, and him that hath none to help him ; he makes
the widow's heart sing for joy, and the blessing of
such as are ready to perish comes on him ; he is eyes
to the blind, feet to the lame; the cause of evil which
he knows not he searches out; breaking the jaws of
the wicked to pluck one spirit out of their teeth.
In a world of work, he would have no idler in the
market-place; in a world of bread, he would not eat
his morsel alone while the fatherless has nought; nor
would he see any perish for want of clothing. He
knows the wise God made man for a good end, and
provided adequate means thereto ; so he looks for them
where they were placed, in the world of matter and of
men, not outside of either. So while he entertains
every old truth, he looks out also into the crowd of new
opinions, hoping to find others of their kin; and the

426 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
new thought does not lodge in the street ; he opens his
doors to the traveler, not forgetful to entertain stran
gers, — knowing that some have also thereby enter
tained angels unawares. He does not fear the great
multitude, nor does the contempt of a few families
make him afraid.
This church constructant has a long apostolical suc
cession of great men, and many nations are gathered
in its fold. And what a variety of beliefs it has !
But while each man on his private account says, credo,
and believes as he must and shall, and writes or speaks
his opinions in what speech he likes best, — they all,
with one accordant mouth, say likewise, faciamus, and
betake them to the one great work of developing
man's possibility of knowledge and virtue.
Mr. Beecher belongs to this church constructant.
He is one of its eminent members, its most popular
and effective preacher. No minister in the United
States is so well known, none so widely beloved. He
is as well known in Ottawa as in Broadway. He has
the largest Protestant congregation in America, and
an ungathered parish which no man attempts to num
ber. He has church members in Maine, Wisconsin,
Georgia, Texas, California, and all the way between.
Men look on him as a national institution, a part of
the public property. Not a Sunday in the year but
representative men from every state in the Union fix
their eyes on him, are instructed by his sermons and
uplifted by his prayers. He is the most popular of
American lecturers. In the celestial sphere of theo
logical journals, his papers are the bright particular
star in that constellation called the " Independent " ;
men look up to and bless the useful light, and learn
therefrom the signs of the times. He is one of the

BEECHER 427
bulwarks of freedom in Kansas, a detached fort. He
was a great force in the last Presidential campaign,
and several stump-speakers were specially detailed to
overtake and offset him.1 But the one man surrounded
the many. Scarcely is there a Northern minister so
bitterly hated at the South. The slave-traders, the
border-ruffians, the purchased officials know no higher
law ; " nor Hale nor devil can make them afraid " ; 2
yet they fear the terrible whip of Henry Ward
Beecher. The time has not come — may it long be far dis
tant ! • — to analyze his talents and count up his merits
and defects. But there are certain obvious excel
lences which account for his success and for the honor
paid him.
Mr. Beecher has great strength of instinct, of spon
taneous human feeling. Many men lose this in " get
ting an education " ; they have tanks of rain-water,
barrels of well-water; but on their premises is no
spring, and it never rains there. A mountain-spring
supplies Mr. Beecher with fresh, living water.
He has great love for nature, and sees the sym
bolical value of material beauty and its effect on man.
He has great fellow-feeling with the joys and sor
rows of men. Hence he is always on the side of the
suffering, and especially of the oppressed; all his ser
mons and lectures indicate this. It endears him to
millions, and also draws upon him the hatred and
loathing of a few Pharisees, some of them members of
his own sect. Listen to this : —
"Looked at without educated associations, there is no differ
ence between a man in bed and a man in a coffin. And yet
such is the power of the heart to redeem the animal life tbat
, there is nothing more exquisitely refined and pure and beauti
ful than the chamber of the house. The couch! From the day

428 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
that the bride sanctifies it, to the day when the aged mother
is borne from it, it stands clothed with loveliness and dignity.
Cursed be the tongue that dares speak evil of the household
bed! By its side oscillates the cradle. Not far from it is the
crib. In this sacred precinct, the mother's chamber, lies the
heart of the family. Here the child learns its prayer. Hither,
night by night, angels troop. It is the Holy of Holies."
How well he understands the ministry of grief
"A Christian man's life is laid in the loom of time to a
pattern which he does not see, but God does; and his heart is
a shuttle. On one side of the loom is sorrow, and on the other
is joy; and the shuttle, struck alternately by each, flies 'back
and forth, carrying the thread, which is white or black, as the
pattern needs; and in the end, when God shall lift up the
finished garment, and all its changing hues shall glance out, it
will then appear that the deep and dark colors were as needful
to beauty as the bright and high colors."
He loves children, and the boy still fresh in his
manhood. "When your own child comes in from the street, and has
learned to swear from the bad boys congregated there, it is
a very different thing to you from what it was when you
heard the profanity of those boys as you passed them. Now
it takes hold of you, and makes you feel that you are a stock
holder in the public morality. Children make men better citi
zens. Of what use would an engine be to a ship, if it were
lying loose in the hull? It must be fastened to it with bolts
and screws before it can propel the vessel. Nov. a childless
man is just like a loose engine. A man must be bolted and
screwed to the community before he can begin to work for its
advancement; and there are no such screws and bolts as chil
dren." He has a most Christ-like contempt for the hypo
crite, whom he scourges with heavy evangelical whips,
¦ — but the tenderest Christian love for earnest men
struggling after nobleness. Read this: —
" I think the wickedest people on earth are those who use a
force of genius to make themselves selfish in the noblest things,
keeping themselves aloof from the vulgar and the ignorant and

BEECHER 429
the unknown; rising higher and higher in taste till they sit,
ice upon ice, on the mountain-top of eternal congelation."
"Men are afraid of slight outward acts which will injure
them in the eyes of others, while they are heedless of the damna
tion which throbs in their souls in hatreds and jealousies and
revenges." " Many people use their refinements as a spider uses his
web, to catch the weak upon that they may be mercilessly de
voured. Christian men should use refinement on this principle;
the more I have, the more I owe to those who are less than I."
He values the substance of man more than his acci
dents. "We say a man is 'made.' What do we mean? That he
has got the control of his lower instincts, so that they are
only fuel to his higher feelings, giving force to his nature?
That his affections are like vines, sending out on all sides blos
soms and clustering fruits? That his tastes are so cultivated,
that all beautiful things speak to him, and bring him their
delights? That his understanding is opened, so that he walks
through every hall of knowledge and gathers its treasures?
That his moral feelings are so developed and quickened that
he holds sweet commerce with Heaven? Oh, no! — none of
these things! He is cold and dead in heart and mind and soul.
Only his passions are alive; but — he is worth five hundred
thousand dollars!
"And we say a man is 'ruined.' Are his wife and children
dead? Oh, no! Have they had a quarrel, and are they sepa
rated from him? Oh, no! Has he lost his reputation through
crime? No. Is his reason gone? Oh, no! it's as sound as ever.
Is he struck through with disease? No. He has lost his prop
erty, and he is ruined. The man ruined? When shall we learn
that ' a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things
be possesseth'"?
Mr. Beecher's God has the gentle and philanthropic
qualities of Jesus of Nazareth, with omnipotence
added. Religious emotion comes out in his prayers,
sermons, and lectures, as the vegetative power of the
earth in the manifold plants and flowers of spring.
"The sun does not shine for a few trees and flowers, but
for the wide world's joy. The lonely pine on the mountain-
top waves its sombre boughs, and cries, 'Thou art my sun!'

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
And the little meadow-violet lifts its cup of blue, and whispers
with its perfumed breath, 'Thou art my sun!' And the grain
in a thousand fields rustles in the wind, and makes answer,
' Thou art my sun ! '
" So God sits effulgent in heaven, not for a favored few, but
for the universe of life; and there is no creature so poor or
so low that he may not look up with childlike confidence and
say, ' My Father ! thou art mine ! ' "
" When once the filial feeling is breathed into the heart the
soul cannot be terrified by augustness, or justice, or any form
of Divine grandeur; for then, to such a one, all the attributes
of God are but so many arms stretched abroad through the
universe, to gather and to press to his bosom those whom he
loves. The greater he is, the gladder are we, so that he be our
Father still.
" But, if one consciously turns away from God, or fears
him, the nobler and grander the representation be, the more
terrible is his conception of the Divine Adversary that frowns
upon him. The God whom love beholds rises upon the horizon
like mountains which carry summer up their sides to the very
top; but that Sternly just God whom sinners fear stands cold
against the sky, like Mont Blanc; and from his icy sides the
soul, quickly sliding, plunges headlong down to unrecalled de
struction." He has hard words for such as get only the form
of religion, or but little of its substance.
" There are some Christians whose secular life is an arid,
worldly strife, and whose religion is but a turbid sentimental
ism. Their life runs along that line where the overflow of the
Nile meets the desert. It is the boundary line between sand
and mud."
" That gospel which sanctions ignorance and oppression for
three millions of men, what fruit or flower has it to shake
down for the healing of the nations? It is cursed in its own
roots, and blasted in its own boughs."
"Many of our churches defy Protestantism. Grand cathe
drals are they, which make us shiver as we enter them. The
windows are so constructed as to exclude the light and inspire
a religious awe. The walls are of stone, which makes us
think of our last home. The ceilings are sombre, and the pews
coffin-colored. Then the services are composed to these cir
cumstances, and hushed music goes trembling along the aisles,
and men move softly, and would on no account put on their
hats before they reach the door; but when they do, they take

BEECHER 431
a long breath, and have such a sense of relief to be in the free
air, and comfort themselves with the thought that they've been
good Christians!
"Now this idea of worship is narrow and false. The house
of God should be a joyous place for the right use of all our
faculties." " There ought to be such an atmosphere in every Christian
church that a man going there and sitting two hours should
take the contagion of heaven, and carry home a fire to kindle
the altar whence he came."
" The call to religion is not a call to be better than your
fellows, but to be better than yourself. Religion is relative
to the individual."
"My best presentations of the gospel to you are so incom
plete! Sometimes, when I am alone, I have such sweet and
rapturous visions of the love of God and the truths of his
word, that I think, if I could speak to you then, I should move
your hearts. I am like a child who, walking forth some sunny
summer's morning, sees grass and flower all shining with drops
of dew. ' Oh,' he cries, ' I'll carry these beautiful things to
my mother ! ' And eagerly plucking them, the dew drops into
his little palm, and all the charm is gone. There is but grass
in his hand, and no longer pearls."
"There are many professing Christians who are secretly
vexed on account of the charity they have to bestow and the
self-denial they have to use. If, instead of the smooth prayers
which they do pray, they should speak out the things which
they really feel, they would say, when they go home at night,
' O Lord, I met a poor curmudgeon of yours to-day, a mis
erable, unwashed brat, and I gave him sixpence, and I have
been sorry for it ever since'; or, 'O Lord, if I had not signed
those articles of faith, I might have gone to the theatre this
evening. Your religion deprives me of a great deal of enjoy
ment, but I mean to stick to it. There's no other way of get
ting into heaven, I suppose.'
" The sooner such men are out of the church, the better."
" The youth-time of churches produces enterprise ; their age,
indolence; but even this might be borne did not these dead
men sit in the door of their sepulchres, crying out against every
living man who refuses to wear the livery of death. In India,
when the husband dies, they burn his widow with him. I am
almost tempted to think, that if with the end of every pas
torate, the church itself were disbanded and destroyed, to be
gathered again by the succeeding teacher, we should thus se
cure an immortality of youth."
" A religious life is not a thing which spends itself. It is

432 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
like a river which widens continually, and is never so broad or
so deep as at its mouth, where it rolls into the ocean of
eternity." " God made the world to relieve an over-full creative thought,
— as musicians sing, as we talk, as artists sketch, when full of
suggestions. What profusion is there in his work! When
trees blossom, there is not a single breastpin, but a whole
bosom full of gems; and of leaves they have so many suits
that they can throw them away to the winds all summer long,
What unnumbered cathedrals has he reared in the forest shades,
vast and grand, full of curious carvings, and haunted evermore
by tremulous music! and in the heavens above, how do stars
seem to have flown out of his hand faster than sparks out of a
mighty forge ! "
" Oh, let the soul alone ! Let it go to God as best it may !
It is entangled enough. It is hard enough for it to rise above
the distractions which environ it. Let a man teach the rain
how to fall, the clouds how to shape themselves and move
their airy rounds, the seasons how to cherish and garner the
universal abundance; but let him not teach a soul to pray, on
whom the Holy Ghost doth brood ! "
I He recognizes the difference between religion and
theology. " How sad is that field from which battle hath just departed!
By as much as the valley was exquisite in its loveliness is it
now sublimely sad in its desolation. Such to me is the Bible
when a fighting theologian has gone through it.
" How wretched a spectacle is a garden into which the cloven-
footed beasts have entered! That which yesterday was fra
grant, and shone all over with crowded beauty, is to-day rooted,
despoiled, trampled, and utterly devoured, and all over the
ground you shall find but the rejected cuds of flowers and
leaves, and forms that have been champed for their juices
and then rejected. Such to me is the Bible when the prag
matic prophecy-monger and the swinish utilitarian have toothed
its fruits and craunched its blossoms.
" O garden of the Lord ! whose seeds dropped down from
heaven, and to whom angels bear watering dews night by night!
O flowers and plants of righteousness ! O sweet and holy
fruits! We walk among you, and gaze with loving eyes, and
rest under your odorous shadows; nor will we, with sacrilegious
hand, tear you, that we may search the secret of your roots,
nor spoil you, that we may know how such wondrous grace and
goodness are evolved within you ! "

BEECHER 433
"What a pin is when the diamond has dropped from its set
ting, is the Bible when its emotive truths have been taken
away. What a babe's clothes are, when the babe has slipped
out of them into death and the mother's arms clasp only
raiment, would be the Bible, if the Babe of Bethlehem, and
the truths of deep-heartedness that clothed his life, should slip
out of it."
" There is no food for soul or body which God has not sym
bolized. He is light for the eye, sound for the ear, bread
for food, wine for weariness, peace for trouble. Every faculty
of the soul, if it would but open its door, might see Christ
standing over against it, and silently asking by his smile,
'Shall I come in unto thee?' But men open the door and
look down, not up, and thus see him not. So it is that men
sigh on, not knowing what the soul wants, but only that it needs
something. Our yearnings are homesickness for heaven; our
sighings are for God; just as children that cry themselves
asleep away from home, and sob in their slumber, know not
that they sob for their parents. The soul's inarticulate moan-
ings are the affections yearning for the Infinite, but having no
one to tell them what it is that ails them."
" I feel sensitive about theologies. Theology is good in its
place; but when it puts its hoof upon a living, palpitating,
human heart, my heart cries out against it."
" There are men marching along in the company of Chris
tians on earth, who, when they knock at the gate of heaven,
will hear God answer, ' I never knew you.' — ' But the ministers
did, and the church-books did.' — ' That may be. I never did.'
" It is no matter who knows a man on earth, if God does
not know him."
" The heart-knowledge, through God's teaching, is true
wealth, and they are often poorest who deem themselves most
rich. I, in the pulpit, preach with proud forms to many a
humble widow and stricken man who might well teach me. The
student, spectacled and gray with wisdom, and stuffed with
lumbered lore, may be childish and ignorant beside some old
singing saint who brings the wood into his study, and who,
with the lens of his own experience, brings down the orbs of
truth, and beholds through his faith and his humility things
of which the white-haired scholar never dreamed."
He has eminent integrity, is faithful to his own
soul, and to every delegated trust. No words are
needed here as proof. His life is daily argument.
The public will understand this; men whose taste he
11—28

434 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
offends, and whose theology he shocks, or to whose
philosophy he is repugnant, have confidence in the in
tegrity of the man. He means what he says, — is
solid all through.
" From the beginning, I educated myself to speak along the
line and in the current of my moral convictions; and though,
in later days, it has carried me through places where there
were some batterings and bruisings, yet I have been supremely
grateful that I was led to adopt this course. I would rather
speak the truth to ten men than blandishments and lying to a
million. Try it, ye who think there is nothing in it! try what
it is to speak with God behind you, — to speak so as to be only
the arrow in the bow which the Almighty draws."
With what affectionate tenderness does this great,
faithful soul pour out his love to his own church ! He
invites men to the communion-service.
" Christian brethren, in heaven you are known by the name of
Christ. On earth, for convenience's sake, you are known by
the name of Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Methodists, Congre-
gationalists, and the like. Let me speak the language of
heaven, and call you simply Christians. Whoever of you has
known the name of Christ, and feels Christ's life beating within
him, is invited to remain and sit with us at the table of the
Lord." And again, when a hundred were added to his
church, he says: —
"My friends, my heart is large to-day. I am like a tree
upon which rains have fallen till every leaf is covered with
drops of dew; and no wind goes through the boughs but I hear
the pattering of some thought of joy and gratitude. I love
you all more than ever before. You are crystalline to me;
your faces are radiant; and I look through your eyes, as
through windows, into heaven. I behold in each of you an im
prisoned angel, that is yet to burst forth, and to live and shine
in the better sphere."
He has admirable power of making a popular state
ment of his opinions. He does not analyze a matter to
its last elements, put the ultimate facts in a row and

BEECHER 435
find out their causes or their law of action, nor aim
at large synthesis of generalization, the highest effort
of philosophy, which groups things into a whole — it
is commonly thought both of these processes are out
of place in meeting-houses and lecture-halls, that the
people can comprehend neither the one nor the other
— but he gives a popular view of the thing to be dis
cussed, which can be understood on the spot without
painful reflection. He speaks for the ear which takes
in at once and understands. He never makes atten
tion painful. He illustrates his subject from daily
life ; the fields, the streets, stars, flowers, music, and
babies are his favorite emblems. He remembers that
he does not speak to scholars, to minds disciplined by
long habits of thought, but to men with common edu
cation, careful and troubled about many things; and
they keep his words and ponder them in their hearts.
So he has the diffuseness of a wide natural field, which
properly spreads out its clover, dandelions, dock, but
tercups, grasses, violets, with here and there a deli- :
cate Arethusa that seems to have run under this sea
of common vegetation and come up in a strange place.
He has not the artificial condensation of a garden,
where luxuriant nature assumes the form of art. His
dramatic power makes his sermon also a life in the
pulpit ; his auditorium is also a theatrum, for he acts
to the eye what he addresses to the ear, and at once
wisdom enters at the two gates. The extracts show
his power of thought and speech as well as of feel
ing. Here are specimens of that pecuhar humor
which appears in all his works.
" Sects and Cnristians that desire to be known by the undue
prominence of some single feature of Christianity are neces
sarily imperfect just in proportion to the distinctness of their
peculiarities. The power of Christian truth is in its unity and

436 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
symmetry, and not in the saliency or brilliancy of any of its
special doctrines. If among painters of the human face and
form there should spring up a sect of the eyes, and another
sect of the nose, a sect of the hand, and a sect of the foot,
and all of them should agree but in the one thing of forgetting
that there was a living spirit behind the features more im
portant than them all, they would too much resemble the
schools and cliques of Christians ; for the spirit of Christ is
the great essential truth; doctrines are but the features of
the face, and ordinances but the hands and feet."
Here are some separate maxims: —
"It is not well for a man to pray cream and live skim-
milk." " The mother's heart is the child's school-room."
"They are not reformers who simply abhor evil. Such men
become in the end abhorrent themselves."
" There are many troubles which you can't cure by the Bible
and the Hymn-book, but which you can cure by a good perspira
tion and a breath of fresh air."
"The most dangerous infidelity of the day is the infidelity
of rich and orthodox churches."
" The fact that a nation is growing is God's own charter of
change." " There is no class in society who can so ill afford to under
mine the conscience of the community, or to set it loose from
its moorings in the eternal sphere, as merchants who live upon
confidence and credit. Anything which weakens or paralyzes
this is taking beams from the foundations of the merchant's
own warehouse."
" It would almost seem as if there were a certain drollery
of art which leads men who think they are doing one thing
to do another and very different one. Thus, men have set up
in their painted church-windows the symbolisms of virtues and
graces, and the images of saints, and even of Divinity itself.
Yet now, what does the window do but mock the separations
and proud isolations of Christian men? For there sit the audi
ence, each one taking a separate color; and there are blue
Christians and red Christians, there are yellow saints and
orange saints, there are purple Christians and green Chris
tians; but how few are simple, pure, white Christians, uniting
all the cardinal graces, and proud, not of separate colors, but
of the whole manhood of Christ ! "
"Every mind is entered, like every house, through its own
door."

BEECHER 437
"Doctrine is nothing but the skin of truth set up and
stuffed." " Compromise is the word that men use when the devil gets
a victory over God's cause."
" A man in the right, with God on his side, is in the ma
jority, though he be alone; for God is multitudinous above all
populations of the earth."
But this was first said by Frederic Douglas, and
better: "One with God is a majority."
"A lie always needs a truth for a handle to it; else the
hand would cut itself, which sought to drive it home upon
another. The worst lies, therefore, are those whose blade is
false, but whose handle is true."
" It is not conviction of truth which does men good; it is
moral consciousness of truth."
" A conservative young man has wound up his life before
it was unreeled. We expect old men to be conservative; but
when a nation's young men are so, its funeral-bell is already
rung." "Night-labor, in time, will destroy the student; for it is
marrow from his own bones with which he fills his lamp."
A great-hearted, eloquent, fervent, live man, full
of religious emotion, of humanity and love, — no won
der he is dear to the people of America. Long may
he bring instruction to the lecture associations of the
North ! Long may he stand in his pulpit at Brooklyn
with his heavenly candle, which goeth not out at all
by day, to kindle the devotion and piety of the thou
sands who cluster around him, and carry thence light
and warmth to all the borders of the land !
We should do injustice to our own feelings, did
we not, in closing, add a word of hearty thanks and
commendation to the member of Mr. Beecher's con
gregation to whom we are indebted for a volume that
has given us so much pleasure. The selection covers
a wide range of topics, and testifies at once to the
good taste and the culture of the editress. Many of

438 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
the finest passages were conceived and uttered in the
rapid inspiration of speaking, and but for her admir
ing intelligence and care, the eloquence, wit, and wis
dom, which are here preserved to us, would have faded
into air with the last vibration of the preacher's voice.

LIFE AND CHARACTER OF DR. FOLLEN
There are two classes of men that have a wide and
reformatory influence on the world; who write out
their thoughts and sentiments, not in words only, but
in things. The one consists of men of great intel
lectual power, but no special goodness of heart. They
see in the " dry light " of the understanding what
is false, what wrong, what ludicrous in man's affairs,
and expose it to be rejected, to be abhorred or to be
laughed at. Their eye is keen and far-reaching in the
actual ; but their insight is not the deepest, nor does
the sphere of their reason include all things of human
concern. Of these men you do not ask, What was
their character? how did they live in their day and
their place? but only, What did they think of this
thing and of that? Their lives may have been bad,
their motives, both for silence and for speech, may have
been ignoble and selfish, and their whole life but a
long attempt to build up for themselves a fortune and
a name; but that does not mar their influence, except
in the narrow sphere of their personal life. The good
they do lives after them, the evil sleeps with their
buried bones. The world looks on them as half-men,
expects from them no wholeness of action, but takes
their good gift and first forgives and then forgets
their moral obliquity or defects. It is often painful
to contemplate such men. The brightness of their
inteUect leads us to wish for a corresponding beauty
on their moral side. If a man's wisdom does not
439

440 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
show itself in his works, if his light does not become
his life, making his pathway radiant; why, our moral
anticipation is disappointed, and we turn away in
sadness. Men of a giant's mind and a pigmy's heart;
men capable of spanning the heavens, of fathoming
the depths of all human science, of mounting with
vigorous and untiring pinions above the roar of the
crowd and the prejudice of th_ schools, and continu
ing their flight before the admiring eyes of lesser men
till distance and loftiness swallows them up ; men who
bring back from their adventurous voyagings new
discoveries for human wonder, new truths for daily
use; men, too, that with all this wondrous endowment
of intellect are yet capable of vanity, selfish ambition,
and the thousand little arts which make up the ac
complished worldling, such men are a sore puzzle to
the young and enthusiastic moralist. " What," he
says, "is God unjust? Shall the man whose eye is
ever on himself, keen as the eagle's to look for his
own profit, yet dull as the blindworm's or the beetle's
to the shadows of wrong in his own bosom, shall he
be gifted with this faculty to pierce the mystic cur
tains of nature, and see clearly in his ignoble life
where the saint groped for the wall and fell, not see
ing? " Such is the fact, often as he may attempt to
disguise it. The world, past and present, furnishes us
with proofs that cannot be winked out of sight. Men
capable of noble and reformatory thought, who lack
the accomplishment of goodness and a moral life —
we need not pause to point out men of this character,
both present and departed ; that would be an ungrate
ful work, one not needed to be done.
The other class is made up of men of moral powers.
Their mental ability may be small or great, but their

FOLLEN 441
goodness is the most striking, and the fundamental
thing. They may not look over a large field, nor be
conversant with all the nooks and crevices of this
wondrous world, where science each day brings some
new miracle to light ; but in the sphere of morals they
see as no others. Fast as thought comes to them it
turns into action; what was at first but light, ele
mentary and cold, is soon transformed into life, which
multiplies itself and its blessings. These men look
with a single eye to the everlasting right. To them
God's law is a law to be kept, come present weal or
present woe. They ask not, What shall accrue to me,
or praise or blame? But contentedly they do the
work of righteousness their hands find to do, and this
with all their might. They Hve faster than they see,
for with a true moral man the spontaneous runs be
fore the reflective, as John outran Peter in seeking
the risen Son of Man. When these men have but
humble minds they are worthy of deep homage from
all mankind. In solitude and in silence, seen by no
eye but the All-seeing, they plant with many and
hopeful prayers the seed that is one day to spread
wide its branches, laden with all manner of fruit, its
very leaves for the healing of the nations. How often
has it happened that some woman, uncouth, not well
bred, and with but little of mind, has kindled in some
boy's bosom a love of right, a sense of the sweetness
of charity, of the beauty of religion, which grew with
his growth and strengthened with his strength, and at
last towered forth, strong and flame-like, in the moral
heroism of a man whom heaven employs to stir the
world and help God's kingdom come! It was only a
raven which the boys, resting at noon-day beside the
brook Cherith, saw slowly flying towards the moun-

442 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
tain. But he bore in his beak food for the fainting
prophet, the last of the faithful.
When this moral power is found with great intel
lectual gifts, as it sometimes is, then have we the fair
est form of humanity, the mind of a giant, and an
angel's heart. These act, each on each. The quick
ening sentiment fires the thought ; this gives strength
again to the feelings. The eye is single, the whole
body is full of light. The intellect of such an one
attracts admiration, his moral excellence enforces love.
He teaches by his words of wisdom, by his works of
goodness. Happy is the age that beholds a conjunc
tion so rare and auspicious as that of eminent genius,
and moral excellence as eminent. A single man of
that stamp gives character to the age, a new epoch
is begun. Men are forced to call themselves after
his name, and that may be said of him which was said
of Elias the prophet, " After his death his body
prophesied." But such are the rarest sons of God.
Dr. Follen belonged to the class of men that act
on the world by their moral power. Certainly it was
that which was most conspicuous in him, in his counte
nance, his writings, his life. Some live for study;
their books, both what they read and what they write,
are their life ; and others for action. They write their
soul out in works; their name may perish, their use
fulness remains, and widens and deepens tiU time and
the human race shall cease to be. Dr. Follen be
longed to the class, then, of men of moral action.
In saying this we do not mean to imply that there
was little of intellectual force, only that the moral
power cast it into the shade ; not that he could not
have been eminent in the empire of abstract thought,
but only that he chose the broad realm of benevolent

FOLLEN 443
action. Others, better fitted for the task, and with
more space and time at command, will doubtless judge
his writings from the intellectual point of view, and
mankind will pass the irreversible decree on his re
corded thoughts, and bid them live or die. We shall
confine ourselves to the first volume of his works, con
taining a biography written by his wife, and only
attempt a dehneation of the moral Hfe and works of
the man.
The main points of his history are briefly summed
up. Charles Theodore Follen was born on the 4th of
September, 1796, at Romrod, in the western part of
Germany ; became obnoxious to' the government at an
early age, fled to Switzerland for an asylum in 1820,
came to America as the only civilized land that of
fered him Hfe and liberty in 1824, and ceased to be
mortal in the beginning of 1840.
There is a rare unity in his life, such as we scarcely
remember to have noticed in any modern biography.
It is a moral-heroic drama in one act, though the scene
shifts from the college to the camp, from the thunder
ing storm of a meeting of reformers to the Christian
pulpit and the Sunday school, where children are
taught of the Great Reformer of the World. Dr.
Follen's work began in early life ; while yet a stripling
at college we see the same qualities, working for the
same end, as in the very last scenes of his life. His
pious love of freedom, his abhorrence of all that had
the savor of oppression about it, his disinterested zeal
for mankind, his unconcern for himself so long as
God saw him at his post and his work, these began
early and continued till the last. His whole life was
a warfare against sin, that had slain and taken pos
session of what belongs to mankind. But we must
speak of the details of his history more minutely.

444 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
He was the son of a counsellor-at-law and judge, in
Hesse Darmstadt. When a child he was serious and
earnest beyond his years. He received his education
at the Seminary and University at Giessen, devoting
himself to the study of the law. His enthusiasm
against the French kindled with the uprising of his
Father-land, and in 1813 we find him a soldier in the
army of the patriots. The return of peace the next
year restored him to his studies at the University. At
the age of twelve, says his biographer, he had con
ceived thoughts of a Christian society far different
from all that is now actual on the earth, and while at
the University " consecrated himself to the work of a
reformer by a perfect subjection of himself to the law
of justice and universal brotherhood, as taught by
Jesus." His attempts to reform his fellow students
brought him into trouble, and rendered him an object
of suspicion to the government. At the age of twenty
he began to lecture, in a private capacity, we suppose,
on " various parts of jurisprudence " at the Univer
sity of Giessen. At this period doubts respecting re
ligion came over him. He met the enemy face to face,
studied the writings of skeptics, pantheists and in
fidels, and found the books written against Christian
ity, next to the Gospel itself, were the most efficient
promoters of his belief in its divine truth. This fear
less examination of all that had been said against
religion showed him that it rested on a rock which
neither its foes nor its friends could ever shake. He
never afterwards feared that the most valuable of all
man's treasures could be blown away by a few mouth-
fuls of wind. Did a man who knew religion by heart
ever fear that it would perish?
In 1818 some towns in Hesse engaged this youth,

FOLLEN 445
in his twenty-second year, to help them in escaping an
artful design of their government to oppress them.
His noble attempt succeeded. Of course " the influ
ential persons " whose object he defeated, and the gov
ernment whose illegal designs he exposed, were of
fended at him. He became the object of a bitter and
unrelenting persecution. His hopes blighted in his
native kingdom, he accepted an invitation to the Uni
versity of Jena. Here he commenced a course of
lectures on the Pandects before a respectable audi
ence, though it was thought extraordinary for so
young a man to undertake a branch so difficult. Here
also his reformatory and liberal principles stood in
the way of his promotion. He was tried as an ac
complice of George Sand in the murder of Kotzebue,
a tool of despotism, was acquitted, but forbidden to
lecture in Jena. He returned to Giessen, suspected
by the government, treated with coolness by some of
his " friends," for they thought his cause without
hope, and " left him to strive alone in his hour of trial
and suffering." The excellence of his character was
pleaded as proof of his innocence of ill. " So much
the worse," said one opposer, who knew what he was
about ; " I should Hke him better if he had a few
vices." The government, thinking him the handle of
the axe, which they knew lay, ready and sharpened, at
the root of the tree, intended to imprison him. He
escaped by flight to Strasburg, thence to Paris, and
became acquainted with Lafayette. But all foreign
ers were soon ordered to quit France, for this was in
1820, and the same spirit ruled in Paris as in Giessen.
A lady invited him to Switzerland. Here he was in
vited to become a professor in the Cantonal School of
the Grisons, one of the higher seminaries of educa-

446 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
tion. Here again his liberal spirit raised up enemies.
But at this time it was the church, not the state, that
took offense at his freedom. In his lectures on his
tory he ascribed the Christian revelation to the effi
cacy of two great principles, namely, the doctrine of
one God, and that all men ought to love one another,
and strive after godlike perfection. Some were in
spired to lead men to this great aim. The clergy were
alarmed, and declared that he denied the godhead of
Jesus, total depravity, and original sin. Dr. Fol-
len's resignation of his office was the result of this
clerical alarm. However, he was soon appointed as a
public lecturer at the University of Basle, where he
taught natural, civil, and ecclesiastical law, and phi
losophy in its application to religion, morals, legis
lation, and the fine arts. But even here, " where the
free Switzer yet bestrides alone his chainless moun
tains," he was not secure, while in the canton of the
Grisons the Congress of Troppau demanded that he
should be given up. While at Basle, in 1824, the
government of Basle received three notes from the
governments of Austria, Prussia, and Russia, demand
ing that he should be given up to the tribunal of
inquisition. The result of all was that he fled from
Basle hid under the boot* of a chaise to Paris, and
thence to America, where he arrived in December,
1824. His subsequent story may be briefly hinted at.
He was successively teacher of Ethics and Ecclesias
tical History at the Divinity School and teacher of
German in the University at Cambridge, a preacher of
the Gospel at Boston, New York, Lexington, and other
places ; and as a philanthropist engaging in the
benevolent works of the day.
Dr. Follen was eminently a Christian man. By

FOLLEN 447
this we do not mean that he had learned by rote a
few traditional doctrines, whose foundation he never
dared examine, and condemned all such as could not
accept them, not that he loved to say there was no
salvation out of the Procrustes-bed of his own church,
not that he accepted the popular standard of con
ventional morals, cursing all that fell below and damn
ing such as were above that standard. We know this
is too often a true description of the sectarian or
popular Christian, a man with more memory than
thought, more belief than life, more fear than love.
With Dr. Follen Christianity took a turn a little
different. To serve God with the whole mind was not
necessarily to think as Anselm and Augustine in re
ligious matters, but to think truly and uprightly; to
serve him with the whole heart and soul was to live a
life of active goodness and holiness of heart. He was
not one of the many who have days to be Christians,
and days to be men of the world ; but a Christian once
was a Christian always. We do not mean to say that
he had no stains of human imperfection, weakness and
evil. Doubtless he had such. The prurient eye may
read traces of such on this monument, where conjugal
love solaces its bereavement by tracing, with affection
ate pen, the tale of his Hfe, his trials, his temptations,
and his endurance.
In a moral character so rich as this of Dr. Follen it
is difficult, perhaps, to select a point of sufficient promi
nence by which to distinguish the man, and about
which to group the lesser elements of his being. But
what strikes us as chief is his love of freedom. He
felt man was superior to all the circumstances, pros
perous or adverse, which could be gathered about him.
Therefore, he saw the weakness of men beneath the

448 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
trappings of a monarch's court, and did not fear to
lift up his juvenile voice for human rights and ever
lasting truth; therefore, he saw the greatness of men
under the squalid garments of the beggar or the slave,
and never despaired of raising them to the estate of
a man, but toiled and prayed for this great end.
This love of freedom was conspicuous in his youth,
breathing in the " Great Song ; " 1 and shone more and
more as years gave him the meditative mind. It ap
pears in all his writings, in all his life. At an early
age he joined the army to fight for freedom and his
Fatherland in the tented field; the chief cause he en
gaged in as a lawyer was the cause of right against
oppression. For this he was an exile in a strange
land, and in that land he but continued in manhood
the work begun in youth. This love of freedom ap
peared in his sermons, where, some think, it does not
often appear. So one day after preaching, a friend
" who had a kind heart, but an arbitrary character,"
took him by the button and said, " Your sermon, sir,
was very sensible, but you spoil your discourses with
your views about freedom. We are all wearied with
hearing the same thing from you. You always have
something about freedom in whatever you say to us.
I am sick of hearing about freedom ; we have too much
freedom. We are all sick of it ; don't let us hear any
more such sermons from you."
He saw the great stain which defiles the govern
ment of the Union, the stain of slavery. With his
characteristic zeal he espoused the cause of the op
pressed and downtrodden African. His attention was
first caUed to the subject by accident. As he returned
from preaching, one rainy day, he overtook a negro,
apparently not well able to bear the storm. He took

FOLLEN 449
him into the chaise. The negro talked of slavery, of
Mr. Walker's " incendiary publication," of the sus
picious death of Mr. Walker.2 This awakened the at
tention of Dr. Follen to the subject. He soon visited
Mr. Garrison, whose efforts in the cause of Abolition
have been so justly celebrated. " He found him in a
little upper chamber where were his writing-desk, his
types, and his printing-press ; his parlor by day, his
sleeping-room by night; where, known only by a few
other faithful spirits, he denied himself all but the
bare necessaries of life that he might give himself up,
heart and hand, to the despised cause of the negro
slave." Here he did not find many of the more conspicuous
men of the land to join him. There is a time when
every great cause, that is one day to move the mil
lions, rests on the hands and in the hearts of a few
men; noble hearts and strong hands; heroes of the
soul, whom God raises up to go on the forlorn hope
of humanity and shed their life where others shall
one day wave the banner of triumph, and walking dry-
shod, sing paeans of victory, though often unmindful
of those by whom the day was won. In 1833 Dr.
Follen writes to Dr. Bowring,3 and says he has " been
seven years in the land, and found but two eminent
men, Dr. Channing and Clement C. Biddle,4 who will
not connive at slavery for any purpose ! " Dr.
Bowring's reply is worthy to be pondered : " I am
not surprised at the way you speak of the slavery ques
tion. It is indeed the opprobium of the United States.
There is no escape from the palpable, the prominent,
the pestiferous fact, that human beings are bought
and sold by men who call themselves republicans and
Christians. It is thrown in our teeth, it is slapped in
II— 29

450 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
our faces, it is branded on our souls, when we talk of
your country and hold up your institutions to ad
miration and imitation. You must indeed labor day
and night, at sun-rising and sun-setting, at home and
abroad, with the influential above, and with the in
fluential below you."
In the days of peril which came over the anti-
slavery cause Dr. Follen did not shrink from fidelity
to his principles. He faced the evil like a man, neither
courage nor calmness forsaking him. We would
gladly, for our country's sake, tear out many pages of
the book that records his life; for they are pages of
shame to the free state we live in ; but what is done
cannot be undone by silence.* But there was one as
true in this matter as himself. His wife writes thus:
" There were some of my friends who thought that I
should feel very badly at seeing my husband one of
this little company of insulted men ; but as he stood
there [before a committee of the Legislature], bat
tling for freedom of speech in this free land, sur
rounded by the rich and the powerful, and the favor
ites of the world, and condemned by them all for it, I
would not have had him exchange positions with any
one of them. The unruffled calmness of his soul took
possession of mine." This is not the only instance of
the same spirit in her. Before this she had bid him
above all things to be true to his convictions. One day
he said to his wife, " I have been thinking of joining
the Anti-Slavery Society; what do you think of it?"
" That you ought to follow the light of your own
mind," was the reply ; " why should you hesitate ? "
" I know that it will be greatly in the way of my
worldly interests." " Very well," says the wife. " I
* See, especially, pages 387-403, not to name other places.

FOLLEN 451
feel," he replied, " as if I ought to join them."
" Then why not do it? " " It is a serious thing to
relinquish my worldly prospects altogether. If I join
the Anti-Slavery Society I shall certainly lose all
chance of a permanent place in college or perhaps any
where else. If it were only for myself I should not
be troubled about it; but to involve you and Charles
in the evils of real poverty — I shrink from that."
" You have," replied the same adviser, " sacrificed
your country, your home, and all that makes home
dear for the sake of freedom and humanity; do not
think that we are not able to make the slight sacri
fices which we may be called on to make in this cause."
" He knew," says the biographer, " that there are
evils belonging to aU associations; he never vindicated
nor approved of abusive language in the Abolitionists,
any more than in their opposers ; but when a young
friend raised this objection to joining the Anti-
Slavery Society he replied to him, ' I did not feel at
Hberty to stand aloof from a society whose only object
was the abolition of slavery.' "
Were his fears well-grounded? To be true, one
must always pay the price. " A clergyman made a
most vehemment attack upon Dr. Follen [though only
in words] for his devotion to the cause of Abolition.
It was in the street." One Thanksgiving-day, while
preaching at New York, in part of his sermon he
spoke of the subject of slavery: " Before he had con
cluded the first sentence of his remarks, two gentle
men rose and went out of the church looking very
angry. Many others showed signs of displeasure and
alarm, and his words evidently excited a strong sensa
tion through the whole society." Dr. Follen him
self writes as follows about the matter : " It is some-

452 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
what doubtful now whether they will settle me here
permanently. I feel sure that, if I had known the con
sequences, I should have changed nothing, either in
matter or manner. So we feel easy, come what may."
He himself attributed his failure with that society to
his expression of the obnoxious opinions about slavery.
But we will speak no more of this theme.
While a minister at New York he labored to convert
men from infidelity, to apply religion to daily life.
He rejoiced in having that city for the sphere of his
action, where misery, vice, and irreligion are sup
posed to act with a deeper intensity of violence than
elsewhere in the land. His heart was in his caUing.
His biographer speaks of his ministerial character and
conduct : " When he saw a crowd of human beings
assembled around him, he did not look upon them as
rich or poor, or weak or powerful, wise or simple,
gentlemen or ladies, but literally and simply as im
mortal spirits, absent from their true home, and seek
ing the way back to their Fatherland. He thought
none so pure that he might not fall ; none so degraded
that he might not rise ; and he always preached with
the feeling that the salvation of souls might be the
consequence of the truths he should declare. He
sought to make the house of the minister common
ground for humanity, where the rich and the poor
might meet together, as representatives of the Com
mon Image of Him that is the Maker of them all.
So he invited the whole society to meet him Wednes
day evenings."
"We made no preparation, except to light our rooms, and
gave no entertainment except a glass of water to those who
desired it. It was understood that all should come in their
usual dress; that those who were so disposed might wear
their bonnets, and that from seven till eleven o'clock in the
evening all should come and go as they pleased.

FOLLEN 453
"These social parties were eminently successful; in fair
weather our room was always full, and even when it was
stormy there were some who did not fail to come. We had
the pleasure of introducing to each other many who had
found the divisions of the pews impassable barriers to a
friendly acquaintance, and who have since become true and
warm friends. The rich in worldly goods, they who were
gifted with the heavenly dowry of genius, the artisan and the
artist, the flattered favorites of the world, and its poor for
gotten pilgrims, the homebound conservative, the republican
stranger whose home was the world, and the exiled philan
thropist, the child and his proud grandparent, the learned
and the unlearned, the grave and the gay, all met at our
house and passed a few free and happy hours in an unre
strained and friendly intercourse, recognising the bond of
brotherhood which exists between the members of God's
human family. Few things ever gave Dr. Follen so true a
pleasure as these meetings, not merely on account of his own
actual enjoyment of them, but as they established the fact
that such social meetings were practicable, and that the van
ity, and expense, and precious time that are lavished upon
show parties are not necessary, in order to obtain all the
higher purposes of social intercourse; and as a proof that
people have a purer and better taste than they have credit
for. It was also a high gratification to his republican heart
to see that it was possible to do away some of those arbitrary
distinctions in society which prevent the highest progress and
improvement of all. One of these Wednesday evenings a lady
was present who belonged to a family, that if such a term
could be used without absurdity in this country, might be
called patrician, but who had herself a patent of nobility
from him who is the giver of all things. I said to her, " That
gentleman who has just sung the Scotch song so well is a
hair-dresser; his wife, who as well as himself, is from Scotland,
and who has been talking very intelligently of Mr. Combe's
lectures, which she attended in her own country is a dress
maker. That highly intelligent woman, who has held a most
interesting correspondence with my husband upon some theo
logical questions, is a watch-maker's wife. That saintly old
lady is the wife of a man who makes india-rubber shoes, etc.,
and that very gentlemanly and agreeable man is a tailor." " I
hope," she replied, "that the time will come when such things
will not be mentioned as extraordinary." When I repeated
this to my husband, after the company were gone, " That is
beautiful" he said, with his face radiant with joy. He never

454 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
forgot it; and when we last went to New York, he said, "We
must go and see that truly republican lady." Dr. Follen often
said that our freedom was a fact rather than a principle, and
that nowhere was opinion so tyrannical as in this boasted land
of liberty. He resolved, in his ministry in New York, to be
truly faithful to his own principles. He took his market-
basket daily to market, and brought home our dinner him
self. He practised the strictest economy, that he might have
something to give to the poor. Mr. Arnold and Mr. Chan
ning, who had been the ministers to the poor, had both left
the city. Provisions were dear, and the sufferings of the
poor were severe; Dr. Follen volunteered his services, and
devoted all his leisure to this difficult and painful though in
teresting duty. His labors were very arduous; the poor Ger
mans, when they knew he was their countryman, beseiged our
door; and during the inclement part of the season it was
seldom that we took any meal without some poor sufferer
waiting till it was finished, that he might tell his sad story
and receive his portion of our frugal repast. Dr. Follen's
labors among the poor would have been a sufficient employ
ment without his duties in his parish and preaching on Sun
day, and he was often so exhausted that I feared he would
lose his health entirely; but he felt such a deep interest, such
an inspiring joy in these occupations that he never complained
of the weariness of his body."
His love of freedom, and his practical exhibition of
this love in searching for the grounds of religion, gave
him an interest in the eyes of infidels, men whom
worldhness or the popular theology had led to despise
religion itself. In the course of sermons he preached
on infidelity he did not use scorn and contempt ; though
these, it is well known, are the consecrated weapons
too often used by the pulpit in this warfare.
" He reveiwed during this course of lectures all the most
celebrated writers and theories of infidelity, the French En
cyclopedists, Hobbes, Hume, Tom Paine, and Fanny Wright.
He vituperated none, he sneered at none, he treated them all
with respect. He took Paine's ' Age of Reason ' into the pul
pit, and read an eloquent passage from it, proving that he
believed in God and in the immortality of the soul, and simply
stated that in the same pages were to be found the grossest
indecencies. He pointed out the inconsistencies of unbelievers,

FOLLEN 455
the false grounds of their arguments, and showed that, in
spite of themselves, they could not get rid of a belief in im
mortality. He then showed that fair and free inquiry would
lead to faith. Christianity, rightly understood, instead of
checking free inquiry, invites it and opens to it an infinite
sphere. " Christianity is," he said, " the most efficient skepticism,
when directed against imposition and blind credulity. Chris
tianity is the deepest science, the most sublime philosophy,
adapted to the capacity of a little child, yet transcending the
wisdom of the wisest." He dwelt most eloquently upon the
importance to the cause of religion, that believers should have
a deep and well-grounded faith themselves before they at
tempted to convert others. " Those who reject Christianity
because of its supposed inconsistency with nature, experience,
and reason, can be convinced of their error only by those
who have embraced it because of its perfect agreement with
the demands of reason, the teachings of experience, and the
deepest wants of human nature. The atheist in his pride is
more imperfect than the most rude and confined worshipper
of Deity; for the former wants entirely that deepest and great
est effort of the mind, of which the other possesses at least a
degree. The principles of man's immortality being acknowledged
in the New Testament ought not to be considered a check to
our inquiry whether this doctrine has any other foundation
beside that evidence. God has given us this infinite desire
of extending our knowledge as far as possible, and if we have
not made this use of our endowments, we do not feel assured
that there are no reasons for doubting. Many think that call
ing in question the truths of the doctrines of the New Testa
ment is a kind of irreverence; but to me it seems, on the
contrary, that the true foundation of our abiding belief in
its truth is, that its fundamental doctrines may at all times
be put to the test of fair reasoning, that its principles are
not a mere matter of fact and history, but of free investiga
tion and conviction. The Bible gives us only means of arriv
ing at truth, not truth itself. I believe in the Bible because
the Bible believes in me. I find the law and the prophets in
my own soul."
We know not the result of these lectures. The ef
fect of a sermon no man can tell. He who preaches
as a man to men casts a seed into the river of human
life, and knows not on what shore it shaU be cast up.

456 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
or whether the waters close, cold as ever, over his liv
ing word and quench its fiery life. But can it be that
a good word is ever spoken in vain? Who will believe
it? The last time Dr. Follen preached in New York,
" He spoke affectionately, as a brother would speak to
brethren whom his heart yearned to bless, and whom he was
to leave for ever. After service he remained in the desk
purposely to avoid meeting any one, for his heart was too full
to speak any more. When he came down to meet me, thinking
all others were gone, a man and his wife came forward, who
had been waiting for him. The man took his hand and said,
'You have, sir, during your ministry here changed an unhappy
atheist, to a happy, believing Christian. I am grieved to think
that I shall worship no more with you in this church; but you
have given me the hope that I may yet worship with you in
a higher, a heavenly temple.' Tears ran fast down his and
his wife's cheeks as he uttered these words and pressed Dr.
Follen's hand and departed. ' That,' said my husband, ' is re
ward enough for all my toils and disappointments.' "
He did not fail or fear to acknowledge goodness and
moral purpose in a philanthropist, though lacking
the strength and beauty of religion. The remarks he
made on Mr. Darusmond, " the husband of Frances
Wright," 5 full of sadness as they are, may well be
pondered by the " rigid righteous."
" There is that noble old man spending his thoughts, his
time, and his money, for what he considers the highest good
of his fellow men, with a youthful devotedness and enthus
iasm of benevolence, carrying in his heart the evidences of
his immortality, and yet tenacious of the belief that he and his
beautiful child, and all that he loves best in the world, and
all his generous and exalted purposes and hopes are but a part
of the dust he treads on. What a lesson does his magnanimous
love for his fellow-beings teach to the multitudes of the cold,
calculating men and women we see, who take the name of
him who was the first and greatest of all philanthropists, and
who call him an infidel, and are eager to condemn him."
There are some things in this book on which we do
not feel competent to decide, and therefore shall hold

FOLLEN 457
our peace; many others on which we should gladly
dwell, did time and space permit. But there is one
trait of his character on which we would dwell, this is,
his hopeful resignation. His disappointments, what
ever was their cause, did not sour his temper, nor make
him less sanguine for the future, not less confident of
his own conviction of right. He did not complain in
adversity ; and when persecuted for righteousness' sake,
took it patiently, and went on his way rejoicing. We
do not say that traces of indignation could not be
found in the fair chronicle of this biography — in
dignation that is not Christian, as we think. But let a
candid, yes, an uncandid reader search for these traces,
and he will marvel that they are so rare. A friend
said he was " a Christian up to the arms, the heart
Christian, the arms somewhat violent, and the head
directed to the outward world." When disappointed,
" He turned directly to some present duty, or he talked
with his friends of the future, which he still trusted had some
unlooked-for good in store for him. His near friends were
in the habit of rallying him upon his sanguine anticipations,
and this even after their failure, might have produced some
sensitiveness upon the subject; but how sweetly did he join in
the laugh at his own confiding credulity, that led him to
measure the good he expected from others, not by the his
tory of his own experience, but by the overflowing bounty of
his own heart. One instance of this I cannot resist relating.
One New Year's day I observed him, in the morning, putting
away some books that he usually kept on his study table, and
apparently making room for something. I asked him what
he was preparing for. ' I am making room on my table for
our New Year's presents,' he replied. I smiled. ' I see,' he
said, 'that you do not expect any, but I do.' I was right; we
had not a single New dear's gift, but his unfeigned merri
ment at his ungrounded hopes, and the many hearty laughs
which the remembrance of his mistake, when like disappoint
ments in more important affairs befel us, proved that he
possessed that which made such things of little importance. No
one thought less of the intrinsic value, or rather of the market

458 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
price, of a gift from a friend than he; and no one that I
ever knew thought more of the active love that prompted such
testimonials of affection; he was truly child-like in these
things. "We practised, necessarily, this winter, the strictest econ
omy. Through mud, and cold, and storms, Dr. Follen walked
out seven miles to the church where he was engaged to preach.
Far from uttering a complaint at the cold or fatigue or in
convenience, which he occasionally had to endure, he always
returned home with a smile upon his face, that seemed to say,
' I have been about my Father's business.' Never did he once
say, I wish I had a chaise; and when I urged him in bad
weather to take one, he always answered, ' I like walking bet
ter; having no horse to take care of I have my mind free,
and I often compose my sermons on the way.' "
" Dr. Follen occasionally, at these times, but not often, al
luded to the fact that his whole life, as it regarded worldly
success, had been a series of failures, never with any bitter
ness, seldom with anything like despondency. ' Had I been
willing,' he has said, 'to lower my standard of right, the
world would have been with me, and I might have obtained
its favor. I have been faithful to principle under all circum
stances, and I had rather fail so than succeed in another way;
besides, I shall do something yet; I am not discouraged, and
we are happy in spite of all things.' He was, however, very
weary of the continual changes we had made, and more es
pecially of a continual change of place; he longed for a more
permanent local home."
One winter he attempted a course of lectures in Bos
ton, on Switzerland. But few came to hear it, not
enough to defray the expenses.
" On one day only I saw him stop from his writing, and rest
his head between his hands for a long time upon his paper.
' What is the matter ? ' I asked. ' I find it very hard to write
with spirit under such circumstances,' he replied. We always
returned to Lexington on the evening of the lecture. It was
a long way, the road was heavy, and the weather was cold;
and it was dark and often very late when we got home.
Usually he was so full of lively conversation, that it seemed
neither long nor dull; but one night he was very silent. 'Why,'
I asked, 'are you so silent to-night?' 'I do feel this disap
pointment,' he replied; 'it shows me how little I have to hope
from public favor in Boston.' 'Perhaps,' I said, 'you have

FOLLEN 459
made a mistake in your subject. People now-a-days prefer
speculations to facts; let us consider this merely as a mode,
not very expensive, of seeing our friends once a week; it is
not, after all, a costly pleasure. Your history of Switzerland
will be written and will be a valuable possession.' ' That is
right,' he replied; 'it shall be so; henceforward we will look
at it as a pleasant visit to our friends; it is a good thing for
me to have this course of lectures written, they will yet be of
use to me, and it is pleasant to see our friends once a week.' "
But we must bring our paper to an end. Yet,
not without noticing his love of the beautiful. " Na
ture was a perpetual joy to him."
" His love of the beautiful was intense, in its most humble
as well as sublime manifestations. I have seen him gaze at
the wings of an insect till, I am sure, he must have committed
all its exquisite coloring and curious workmanship to memory.
One Sunday, when he had walked far into the country to
preach, he was requested to address the children of the Sun
day school. He gave them an account of a blue dragon-fly
that he had seen on his way. He described it, with the clear
blue sky shining through its thin gauzy wings, and its airy
form reflected in the still pure water over which it hovered,
looking doubtful whether to stay here or return to the heavens
from whence it apparently came. He sought, by interesting
the children in its beauty, to awaken feelings of admiration
and love towards all the creatures that God has made."
We must come to the last scene of his life. He left
New York to go to Lexington and preach the dedica
tion sermon in the new church built there after a plan
of his own, the church he hoped should be the scene of
his future labors. He had prepared a part of the dis
course to be delivered on the occasion. He read this to
his wife, and added:
" ' I shall explain to the people the meaning and use of sym
bols in general, and then explain the meaning of those carved
on the pupit.' These were of his own designing, and were a
candlestick, a communion cup, a crown of thorns, a wreath of
stars, and in the centre a cross. ' I shall not write this part
of my sermon,' said he, ' but I will tell you what I shall say,

460 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
and that will make it easier when I shall speak to the people.
I shall tell them that the candlestick is a symbol of the light
which should emanate from the Christian pulpit, and from the
life of every individual Christian. The crown of thorns is a
representation of the trials and sufferings which the faithful
Christian has to endure for conscience' sake. The cup signi
fies that spiritual communion which we should share with all
our brethren of mankind, and that readiness to drink the
bitter cup of suffering for their sake, and for conscience' sake,
which he manifested who offered it to his disciples before he
was betrayed. The cross is a type of him who gave his life
for us all, and whose example we must stand ready to follow,
even though it lead to death. The circle of stars represents
the wreath of eternal glory and happiness which awaits the
faithful soul in the presence of God.' "
The simple words of his biographer best describe his
departure :
" He arranged his papers against his return. He was going
to take his lectures of German literature with him, but I urged
him to leave them with me, to be put in my trunk, where they
would be kept in better order. He made a little memorandum
of what he had to do when he returned. One article was to get
the ' Selections from Fenelon ' reprinted ; the next, to inquire
about a poor German, who was an exile, and a sufferer for
freedom's sake. The last was to get a New Year's gift for
a poor little girl whom he had taken to live with us. Just as
I left the door at Lexington I told this child that if she was
a good girl I would bring her a New Year's gift from New
York. Dr. Follen overheard me, I never spoke of it to him.
My illness and anxiety had put it out of my head, but he re
membered it. As he put his sermon in his pocket, he said,
'I shall not go to bed, but devote the night to my sermon;
I want to make something of it that is worth hearing.' He
gave Charles some money, and told him to go presently and
get some grapes for me at a shop where he found some very
fine ones. 'They are good for your mother,' he said, "and
you must keep her supplied till my return.' ' Be of good
courage till you see me again,' he said to me as he took leave
of me. ' Be a good boy, and obey your mother till I come
back again,' were his words to Charles, as he took him in his
arms, and kissed him."
The partner of his joys, the prime cheerer of his
sorrows, has built up a beautiful monument to his

FOLLEN 461
character. How beautifully she has done her work;
with what suppression of anguish for shattered hopes,
and buds of promise never opening on earth, we have
not words to tell. But the calmness with which the
tale is told, the absence of panegyric, the sublime trust
in the great principles of religion, apparent from end
to end of this heart-touching record of trials borne
and ended — these show that she likewise drank at
that fountain whence he derived his strength and joy.
We would gladly say more, but delicacy forbids us to
dweU on the mortal. Let us pass again to him who
has put off this earthly shroud.
This record of life is to us a most hopeful book. It
shows a man true to truth, an upright man whom
fame and fortune could not bribe, whom the menace of
monarchs and the oppression of poverty could never
swerve from the path of duty. Disappointment at
tended his steps, but never conquered his spirit nor
abated his hope. He had the consolations of religion,
that gave him strength which neither the monarchs,
nor poverty, nor disappointment, nor the neglect of
the world, nor the attacks of men narrow-minded and
chained down to bigotry could ever take from him.
How beautifuUy he bears his trials. In the balance of
adversity God weighs choice spirits. In the hour of
trial he gives them meat to eat which the world knows
not of. But Dr. Follen did not stand alone. Not to
name others, there was one brave soul in a pulpit whose
counsel and sympathy gave new warmth to his heart,
new energy to his resolution; one like himself, whom
fear could not make afraid.8 They rest from their la
bors. The good they have done shall live after them ;
the kind words they spoke, the pure lives they lived,
shall go up as a testimonial to him that liveth for

462 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ever; their example kindles the fire in earnest hearts
on earth, a light that never dies. Dr. Follen was
fortunate in his life. Talents God gave him, and an
occasion to use them; defeat gave him courage, not
dismay. Deep, rich blessings fell on him.
"Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere;
Heaven did a recompense as largely send;
He gave to misery all he had, a tear;
He gained from Heaven — 'twas all he wished —
a Friend."

XI
GERMAN LITERATURE
Opinions are divided respecting German literature.
If we are to believe what is currently reported and
generally credited, there is, somewhere in New Eng
land, a faction of discontented men and maidens who
have conspired to . love everything Teutonic, from
Dutch skates to German infidelity. It is supposed, at
least asserted, that these misguided persons would fain
banish aU other literature clean out of space; or at
the very least would give it precedence of all other
letters, ancient or modern. Whatever is German, they
admire ; philosophy, dramas, theology, novels, old
ballads, and modern sonnets ; histories, and disserta
tions, and sermons ; but above all, the immoral and
irrehgious writings which it is supposed the Germans
are chiefly engaged in writing, with the generous in
tention of corrupting the youth of the world, restoring
the worship of Priapus or Pan or the Pope, — it is not
decided which is to receive the honor of universal
homage, — and thus gradually preparing for the
kingdom of misrule, and the domination of chaos and
" most ancient Night." It is often charitably taken
for granted that the lovers of German works on philos
ophy and art amongst us are moved thereto, either
by a disinterested love of whatever is German, or else,
which is the more likely, by a disinterested love of evil,
and the instigation of the devil, who, it is gravely
said, has actually inspired several of the most esteemed
writers of that nation. This German epidemic, we
463

464 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
are told, extends very wide. It has entered the board
ing-schools for young misses of either sex, and com
mitted the most frightful ravages therein. We have
been apprised that it has sometimes seized upon a
College, nay, on Universities, and both the Faculty and
the Corporation have exhibited symptoms of the fatal
disease. Colleges, did we say?
" No place is sacred, not the church is free."
It has attacked clergymen in silk and in lawn. The
Doctors of Divinity fall before it. It is thought that
" Fever and ague, j aundice and catarrh,
The grim-looked tyrant's heavy horse of war,
And apoplexies, those light troops of death,
That use small ceremony with our breath,"
are all nothing to the German epidemic. We meet men
with umbrellas and over-shoes, men " shawled to the
teeth," and suppose they are prudent persons who have
put on armor against this subtle foe. Histories of
this plague, as of the cholera, have been written; the
public has often been called to defend itself from the
enemy, and quarantine regulations are put in force
against all suspected of the infection. In short, the
prudent men of the land, men wise to foresee and
curious to prevent evil, have not failed to advise the
public from time to time of the danger that is im
minent, and to recommend certain talismans as effect
ual safeguards. We think a copy of the " Westmin
ister Catechism," or the " Confessions of Faith adopted
by the Council of Trent," or the " Athanasian Creed,"
perhaps, if hung about the' neck, and worn next the
skin, might save little children, and perhaps girls nearly
grown up, especially if they read these amulets every
morning fasting. But a more important specific has

GERMAN LITERATURE 465
occurred to us, which we have never known to fail, and
it has been tried in a great many cases, in both hemis
pheres. The remedy is simple; it is a strong infu
sion of dulness. Continued applications of this ex
cellent nostrum wiU save any person, we think, from all
but very slight attacks of this epidemic. Certainly,
it wUl secure the patient from the worst form of the
disease, — the philosophical frenzy which it is said
prevails in coHeges and among young damsels, but
which, we think, does not attack the pulpit. The
other forms of the malady are mainly cutaneous, and
easUy guarded against.
It has often been matter of astonishment to us that
the guardians of the public welfare did not discover
German Hterature when it first set foot in America,
and thrust it back into the ocean; and we can only
account for the fact of its extension here from the
greater activity of evil in general. " Rank weeds do
grow apace." So this evil has grown up in the ab
sence of our guardians, as the golden calf was made
while Moses was in the mount fasting. While the
young men and maidens have been eating the German
lotus the guardians of the public weal have been
" talking, or pursuing, or journeying, or peradventure
they slept, and must needs be awaked." However this
may be, they are now awake, and in full cry.
Now, for our own part, we have never yet fallen in
with any of these dangerous persons who have this
exaggerated admiration of whatever is Teutonic, still
less this desire to overthrow morality, and turn reli
gion out of the world. This fact may be taken as
presumptive evidence of blindness on our part, if men
wiU. We sometimes, indeed, meet with men, and
women also, well read in this obnoxious literature ; they
11—30

466 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
are mostly, — yes, without a single exception, as we
remember, — unoffending persons. They " gang their
ain gait," and leave others the same freedom. They
have tastes of their own, scholarly habits ; some of them
are possessed of talent, and no contemptible erudition,
judging by the New England standard. They honor
what they find good and to their taste, in German
literature as elsewhere. Men and women, some of them
are, who do not think all intellectual and aesthetic ex
cellence is contained in a hundred volumes of Greek
and Roman authors, profound and beautiful as they
are. They study German philosophy, theology, criti
cism, and literature in general, as they would the sim
ilar works of any nation, for the good they contain.
This, we think, is not forbidden by the Revised Stat
utes, or any other universal standard of right and
wrong. Why should not a man study even Sanscrit
philosophy if he will, and profit by it in peace, if he
can? We do not say there are no enthusiastic or
fanatical admirers of this Hterature ; nor, that there
are none who " go too far " in their admiration, —
which means, in plain English, farther than their critic,
— but that such persons are by no means common, so
that there seems, really, very small cause for the panic
into which some good people have seen fit to fall. We
doubt the existence, therefore, of this reputed faction
of men and maidens who design to reinstate confusion
on her throne.
But on the other hand, we are told — and partly be
lieve it — that there is a party of cool-headed, discreet,
moderate, sound, and very respectable persons, who
hate German literature. Of these we can speak from
knowledge. Most men have heard of them, for they
have cried out like Bluebeard in the tale, " till all shook

GERMAN LITERATURE 467
again." They are plenty as acorns in autumn, and
may be had for the asking. This party has, to speak
gently, a strong dislike to German literature, philos
ophy, and theology. Sometimes this dislike is founded
on a knowledge of facts, an acquaintance with the
subject, in which case no one will find fault; but far
oftener it rests merely on prejudice, — on the most
utter ignorance of the whole matter. Respecting this
latter class of haters without knowledge, we have a few
words to say. We have somewhere seen it written,
" He that answereth a matter before he heareth it,
it is a folly and shame unto him." We commend it
to the attention of these judges. They criticize Ger
man literature by wholesale and retail — to adopt the
ingenious distinction of Dr. Watts. They issue their
writs, and have the shadow of some poor German
brought into the court of their greatness, and pass
sentence with the most speedy justice, never examin
ing the evidence, nor asking a question, nor permitting
the prisoner at the bar to say a word for himself till
the whole matter is disposed of. Before this honorable
bench Goethe, and Schleiermacher, and Schiller, and
Arndt, and Kant, and Leibnitz, Henry Heine 1 and
Jacob Bohme, Schelling of universal renown, and
Schefer of Muskau in Neider-Lausitz, and Hegel, and
Strauss, with their aids and abettors, are brought up
and condemned as mystics, infidels, or pantheists ; in
one word, as Germans. Thus the matter is disposed
of by the honorable court. Now we would not protest
against this method of proceeding, ancient as it is, and
supported by precedents from the time of Jethro to
General Jackson. Such a protest would be. " a dan
gerous innovation," no doubt. We would have no ex
ceptions from the general method made in favor of

468 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
German letters. No literature was ever written into
more than temporary notice, and certainly none was
ever written down. German literature amongst us
encounters just the same treatment the classic authors
received at the hands of the middle ages. When those
old sages and saints began to start out of the corners
where night had overtaken them, men were alarmed
at their strange faces and antique beards and myste
rious words. " What ! " said they, as they gaped on
one another, in the parlor, the court, the camp, or the
church, with terror in their faces, — " What ! study
Greek and Roman letters? Greek and Roman philos
ophy? Shall we men of the tenth century study au
thors who lived two thousand years ago, in an age of
darkness? Shame on the thought! Shall we who are
Christians, and live in an age of light, look for in
struction to Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, or Seneca ¦ — men
from dark pagan times ? It were preposterous !
Let such works perish, or sink back to their original
night." * So it goes with us ; and it is said, " Shall
we Americans, excellent Christians as we are, who live
in a land of education, of righteousness, of religion,
and know how to reconcile it all with our three millions
of slaves; in the land of steamboats and railroads; we
Americans, possessed of all needed intelligence and cul
ture, — shall we read the books of the Germans, infidels
* The following anecdote is quite to the point. One day,
in the year 1530, a French monk said in the pulpit, " a new lan
guage has been discovered, which is called Greek. You must
take good heed, and keep out of its way. This language en
genders all heresies. I see in the hands of many, a book
written in this language. It is called the New Testament.
It is a book full of thorns and vipers. As for the Hebrew
language, all who study that become Jewc immediately." 
Sismondi, Histoire des Frangaise, T. XVI. p. 364, cited in
Michelet's Hist. Luther.

GERMAN LITERATURE 469
as they are — Germans, who dwell in the clouds, and
are only fitted by divine grace to smoke tobacco and
make dictionaries ? Out upon the thought ! "
No doubt this decision is quite as wise as that pro
nounced so gravely by conservatives and alarmists of
the middle ages. " Would you have me try the crim
inal before I pass sentence? " said the Turkish justice;
" that were a waste of words and time, for if I should
condemn him after examination, why not before, and
so save the trouble of looking into the matter? " Cer
tainly the magistrate was wise, and wherever justice
is thus administered the traditional complaint of the
" law's delay " will never dare lift up its voice. Honor
to the Turkish judge and his swift decision ; long may
it be applied to German literature. Certainly it is
better that ninety-and-nine innocent persons should
suffer outrageous torture than that one guilty should
escape. Why should not public opinion lay an em
bargo on German works as on India crackers, or for
bid their sale? Certainly it costs more labor to read
them than the many excellent books in the mother
tongue. No doubt a ready reader would go over the
whole ninety-eight volumes of Sir Walter Scott in less
time than he could plod through and master the single
obstinate book of Kant's Kritik of the Pure Reason.
Stewart, and Brown, and Reid, and Paley, and Thomas
Dick, and Abercrombie, are quite easy reading. They
trouble no man's digestion, though he read them after
dinner, with his feet on the fender. Are not these
writers, with their illustrious progenitors, successors,
and coadjutors, sufficient for all practical purposes?
Why, then, allow our studious youth in colleges and
log-cabins to pore over Leibnitz and Hegel till they
think themselves blind, and the red rose yields to the
white on their cheek?

470 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
In the name of good sense, we would ask if English
literature, with the additions of American genius, is
not rich enough without our going to the Hercynian
forest, where the scholars do not think but only dream ?
Not to mention Milton, and Shakespeare, and Bacon, —
names confessedly without parallel in the history of
thought, — have we not surpassed the rest of the world
in each department of science, literature, philosophy,
and theology ? Whence comes the noble array of scien
tific works that connect general laws with single facts,
and reveal the mysteries of nature? Whence come the
most excellent works in poetry, criticism, and art?
Whence the profound treatises on ethics and meta
physics? Whence the deep and wide volumes of the
ology, the queen of all sciences? Whence come works
on the classics of Greece and Rome ? Whence histories
of all the chief concerns of man? Do they not all
come, in this age, from England and our own bosom?
What need have we of asking favors from the Ger
mans, or of studying their literature? As the mid
dle-age monks said of the classics,- — - Anathema sit. It
is certainly right that the ghost of terror, like Mr.
Littlefaith in the story, should cross itself in presence
of such a spirit, and utter its Apage Sathanas. Such
an anathema would, no doubt, crush the Monadnoc —
or a sugar-plum.
But let us come out of this high court of Turkish
justice, and for a moment look German literature in
the face, and allow it to speak for itself. To our ap
prehension, German literature is the fairest, the rich
est, the most original, fresh and religious Hterature
of all modern times. We say this advisedly. We do
not mean to say Germany has produced the greatest
poetic genius of all modern times. It has no Shake-

GERMAN LITERATURE 471
speare, as the world has but one in whom the poetic
spirit seems to culminate, though it will doubtless rise
higher in better ages. But we sometimes hear it said,
admitting the excellence of two or three German
writers, yet their literature is narrow, superficial and
poor, when compared with that of England. Let us
look at the facts, and compare the two in some points.
Classical taste and culture have long been the boast
of England. There is a wealth of classical allusion
in her best writers, which has an inexpressible charm,
and forms the chief minor grace in many a work of
poetic art. Classical culture is the pride, we take it,
of her two " ancient and honorable universities," and
their spirit prevails everywhere in the island. The
English scholar is proud of his " quantity," and the
correctness of his quotations from Seneca and Demos
thenes. But from what country do we get editions
of the classics that are worth the reading, in which
modern science and art are brought to bear on the an
cient text? What country nurtures the men that illus
trate Homer, Herodotus, the Anthology of Planudes,
and the dramatic poets? Who explain for us the an
tiquities of Athens, and write minute treatises on the
law of inheritance, the castes, tribes, and manners of
the men of Attica? Who collect aU the necessary
facts, and reproduce the ideas lived out, consciously
or unconsciously, on the banks of the Eurotas, the
Nile, or the Alpheus? Why, the Germans. We do
not hesitate to say, that in the present century not a
Greek or a Roman classic has been tolerably edited in
England, except through the aid of some German
scholar. The costly editions of Greek authors that
come to us from Oxford and London, beautiful reprints
of Plato, Aristotle, Aristophanes, Euripides, Sophocles,

472 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
iEschylus, Herodotus, the Attic orators, and Plotinus
— all these are the work of German erudition, German
toil, German genius sometimes. The wealthy island
ers, proud of their classic culture, furnish white paper
and luminous type ; but the curious diligence that never
tires, the profound knowledge and philosophy which
brings the whole light of Grecian genius to illuminate
a single point,- — all this is German, and German solely.
Did it not happen within ten years that the translation
of a German work containing some passages in Greek,
incorrectly pointed in the original edition, and, there
fore, severely censured at home, was about being pub
lished in Edinburgh, and no man could be found in the
Athens of the North, and " no man in all Scotland,"
who could correctly accent the Greek words? The
fact must be confessed. So the book was sent to its
author, — a Professor of Theology, — and he put it
into the hands of one of his pupils, and the work was
done. These things are trifles, but a straw shows
which way the stream runs, when a mill-stone would
not. Whence come even the grammars and lexicons
of almost universal use in studying the ancient authors?
The name of Reimer, and Damm, and Schneider, and
Biittman, and Passow, give the answer. Where are
the English classical scholars in this century who take
rank with Wolf, Heyne, Schweighauser, Wyttenbach,
Boeckh, Herrmann, Jacobs, Siebelis, Hoffman, Sieben-
kis, Muller, Creutzer, Wellauer, and Ast? Nay,
where shall we find the rivals of Dindorf, Schafer,
Stallbaum, Spitzner, Bothe and Bekker, and a host
more? for we have only written down those which rushed
into our mind. What English name of the present
century can be mentioned with the least of these? Not
one. They labor, and we may enter into their labors,

GERMAN LITERATURE 473
if we are not too foolish. Who write ancient history
like Niebiihr, and Muller, and Schlosser? But for the
Germans the Enghsh would have believed till this day,
perhaps, all the stories of Livy, that it rained stones,
and oxen spoke, for so it was written in Latin, and the
text was unimpeachable.
But some may say, these are not matters of primary
concern ; in things of " great pith and moment " we
are superior to these Teutonic giants. Would it were
so. Perhaps in some of the physical sciences the Eng
lish surpass their German friends, though even here
we have doubts which are strengthened every month.
One would expect the most valuable works on physical
geography from England; but we are disappointed,
and look in vain for any one to rival Ritter, or even
Mannert. In works of general civil and political his
tory in the present century, though we have two emi
nent historians in our own country, one of whom must
take rank with Thucydides and Tacitus, Gibbon and
Hume, England has nothing to equal the great works
of Von Hammer, Wilkins, and Schlosser. Why need
we mention the German histories of inventions, of art,
of each science, of classical education, of literature in
general? Why name their histories of philosophy,
from Brucker down to Brandis and Michelet? In
Enghsh, we have but Stanley, good in his time, and
valuable even now, and Enfield, a poor compiler from
Brucker. The Germans abound in histories of liter
ature, from the beginning of civilization down to the
last Leipsic fair. In England such works are un
known. We have as yet no history of our own liter
ature, though the Germans have at least one, quite
readable and instructive. Even the dry and defective
book of Mr. Hallam, — for such it is with all its many

474 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
excellencies, — is drawn largely from its German prede
cessors, though it is often inferior to them in vigor,
and almost always in erudition and in eloquence.
Doubtless, the English are a very learned people; a
very Christian people likewise, no doubt. But within
the present century, what has been written in the Eng
lish tongue, in any department of theological scholar
ship, which is of value and makes a mark on the age?
The Bridgewater Treatises, and the new edition of
Paley, — we blush to confess it, are the best things.
In the criticism and explanation of the Bible, Old Tes
tament or New Testament, what has been written that
is worth reading? Nothing, absolutely nothing of any
permanent value, save some half-dozen of books, it
may be, drawn chiefly from German sources. Who
have written the grammars and lexicons by which the
Hebrew and Greek Testaments are read? Why, the
Germans. Who have written critical introductions to
the Bible, useful helps in studying the sacred let
ters? Why, the Germans. Who have best and alone
developed the doctrines of the Bible, and explained
them, philosophically and practically? Why, the Ger
mans again. Where are the men who shaU stand up
in presence of Gesenius, Fiirst, Schleusner, and Wahl;
Winer, and Ewald, and Nordheimer; Michaelis, Eich-
horn, Jahn and Bertholdt, Hug and De Wette; the
Rosenmiillers, Maurer, Umbreit, Credner, Paulus, Kui-
noel, Fritzsche, Von Meyer, Liicke, Olshausen, Heng-
stenberg and Tholuck, and take rank as their peers?
We look for them, but in vain. " We put our finger
on them, and they are not there." What work on the
ology which has deserved or attracted general notice,
has been written in English in the present century?
We know of none. In Germany such works are nu-

GERMAN LITERATURE 475
merous. They have been written by pious men, and
the profoundest scholars of the age. Wegscheider's
Theology is doubtless a poor work; but its equal is
nowhere to be found in the English tongue. Its equal,
did we say ? There is nothing that can pretend to ap
proach it. Where, then, shall we find rivals for such
theologians as Ammon, Hase, Daub, Baumgarten,
Crusius, Schleiermacher, Bretschneider, and De Wette?
even for Zacharias, Vatke, and Kaiser?
In ecclesiastical history everybody knows what sort
of works have proceeded from the English and Ameri
can scholars. Jortin, Milner, Priestley, Campbell,
Echard, Erskine, Jones, Waddington, and Sabine;
these are our writers. But what are their works?
They are scarcely known in the libraries of scholars.
For our knowledge of eccelsiastical history we depend
on the translations from Du Pin, and Tillemont, or
more generally on those from the German Mosheim and
Gieseler. All our English ecclesiastical historians,
what are they when weighed against Mosheim, the
Walchs, Vater, Gieseler, Schrockh, Planck, Muenscher,
Tzschirner, and Neander? Why, they might make
sumptuous repasts on the crumbs which fall from these
men's table. The Germans pubhsh the Fathers of
the Greek and Latin Church, and study them. To the
Enghsh they are almost " a garden shut up and a
fountain sealed." It is only the Germans in this age
who study theology, or even the Bible, with the aid of
enlightened and scientific criticism. There is not even
a history of theology in our language.
But this is not all, by no means the chief merit of
the German scholars. Within less than threescore
years there have appeared among them four philoso
phers who would have been conspicuous in any age, and

476 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
will hereafter, we think, be named with Plato, Aristotle,
Bacon, Descartes, and Leibnitz — among the great
thinkers of the wrold. They are Kant, Fichte, ScheU-
ing, and Hegel. Silently these lights arose and went
up the sky without noise, to take their place among
the fixed stars of genius, and shine with them ; names
that will not fade out of heaven until some ages shall
have passed away. These men were thinkers all ; deep,
mighty thinkers. They knelt reverently down before
nature with religious hearts, and asked her questions.
They sat on the brink of the well of truth, and contin
ued to draw for themselves and the world. Take Kant
alone, and in the whole compass of thought we scarce
know his superior. From Aristotle to Leibnitz we do
not find his equal. No, nor since Leibnitz. Need we
say it? Was there not many a Lord Bacon in Im-
manuel Kant? Leibnitz himself was not more capa
cious, nor the Stagyrite more profound. What revo
lutions are in his thoughts ! His books are battles.
Philosophical writers swarm in Germany. Philosophy
seems epidemic almost, and a score of first-rate Ameri
can, or half a dozen English, reputations might be
made out of any of their philosophical writers of fourth
or fifth magnitude. Here, one needs very little schol
arship to establish a name. A small capital suffices for
the outfit, for the credit system seems to prevail in the
literary as well as the commercial world; and one can
draw on the bank of possibilities, as well as the fund
of achievements. One need but open any number of
the Berlin Jahrbiicher, the Jena Allgemeine Literatur
Zeitung, or the Studien und Kritiken, to see what a
lofty spirit prevails among the Germans in philosophy,
criticism, and religion. There a great deal is taken
for granted, and supposed to be known to all readers

GERMAN LITERATURE 477
which here is not to be supposed, except of a very
few, the most learned. Philosophy and theology we
reckon as the pride of the Germans. Here their genius
bursts into bloom, and ripens into fruit. But they are
greatly eminent, likewise, in the departments of poetry
and elegant letters in general. Notwithstanding their
wealth of erudition, they are eminently original.
Scandinavia and the East, Greece and the middle ages,
all pour their treasures into the lap of the German
muse, who not only makes trinkets therefrom, but out
of her own stores of linen, and wool, and silk, spins
and weaves strong and beautiful apparel for all her
household, and the needy everywhere. " She maketh
herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and
purple." No doubt, among the Germans there is a
host of servile imitators, whose mind travels out of it
self, so to say, and makes pilgrimages to Dante, or
Shakespeare, or Pindar, or Thucydides. Some men
think they are very Shakespeares, because they trans
gress obvious rules. The sickly negations of Byron,
his sensibility, misanthropy, and affectation, are aped
every day in Berlin and Vienna. Horace and Swift,
Anacreon and Bossuet, and Seneca and Walter Scott,
not to name others, have imitators in every street, who
remind one continually of the wren that once got into
the eagle's nest, set up to be king of the birds, and
attempted a scream. Still the staple of their literature
is eminently original. In point of freshness it has no
equal since the days of Sophocles. Who shall match
with Wieland, and Lessing, the Schlegels, Herder, so
sweet and beautiful, Jean-Paul, Tieck, and Schiller,
and Goethe? We need not mention lesser names, nor
add more of their equals.
In what we have said, we would not underrate Eng-

478 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
lish literature, especially the works of former ages.
We would pay deep and lasting homage to the great
poets, historians, philosophers, and divines of the
mother country, in her best days. Their influence is
still fresh and living throughout the world of letters.
But as these great spirits ascended, the mantle of their
genius or inspiration has fallen on the Germans, and
not the English. Well says a contemporary, " Mod
ern works are greatly deficient both in depth and purity
of sentiment. They seldom contain original and strik
ing views of the nature of man, and of the institutions
which spring from his volition. There is a dearth of
thought and sterility of sentiment among us. Liter
ature, art, philosophy, and life, are without freshness,
ideality, verity, and spirit. Most works since the days
of Milton require little thought; they want depth,
freshness; the meaning is on the surface; and the
charm, if any, is no deeper than the fancy ; the imagi
nation is not called into life; the thoughts are carried
creepingly along the earth, and often lost amid the
low and uncleanly things of sense and custom." " I
do not, at this time, think of any writer since Milton,
excepting Coleridge and Wordsworth, whose works
require a serene and thoughtful spirit in order to be
understood." *
As little would we be insensible to the merits of the
rising Hterature of our own land. Little could be ex
pected of us, hitherto. Our business has been to hew
down the forest ; to make paths and saw-mills, railroads
and steamboats ; to lay the foundation of a great peo
ple, and provide for the emergencies of the day. As
yet there is no American literature which corresponds
to the first principles of our institutions, as the Eng-
*A. B. Alcott in " Record of a School."

GERMAN LITERATURE 479
lish or French Hterature corresponds to theirs. We
are, perhaps, yet too young and raw to carry out the
great American idea, either ir literature or society.
At present both are imitations, and seem rather the
result of foreign and accidental circumstances, than the
offspring of our own spirit. No doubt the time will
come when there shall be an American school in science,
letters, and the elegant arts. Certainly, there is none
now. The promise of it must be sought in our news
papers and speeches oftener than in our books. Like
aU other nations we have begun with imitations, and
shall come to originals, doubtless, before we end.
But there is one peculiar charm in German Htera
ture quite unequalled, we think, in modern days, that
is, the religious character of their works. We know
it is often said the Germans are licentious, immoral in
all ways, and above all men, — not the old giants ex
cepted, — are haters of religion. One would fancy
Mezentius 2 or Goliah was the archetype of the nation.
We say it advisedly that this is, in our opinion, the
most religious literature the world has seen since the
palmy days of Greek writing, when the religious spirit
seemed fresh and warm, coming into Hfe and playing
grateful with the bland celestial light reflected from
each flower-cup and passing cloud, or received direct
and straightway from the source of all. It stands an
unconscious witness to the profound piety of the Ger
man heart. We had almost said it was the only Chris
tian national literature the world has ever seen. Cer
tainly, to our judgment, the literature of Old England
in her best days was less religious in thought and feel
ing, as it was less beautiful in its form, and less simple
in its quiet loving holiness, than this spontaneous and
multiform expression of the German soul. But we

480 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
speak not for others, let each drink of " that spiritual
rock " where the water is most salubrious to him. But
we do not say that German literature comprises no
works decidedly immoral and irreligious. Certainly
we have read such, but they are rare, while almost
every book not entirely scientific and technical breathes
a religious spirit. You meet this coming unobtru
sively upon you where you least of all expect it. We
do not say, that the idea of a Christian literature is
realized in Germany, or likely to be realized. No, the
farthest from it possible. No nation has yet dreamed
of realizing it. Nor can this be done until Christian
ity penetrates the heart of the nations, and brings aU
into subjection to the spirit of life. The Christianity
of the world is yet but a baptized heathenism, so lit
erature is yet heathen and profane. We dare not
think lest we think against our faith. As if truth
were hostile to faith, and God's house were divided
against itself. The Greek literature represents the
Greek religion, its ideal and its practical side. But
all the literature of all Christian nations, taken to
gether, does not represent the true Christian religion,
only that fraction of it these nations could translate
into their experience. Hence, we have as yet only the
cradle song of Christianity and its nursery rhymes.
The same holds true in art, — painting, sculpture, and
architecture. Hitherto it is only the church militant,
not the church triumphant, that has been represented.
A Gothic cathedral gives you the aspiration, not the
attainment, the resting in the fulness of God which
is the end of Christianity. We have Magdalens, Ma
donnas, saints emaciated almost to anatomies, with
most rueful visage, and traditional faces of the Sav
ior. These, however, express the penitence, the wail-

GERMAN LITERATURE 481
ing of the world lying in darkness, rather than the
light of the nations. The Son of Man risen from the
grave is yet lacking in art. The Christian Prome
theus or Apollo is not yet ; still less the triple Graces,
and the Olympian Jove of Christianity. What is
Saint Peter's to the Parthenon, considered as symbols
of the two religions? The same deficiency prevails in
literature. We have inherited much from the heathen,
and so Christianity, becoming the residuary legatee of
deceased religions, has earned but little for itself. His
tory has not yet been written in the spirit of the
Christian scheme ; as a friend says, hitherto it has been
the " history of elder brothers." Christianity would
write of the whole family. The great Christian poem,
the Tragedy of Mankind, has not yet been conceived.
A Christian philosophy founded on an exhaustive ana
lysis of man is among the things that are distant. The
true religion has not yet done its work in the heart of
the nations. How, then, can it reach their literature,
their arts, their society, which come from the nation's
heart? Christianity is still in the manger, wrapped in
swaddling-bands, and unable to move its limbs. Its
Jewish parent watches fearful, with a pondering heart.
The shepherds that honor the new-born are Jewish still,
dripping as yet with the dews of ancient night. The
heathen magicians have come up to worship, guided
by the star of truth which goes before all simple hearts,
and lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
But they are heathen even now. They can only offer
" gold, and frankincense, and myrrh." They do not
give their mind, and still less their heart. The celes
tial child is still surrounded by the oxen that slumber
in their stalls, or wake to blame the Hght that pre
vents their animal repose. The Herod of superstition
II— 31

482 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
is troubled, and his city with him. Alarmed at the
new tidings, he gathers together his mighty men, his
chief priests and scribes, to take counsel of his twin
prophets, the flesh and the devil, and while he pre
tends to seek only to worship, he would gladly slay the
young child, that is born king of the world. But
Christianity will yet grow up to manhood, and escape
the guardianship of traditions, to do the work God has
chosen. Then, and not till then, will the gospel of
beautiful souls, fair as the light, and " terrible as an
army with banners," be written in the literature, arts,
society, and life of the world. Now when we say that
German literature is religious, above all others, we
mean that it comes nearer than any other to the Chris
tian ideal of literary art. Certainly it by no means
reaches the mark.
Such, then, is German literature. Now, with those
among us who think nothing good can come of it, we
have nothing to say. Let them rejoice in their own
cause, and be blessed in it. But from the influence
this rich, beloved, and beautiful literature will exert
on our infant world of letters, we hope the most happy
results. The diligence which shuns superficial study ;
the boldness which looks for the causes of things, and
the desire to fall back on what alone is elementary and
eternal, in criticism, philosophy, and religion; the re
ligious humility and reverence which pervades it, —
may well stimulate our youth to great works. We
would not that any one should give in his adhesion to a
German master or copy German models. AU have
their defects. We wonder that clear thinkers can
write so darkly as some do, and that philosophers and
theologians are content with their slovenly paragraphs,
after Goethe has written such luminous prose. We

GERMAN LITERATURE 483
doubt that their philosophical or theological systems
can ever take root in the American mind. But their
method may well be followed ; and fortunate will it be
for us if the central truths their systems are made to
preserve are sown in our soil, and bear abundant fruit.
No doubt there is danger in studying these writings ;
just as there is danger in reading Copernicus or Locke,
Aristotle or Lord Brougham, or Isaiah and St. John.
As a jocose friend says, " It is always dangerous for
a young man to think, for he may think wrong, you
know." It were sad to see men run mad after Ger
man philosophy ; but it is equally sad to see them go
to the same excess in English philosophy. If " Trans
cendentalism " is bad, so is Paleyism and Materialism.
Truth is possessed entire by no sect, German or Eng
lish. It requires all schools to get at aU truth, as the
whole church is needed to preach the whole Gospel.
Blessed were the days when truth dwelt among men
in her wholeness. But alas ! they only existed in fable,
and now, like Osiris in the story, she is cut into frag
ments and scattered world-wide, and sorrowing mor
tals must journey their life long to gather here a
piece and there a piece. But the whole can never be
joined and reanimated in this life. Where there is
much thought there will be some truth, and where there
is freedom in thinking there is room for misconduct
also. We hope light from Germany; but we expect
shadows with it. The one will not eclipse the sun, nor
the other be thicker than the old darkness we have
" felt " from our youth up. We know there is sin
among the Germans ; it is so wherever there are men
and women. Philosophy, in Germany or England,
like the stout man a-j ourneying, advances from day to
day ; but sometimes loses the track and wanders, " not

484 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
knowing whither he goeth;" nay, sometimes stumbles
into a ditch. When this latter accident, — as it is con
fessed, — has bef aUen philosophy in America and Eng
land, and men declare she is stark dead, we see not why
her friends might not call on her German sister to
extricate her from the distress and revive* her once
more, or at least give her decent burial. We are sorry,
we confess it, to see foolish young men, and old men
not burthened with wisdom, trusting wholly in a man,
thinking as he thinks, and moving as he pulls the
strings. It is dangerous to yield thus to a German or
a Scotch philosopher. It were bad to be borne off on
a cloud by Fichte and Hegel, or to be made " spouse
of the worm and brother of the clay " by Priestley or
Paley. But we fancy it were better to faU into the
hands of Jove than Pluto. We cannot predict the re
sult of the German movement in philosophy ; but we see
no more reason for making Henry Heine, Gutzkow,
and Schef er the exponents of that movement, — as the
manner of some is, — than for selecting Bulwer, Byron,
Moore, and Taylor the infidel, to represent the church
of England. Seneca and Petronius were both Roman
men, but which is the type? Let German literature be
weighed in an even balance, and then pass for what it
is worth. We have no fear that it will be written
down, and should be sorry to see any exaggerated
statement of its excellence which would in the end lead
to disappointment.
We turn now to the book named at the head of our
article. The author's design is to give a picture of
German literature. His work does not pretend to be
a history, nor to point out the causes which have
made the literature what it is. His aim is to write
of subjects rather than to talk about books. His work

GERMAN LITERATURE 485
is merely a picture. Since this is so its character de
pends on two things, namely, the artist's point of
sight, and the fidelity with which he has painted things
as they appear from that point. The first question
then is, from what point does he survey the field? It
is not that of philosophy, theology, or politics. He
is no adept in either of these sciences. He is emi
nently national, and takes the stand of a German ama
teur. Therefore it is his duty to paint things as they
appear to a disinterested German man of letters ; so
he must treat of religion, philosophy, education, his
tory, politics, natural science, poetry, law, and criti
cism, from this point of view. It would certainly re
quire an encyclopedical head to discuss ably all these
subjects, and bring them down to the comprehension
of the unlearned. It was scarcely to be expected that
any one man should be so familiar with all departments
of thought in a literature so wide and rich as this,
as never to make mistakes, and even great mistakes.
But Mr. Menzel 3 does not give us a faithful picture
of things as seen from this position, as we shall pro
ceed to show in some details. He carries with him
violent prejudices, which either blind his eyes to the
truth or prevent him from representing it as it is. On
his first appearance, his unmanly hostility to Goethe
began to show itself.* Nay, it appeared, we are told,
in his Streckverse, published a little before. This
hostility amounts to absolute hatred, we think, not only
of the works, but of the man himself. This animosity
towards distinguished authors vitiates the whole work.
Personal feelings and prepossessions perpetually in-
* Europaischen Blattern for 1824, I. B. p. 101 — 108, and IV.,
p. 233, seq. But these we have never seen, and only a few
stray numbers of the Literatur-Blatt.

486 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
terrupt the cool judgment of the critic. When a
writer attempts, as Menzel does, to show that an au
thor who has a reputation which covers the world, and
rises higher and higher each year, who is distinguished
for the breadth of his studies and the newness of his
views, and his exquisite taste in all matters of art, is
only a humbug, what can we do but smile, and ask if
effects come without causes? Respecting this hostil
ity to Goethe, insane as it obviously is, we have noth
ing to say. v Besides, the translator has ably referred
to the matter in the preface. That Goethe as a man
was selfish to a very high degree, a debauchee and
well-bred epicurean, who had little sympathy with
what was highest in man, so long as he could crown
himself with rose-buds, we are willing to admit. But
let him have justice, none the less. Mr. Menzel sets
up a false standard by which to judge literary pro
ductions. Philosophy, ethics, art, and literature should be
judged of by their own laws. We would not
censure the Laocoon because it did not teach us
agriculture, nor the Iliad because it was not repub
lican enough for our taste. Each of these works is to
be judged by its own principles. Now, we object to
our friend, that he judges literary works by the po
litical complexion of their author. Thus, for exam
ple, not to mention Goethe, he condemns Johann von
Muller, — whom, as a Swiss, he was not bound to men
tion among German writers, — and all his works, be
cause he was no patriot. For him, " of all the German
writers, I entertain the profoundest contempt." No
doubt the venerable historian, as some one has said,
would be overwhelmed as he stands in the Elysian
fields with Tacitus and Thucydides, to be despised

GERMAN LITERATURE 487
by such an historian as Menzel ! * So Krug is con
demned, not for his fustiness and superficiality, but
because he wrote against the Poles. It is surprising
to what a length this is carried. He ought to con
demn the " Egoism " of Fichte no less than that of
Hegel. But because the former is a Hberal and the
latter a conservative, the same thing is tolerated in the
one and condemned in the other. Words cannot ex
press his abhorrence of Hegel. Fries is commended
as a philosopher because he was " almost the only true
patriot among our philosophers." Oken must not be
reproached with his coarse materialism, because he re
signed his professorship at Jena rather than give up
his Hberal journal. These few instances are sufficient
to show the falseness of his standard.
He indulges in personal abuse; especially does he
pour out the vials of his calumny on the " young Ger
mans," whom he censures for their personal abuse.
He seems to have collected all the " little city twad
dle," as the Germans significantly name it, as mate
rial for his work, and very striking are the colors, in
deed. His abuse of this kind is so gross that we
shall say no more of it.f Mr. Menzel is the Ber
serker of modern critics. He scorns all laws of lit
erary warfare; scalps, and gouges, and stabs under
the fifth rib, and sometimes condescends to tell a little
fib, as we shall show in its place. He often tries the
works he censures by a moral, and not a critical or
artistic standard. No doubt, the moral is the high
est; and a work of art wherein the moral element is
wanting deserves the severest censure. No man can
* See an able defence of Von Muller, in Strauss's Streit-
schriften, Heft 2. Tubingen: 1837. p. 100.
t Read who will, Vol. III. p. 228, for an example.

488 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
insist on this too strongly. But when a man writes
from the artistic point of view, we think it is his duty
to adhere to his principles. If a work is immoral, it
is so far false to the first principles of art. It
does very little good, we fancy, merely to cry out
that this book of Gutzkow, or that of Goethe, is im
moral. It only makes foolish young men the more
eager to read it. But if the critic would show that
the offending parts were false, no less than wicked,
and mere warts and ulcers on the body of the work,
he would make the whole appear loathsome and not
attractive. Mr. Menzel is bound to do this, for he
believes that the substance and the form of art are
inseparable, or in plain Enghsh, that virtue is beauti
ful and vice ugly. Having made this criticism, he
might justly pronounce the moral sentence also. If
truth is harmonious, then a licentious work is false
and detestable, as well in an artistic as in a moral
point of view. But we cannot enlarge on this great
question at the end of an article.
Judging Menzel from his own point of view, this
work is defective in still graver points. He carries his
partisan feelings wherever he goes, and with very su
perficial knowledge passes a false sentence on great
men and great things. His mistakes are sometimes
quite amusing, even to an American scholar, and must
be doubly ludicrous to a German, whose minute knowl
edge of the literature of his own country would reveal
more mistakes than meet our eye. We will point out
a few of these in only two chapters — those on philos
ophy and religion. In the first, we think the author
may safely defy any one to divine from his words the
philosophical systems of the writers he treats of.
Take, for a very striking example, his remarks upon

GERMAN LITERATURE 489
Leibnitz. " The great Leibnitz, who stood on the
boundary line between the old times of astrology,
magic, and sympathetic influences, and the later times
of severe scientific method, united the labyrinth of life
belonging to these austere dark days with the clear
light of our own. He was animated with deep re
ligious faith, but still had the full vigor of thought.
Living faith in God was his rock; but his system of
world-harmony * showed nothing of the darkly-colored
cathedral light of the ancient mystics ; it stood forth
in the clear white light of the day, like a marble tem
ple on the mountain-top." From this statement one
would naturally connect Leibnitz with Pythagoras,
Kepler, and Baron Swedenborg, who really believed
and taught the world-harmony. But who would ever
dream of the monads, which play such a part in the
system of Leibnitz? He tells us that Eberhard has
written a one-sided and Kantian history of philosophy,
which is very strange in a man who lived a Wolfian
all his days and fought against the critical philosophy,
though with somewhat more zeal than knowledge, it is
thought. Besides, his history of philosophy was pub
lished in 1788, before the Kantian philosophy had be
come lord of the ascendant. As he criticises poets by
the patriotic standard, so he tries the philosophers by
his aesthetic rule, and wonders they are hard to under
stand. But these are minor defects ; come we to the
greater. His remarks on Kant are exceedingly un
just, not to speak more harshly. " The philosoph
ical century wanted an earth without a heaven, a state
without a church, man without a God. No one has
* Mr. Felton has translated Weltharmonie " Preestablished
Harmony," which Leibnitz believed in, but it is not the mean
ing of the word.

490 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
shown so plainly as Kant how with this Hmitation
earth may still be a paradise, the state a moral union,
and man a noble being, by his own reason and power,
subjected to law." We do not see how any one could
come to this conclusion who had read Kant's Kritik
of Judgment, and Practical Reason, and conclude our
critic, forgetting to look into these books, in his ab
horrence of scholastic learning and " study that makes
men pale," cut the matter short, and rode over the
" high priori road " in great state to the conclusion.
We pass over his account of Fichte and Schelling, leav
ing such as have the ability to determine, from his
remarks, what were the systems of these two philoso
phers, and reconstruct them at their leisure. There is
an old remark we have somewhere heard, that it takes
a philosopher to judge a philosopher; and the truth
of the proverb is very obvious to the readers of this
chapter. Hegel seems the object of our author's most
desperate dislike. His sin, however, is not so much
his philosophy as his conservative politics, as it ap
pears. He does not condescend — as an historian
might do once in a while — to give us a portrait, or
even a caricature of his system; but contents himself"
with such abuse as the following precious sentences.
" Hegel first reduced God to a mere speculation, led
about by an evil spirit, in the void of his heavenly
heath, who does nothing but think, indeed, nothing
but think of thinking." " He makes no distinction
between himself and God; he gives himself out for
God." He says God first came to a clear conscious
ness of himself " in the philosopher who has the only
right philosophy, therefore in himself, in the person
of Hegel. Thus we have, then, a miserable, hunch
backed, book-learned God; a wooden and squinting

GERMAN LITERATURE 491
academical man, a man of the most painful and pomp
ous scholasticism ; in a word, a German pedant on the
throne of the world." We need make no comments on
the spirit which suggests such a criticism upon a
philosopher like Hegel. Still further, he says, Forster
" declared over the grave of Hegel that, beyond all
doubt, Hegel was himself the Holy Ghost, the third
person in the Godhead." When we read this several
years ago, we believed the words were uttered by some
man of an Oriental imagination, who meant no harm
by his seeming irreverence. But on inquiry we find it
is not so. One who heard Mr. Forster's oration, who
had it lying before him in print at the time of writ
ing, declares there was no such thing in it, but the
strongest passage was this : " Was it not he who rec
onciled the unbelievers with God, inasmuch as he taught
us truly to understand Jesus Christ." *
But enough on this subject. Let us say a word re
specting the chapter on religion, more particularly on
that part relating to theology. Here the learned au
thor's abhorrence of book-learning is more conspicuous
than elsewhere, though obvious enough in all parts of
the book. We pass over the first part of the chapter,
— which contains some very good things that will
come to light in spite of the smart declamations in
which they are floating, — and proceed to his account
of Catholicism in Germany. Here, in a work on Ger
man literature, we naturally expect a picture of the
Catholic theology, at least a reference to the chief
Catholic writers in this department. But we are dis
appointed again. We find declamations and anecdotes
well fitted for the Penny Magazine, as a German critic
says, to whom we are indebted for some hints on this
* Strauss, ubi sup., p. 212, 213.

492 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
topic. He throws together such remarks as would
make excellent and smart paragraphs in a newspaper ;
but gives no calm, philosophical view of the subject.
He can enlarge on the Jesuits or Jansenists, on the
influence of Kant's and Schelling's philosophy, and
the reaction in favor of Catholicism, for these subjects
are in all mouths ; but he scarce looks at the great
philosophical question on which the whole matter
hinges. His acquaintance with modern Catholic writ
ers seems to be as narrow as his philosophy is super
ficial. Gunther, Pabst, Mohler, Singler, Stauden-
maier, Klee, and Hermes, have escaped the sharp
glance of our author. In the portion of the chapter
which relates to Protestantism we find the same defects.
The sketch of the history of theology since Luther is
hasty and inaccurate. It does not give the reader a
clear conception of the progress of ideas. He makes
some amusing misrepresentations, to which we will
only refer. Among the most celebrated of German
preachers since the middle of the last century, he for
gets to mention Teller, Loffler, Zollikoffer, Lavater,
Herder, Tzschirner, Schmalz, Rohr, Zimmermann, De
Wette, Marheineke, Nitzsch, Tholuck, Ehrenberg,
Strauss, Reinhard, Therimin, Couard, Lisco, and many
others of equal fame. Mosheim is mentioned as a dis
tinguished writer on morals, Ammon and Bretschneider
are dispatched in a word. Wetstein is mentioned
among the followers of Ernesti and Semler, and is put
after Eichhorn, though he died only two years after
the latter was born. But it is an ungrateful task to
point out these defects. Certainly we should not
name them, if there were great and shining excel
lencies beside. But they are not to be found. The
chapter gives a confused jumble of ideas, and not a

GERMAN LITERATURE 493
true picture. True, it contains passages of great
force and beauty, but throughout the whole section,
order and method, accurate knowledge and an impar
tial spirit, are grievously wanting. Who would guess
what great things had been done in Biblical criticism
from Mr. Menzel's words? Who would know that
De Wette had written profound works in each of the
four great departments of theology ; indeed, that he
wrote anything but a couple of romances? But we
are weary with this fault-finding. However, one word
must be said by way of criticism upon his standing
point itself. German literature is not to be surveyed
by an amateur merely. The dilettanti has no rule
and compasses in his pocket by which he can measure
all the objects in this German ocean of books. No
doubt, histories of Hterature have hitherto been too
often " written in the special interest of scholastic
learning," and are antiquarian lists of books and not
living histories. It is certainly well to write a his
tory of Hterature so that all men may read. But it
would require a most uncommon head to treat ably of
all departments of literature and science. In one
word, it is quite impossible to judge all by one rule.
The writer, therefore, must change his position as
often as he changes the subject. He must write of
matters pertaining to religion with the knowledge of a
theologian, on philosophical subjects like a philoso
pher, and so of the rest. Any attempt to describe
them all from one point of sight seems as absurd as to
reckon pounds, shiUings, and pence, and drachms,
ounces, quarters, and tons in the same column. A
sketch of German theological literature ought to tell
what has been done and what is now doing by Protes
tants and Catholics in the four great departments of

494 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
exegetical historical, systematic, and practical the
ology. It should put us in possession of the idea,
which lies at the bottom of Catholicism and Protestant
ism, and tell what form this idea assumes, and why
it takes this form and no other. But to this Mr.
Menzel makes no pretension. He has not the requisite
knowledge for this. His learning seems gathered
from reviews, newspapers, the conversations-lexicon,
literary gossip, and a very perfunctory perusal of
many books. The whole work lacks a plan. There is
no unity to the book. It seems a compilation of ar
ticles, written hastily in the newspapers, and designed
for immediate effect. So the spirit of the partisan
appears everywhere. We have declamation instead of
matter-of-fact and cool judgment. Still the work is
quite entertaining. Its author, no doubt, passes for
a man of genius; but, as a friend says, who rarely
judges wrong, " he has more show than sinew, and
makes up in smartness what he wants in depth." We
are glad to welcome the book in its English dress, but
we hope it will be read with caution, as a guide not to
be trusted. Its piquant style and " withering sar
casm " remind us often of Henry Heine and the young
Germans, with whom the author would not wish to be
classed. We think it will not give a true idea of the
German mind and its workings to the mere English
reader, or aid powerfully the student of German to
find his way amid that labyrinthian literature. The
book is very suggestive, if one will but follow out the
author's hints, and avoid his partialities and extrava
gance. Professor Felton 4 seems to have performed the work
of translation with singular fidelity. His version is
uncommonly idiomatic and fresh. It reads like

GERMAN LITERATURE 495
original English. But here and there we notice a
slight verbal inaccuracy in translating, which scarce
any human diligence could avoid.* We regard the
version as a monument of diligence and skill. The
metrical translations are fresh and spirited.
* It would have been a convenience to the readers, if it had
been stated in the preface, that the version was made from the
second German edition, published at Stuttgart, 1835; for the
author only treats of things as they were at that time, or be
fore it.

NOTES

NOTES I
THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
This address was delivered at Waterville, Maine,
August 8, 1849, apparently at the commencement ex
ercises of Colby College. It was published in Speeches,
Addresses, and Occasional Sermons, vol. III., 1852, at
the end of that volume, and bore the title of "The Po
sition and Duties of the American Scholar." It was
reprinted in Miss Cobbe's edition, volume seven, Dis
courses of Social Science.
Page 6, note 1. The founder of the Hopkins
fund was Edward Hopkins, born in Shrewsbury,
England, 1600, educated in its Royal Free Grammar
School, became a successful London merchant, turned
Puritan, migrated to New England, joined in the
settlement of Connecticut, was secretary of the colony
in 1638, and was alternately governor and lieutenant
governor from 1640 to about 1655. He went to Eng
land in 1653, and died in London, March, 1657. In
his will he left his estate in New England, valued at
about £20,000, after the decease of his wife, "for the
breeding of hopeful youths both at the grammar school
and college for the better service of the country in
future times." About £1,000 went to the grammar
schools of Hartford, New Haven, and Hadley. By a
decree in chauncery £500 went to Harvard College in
1710. This money was invested in the purchase of a
township belonging to the "praying Indians," now
comprising Hopkinton (named after the donor J and
parts of Upton and Holliston, in Worcester county,
Massachusetts. Of the money accruing from this
land three-fourths went to Harvard College and one-
fourth to the Cambridge Grammar School.
499

500 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Page 12, note 2. The political term doughface,
meaning a person who is pliable and facing all ways,
was first used by John Randolph of Roanoke. He
first spelled it doe, using it of those timid persons not
having the courage of their convictions. It was ap
plied to northern men friendly to slavery, who were
open to political influence, and modified their actions
to suit occasions and personal interests. It was also
sometimes applied to southern men willing to conciliate
the northern demands. During the discussion of the
Missouri bill, in 1820, several northern men voted with
the southern members of the House, and Randolph
called them doughfaces. Another account says that
several southern men voted to exclude slavery, from the
territories, and were called doughfaces by Randolph.
He termed this action "a dirty bargain." The atti
tude of Randolph was well expressed in a letter he
wrote February 24, 1820: — "These Yankees have
almost reconciled me to negro slavery. They have
produced a revulsion even on my mind; what then
must the effect be on them who had no scruples on the
subject? I am persuaded that the cause of humanity
to these unfortunates has been put back a century,
certainly a generation, by the unprincipled conduct of
ambitious men, availing themselves of a good, as well
as a fanatical spirit in the nation." — The Life of John
Randolph of Roanoke, by Hugh A. Garland, New
York, Appletons, 1850, vol. II, p. 133.
Page 15, note 3. To sign off from the church was
a term used in the American colonies during the
eighteenth century, after the process had begun that
led to the separation of state and church. When a
person was no longer willing to continue his connec
tion with the church established by law he could sign
a statement requesting that his share of the church tax
should be assigned to the congregation of his prefer
ence, which was always one not sanctioned by the state
in any other manner.

NOTES 501
" When the legislature at Boston broke in upon
their own exempting law, in 1752, the Baptists were
so much alarmed as to call several meetings, and to
elect John Proctor their agent to carry their case to
England; and he drew a remonstrance upon the sub
ject, which was presented to the Assembly at Boston,
in May, 1754. It stated matters so plainly that a
motion was made by some to take the signers of it into
custody; but Governor Shirley, newly returned from
Europe, convinced them of the impolicy of such a
step ; and then they appointed a committee to confer in
a friendly way with the Baptists ; and matters were
shifted along until the war came on, and their de
sign in England was dropped. At length all their
exempting laws for Baptists and Quakers expired, and
the Assembly of November 23, 1757, made a new one
wherein both denominations were again included in one
act. By it no Baptists were to be exempted from min
isterial taxes in the places where they lived, ' but such
whose names shall be contained in a list or lists to be
taken and exhibited on or before the 20th of July an-
nuaUy, to the assessors of such town, district, precinct
or parish, and signed by three principal members of
the Anabaptist church to which he or they belong,
and the minister thereof, if any there be, who shall
therein certify that the persons whose names are in
serted in the said list or lists are really belonging
thereto, that they verily believe them to be conscien
tiously of their persuasion, and that they frequently
and usually attend public worship in said church on
the Lord's days.' And the like was required of the
Quakers. It was continued in force thirteen years;
and no tongue nor pen can fully describe all the evils
that were practiced under it." — A History of New
England, with particular reference to the Denomina
tion of Christians called Baptists, by Isaac Backus.
Second ed., 1871, vol. II, pp. 140-141. This is one

502 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
instance of many laws enacted in the eighteenth cen
tury, and, up to the time of the separation of church
and state in Massachusetts, which took place in 1834.
The later laws, which enabled the individual member
of a parish to withdraw from the payment of church
taxes, established more especially the designation of
" signing off."
Page 15, note J^. Polk and Taylor were opposed
to the United States Bank, and helped to destroy it.
Polk opposed its recharter, and in a letter written in
1829 he said he was irreconcilably opposed to the ex
istence of such an institution, denied its constitution
ality and its expediency. He at first favored the
State Bank system, but later opposed it in favor of
an independent treasury as most desirable for the na
tional government.
Page 19, note 5. The lyceum was a very important
institution for general education at the time this ad
dress was given. It began in 1826 in Massachusetts
and Connecticut, and extended widely throughout the
country. Many town lyceums were organized, which
were combined into county, state, and finally a national
organization. In the cities these often took the form
of mechanics' institutes. See Cooke's Emerson, and
Old South Leaflets, vol. VI, no. 139, pp. 293-312.
Page 20, note 6. Most of the first State Constitu
tions, following the Declaration of Independence, have
a Bill of Rights at the beginning, which sets forth
fundamental political principles, and guarantees the
rights of the individual which it was thought neces
sary to have assured. These rights were those of free
press, speech, trial by jury, no oppressive taxation,
protection from unwarranted search, habeas corpus,
and several others, varying in different States. The
National Constitution did not set out with such a
guarantee, and this nearly resulted in its failure to
secure the necessary majority for its adoption.

NOTES 503
Page 20, note 7. Such metaphysical fruit may be
seen not only in the writings of Jonathan Edwards and
Samuel Hopkins, but in the earlier works of John
Wise. Later it appeared in Jonathan Mayhew and
Channing. Other names might be mentioned to jus
tify the statement.
Page 26, note 8. " Up for California " refers to
the keen interest, at the time this address was given,
incident to the discovery of gold.
Page 27, note 9. It is not known when the figure
of a codfish was first placed over the Speaker's chair
in the Massachusetts House of Representatives as em
blematic of the then chief industry of the colony.
Tradition carries it back to the beginning of the
eighteenth century. It was there from 1773, and was
transferred to the new house in 1798. In 1895 it
was transferred to the then new chamber. See all
that is known on the subject in " A History of the
Emblem of the Codfish in the Hall of Representatives,
compiled by a Committee of the House," Boston, State
Printers, 1895.
Page 31, note 10. In 1849 the four most impor
tant American periodicals were the North American
Review, Christian Examiner, Democratic Review, and
New Englander. Those of England were the Quar
terly, British and Foreign, Critical, and Monthly Re
views. Others might be named, but these indicate the
force of the comparison.
Page 37, note 11. In 1848 the United States gov
ernment sent the store-ship " Supply " on an expedi
tion to survey the Dead Sea. The commander of the
expedition, by whom it was planned, was a lieutenant
in the Navy. The results were published in a " Nar
rative of the United States Expedition to the River
Jordan and the Dead Sea," by W. F. Lynch, U. S. N.,
Philadelphia, 1849- In the Smithsonian Institution
and the Bureau of Ethnology the national govern-

504 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ment has since done extended and important work
along the lines of research suggested by Parker.
Page 37, note 12. Perhaps the most important of
these lives of fugitive slaves was that of Frederick
Douglas, whose " Narrative " was published in 1845,
" My Bondage and My Freedom," 1855, and " Life
and Times of Frederick Douglas," 1882. The first
of such narratives, however, was " Walker's Appeal,"
published in Boston in 1829. He was born in North
Carolina of a slave father and free mother, traveled
extensively in the South, and knew intimately the
condition of the slaves. He kept a shop in Boston
for second-hand clothes, and published his own work
for free distribution. It created much stir in the
South. Rev. Samuel Ringgold Ward published his
" Autobiography of a Fugitive Negro," in 1855. He
was a protege of Gerrit Smith, and was a man of much
ability. Rev. W. H. Furness said of one of his ad
dresses, at an anti-slavery meeting in New York, that
" his speech was such a strain of eloquence as I never
heard excelled before or since." Several other such
books were published from 1830 to 1860.
Page 38, note 13. Many attempts were made to
annex Cuba and other territory to the south of the
United States during the period of the anti-slavery
agitation, especially after the South learned it could
not introduce slavery into the western territories.
Most of the histories of the period deal with these
attempts. II
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
This critical and appreciative survey of the writ
ings of Emerson appeared in the Massachusetts Quar
terly Review for March, 1850. It bore the title of
" The Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson." At the
head of the article as it appeared in the Review was a.

NOTES 505
list of Emerson works which had then been published,
as foUows: —
Nature. Boston, 1836, 1 vol. 12mo.
Essays. By Ralph Waldo Emerson, Boston, 1841,
1 vol. 12mo.
Essays, Second Series. By Ralph Waldo Emer
son, 1844, 1 vol. 12mo.
Poems. By Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1847, 1 vol.
12mo. Nature, Addresses and Orations. By Ralph Waldo
Emerson, 1849, 1 vol.
Representative Men: Seven Lectures. By R. W.
Emerson, 1850, 1 vol. 12m.
This review was included by Miss Cobbe in her edi
tion, vol. II, Critical Writings. It has not otherwise
been reprinted.
An account of the origin and history of the Massa
chusetts Quarterly Review is to be found in the tenth
chapter of Weiss's Life and Correspondence, and in
Cabot's Emerson. The first number appeared in De
cember, 1847, and it was continued for three years.
It was proposed that Emerson should be the editor, but
he wrote only the " Editors' Address " in the first
number, and two book reviews in subsequent issues.
The other editor was James Elliot Cabot, who wrote
Emerson's biography many years after, and edited
some of his later volumes. Much of the real work of
the Review fell on Parker, and he wrote for nearly
every number, furnishing two articles to some issues,
and many book reviews to all. Several of his con
tributions to its pages appear in the present volume-
Among the writers were Lowell, Phillips, Sumner,
Weiss, and other liberal men; but the pay was too
small, if anything at all, to command the constant ef
fort of the best talent.
All the biographies of Parker bear testimony to the
close relations of Emerson and Parker, and their writ-

506 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ings indicate how wide apart they were in much of
their thinking. The words spoken by Emerson in
memory of Parker after his death sufficiently prove
his regard for his friend. These words were spoken
in Music Hall, June 15, 1860, and may be found in
the centenary edition of Emerson's works. At a
time when Emerson was still condemned and misrep
resented Parker wrote this worthy testimony to his
genius, appraising his intellectual qualities and his
philosophy of life ; and quoting from him in a manner
to attract the attention of those who had not hitherto
been drawn to his teachings.
Parker's admiration for Emerson began very early,
as is seen in what he wrote in his journal after hear
ing the Divinity School Address.
" Sunday, July 15, 1838. — Proceeded to Cam
bridge to hear the valedictory sermon by Mr. Emer
son. In this he surpassed himself as much as he sur
passes others in the general way. I shall give no
abstract. So beautiful, so just, so true, and terribly
sublime was his picture of the faults of the church in
its present position. My soul is roused, and this week
I shall write the long-meditated sermons on the state
of the church and the duties of these times."
In his " Historic Notes of Life and Letters in New
England " Emerson gave a most appreciative and yet
critical estimate of Parker and his work, and none more
just has been written. In his tribute after Parker's
death, he said:
" Theodore Parker was a son of the soil, charged
with the energy of New England, strong, eager, in
quisitive of knowledge, of a diligence that never tired,
upright, of a haughty independence, yet the gentlest
of companions ; a man of study, fit for a man of the
world; with decided opinions and plenty of power to
state them; rapidly pushing his studies so far as to
leave few men qualified to sit as his critics. He elected

NOTES 507
his part of duty, or accepted nobly that assigned him
in his rare constitution. Wonderful acquisition of
knowledge, a rapid wit that heard all, and welcomed all
that came, by seeing its bearing. . . . He had a
strong understanding, a logical method, a love for
facts, a rapid eye for their historic relations, and a
skill in stripping them of traditional lustres. He had
a sprightly fancy, and often amused himself with
throwing his meaning into pretty apologues; yet we
can hardly ascribe to his mind the poetic element,
though his scholarship had made him a reader and
quoter of verses."
In view of the high praise of Emerson in this tribute
it is most interesting to consider what he says in de
preciation of what he regards as Parker's tendency
to overpraise his friends: "He never kept back
the truth for fear to make an enemy. But, on the
other hand, it was complained that he was bitter and
harsh, that his zeal burned with too hot a flame. It
is so difficult, in evil times, to escape this charge! for
the faithful preacher most of all. It was his merit,
like Luther, Knox, and Latimer, and John Baptist,
to speak tart truth, when that was peremptory and
when there were few to say it. But his sympathy for
goodness was not less energetic. One fault he had,
he overestimated his friends, — I may well say it, —
and sometimes vexed them with the importunity of his
good opinion, whilst they knew better the ebb which
follows unfounded praise. He was capable, it must
be said, of the most unmeasured eulogies on those he
esteemed, especially if he had any jealousy that they
did not stand with the Boston public as highly as
they ought. His commanding merit as a reformer is
this, that he insisted beyond all men in pulpits — I
cannot think of one rival — that the essence of Chris
tianity is its practical morals ; it is there for use, or it
is nothing."

508 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Page 55, note 1. George Steevens, 1737-1800, a
commentator on Shakespeare. His edition, with the
help of Dr. Johnson, appeared in 1773, revised and
enlarged in 1778. He did other important editorial
work. Page 66, note 2. It is probable this reference was
to Christopher Pearse Cranch, 1815-1892. He
worked as a painter in Italy, New York, and Paris.
His work deserved Parker's praise. He was also a
poet, and published much, including " The Bird and
the Bell " and " Ariel and Caliban."
Page 66, note 3. This younger man, it may be
assumed, was either James RusseU Lowell or George
William Curtis.
Page 67, note 4- It may be possible to guess who
was meant by this scathing criticism, but it could be
nothing more than conjecture.
Page 70, note 5. Under the title of " Ethnical
Scriptures " Emerson gave much attention in " The
Dial " to the religious writings of India, Persia, China,
and other oriental countries. The first of these ap
peared in the very first number edited by him, that for
July, 1842, and was a series of selections from the
" Veeshnoo Sarma." The issue for January, 1843,
contained selections from Manu, and that for July, first
using the general title of Ethnical Scriptures, was ex
tracted from the Desatir. Other selections were from
the Kings, Preaching of Buddha, Hermes Trismegis-
tus, and the Chaldean Oracles. Some of these se
lections were made by Thoreau. This was one of the
earliest attempts in this country to make the public
familiar with the sacred books of the world, other than
the Hebrew and Christian.
Page 71, note 6. In. later editions this sentence
reads, " I am glad to the brink of fear."
Page 7 If., note 7 . This was perhaps at a meeting
of the Boston Association of Ministers after the Di-

NOTES 509
vinity School Address. Cabot says in the Memoir,
page 334, that " among the ministers who came to
gether at the Thursday lecture there was a good deal
of stir, which communicated itself to the circles they
influenced. Hard words were said, and when the ad
dress appeared in print it was sharply -attacked in the
Daily Advertiser by Andrews Norton."
Page 75, note 8. James Usher, 1580-1656, was
archbishop of Armagh, intimately connected with the
University of Dublin, founded by his uncle Henry
Usher, also archbishop of Armagh. Usher was a
theologian of prominence. John Selden, 1584-1654,
was a famous jurist, antiquary, and oriental scholar,
whose Table-talk is one of the famous English books.
See John Selden and his Table-Talk, by Robert Wat
ers, for an interesting account of him and his rela
tions to Usher. Inigo Jones, the famous English
architect, 1572—1651, designed many important
buildings, and planned the repairs of St. Paul begun
in 1633.
Page 85, note 9. These were the lectures now pub
lished in the Conduct of Life.
Page lilt, note 10- This line was afterwards
changed to " Has turned my child's head? "
Page 115, note 11. These lines, were revised to
read, " To vision profounder,
Man's spirit must dive ; >
His aye-rolling orb
At no goal will arrive." ||
Page 115, note 12. These lines now read,
" Lurks the joy that is sweetest
In stings of remorse."
Page 118, note 13. This line now reads,
" He who loves, of gods or men."

510 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Page 119, note 14- Emerson uses these and other
names in a symbolical and mystical sense. They are
names from mythology, legend, early poetry or biog
raphy. Most of them have been explained in William
Sloane Kennedy's " Clews to Emerson's Mystic
Verse," published in The American Author for June,
1903. They have also been elaborately interpreted in
The Arena by Charles MaUoy.

Ill
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
Parker had already spoken of Dr. Channing in a
sermon on the occasion of his death. The present
survey of his life, character, and works was called out
by the appearance of an elaborate biography :
Memoir of William Ellery Channing, with Extracts
from his Correspondence and Manuscripts. In three
volumes. Boston, Crosby and Nichols, 1848.
This memoir was prepared by a nephew, WiUiam
Henry Channing, whose biography has been extendedly
written by O. B. Frothingham. Parker's review of
this memoir was published in the Massachusetts Quar
terly Review for September, 1848. Miss Cobbe in
cluded it in her second volume, entitled Critical Writ
ings. Page 156, note 1. It has been often asserted that
Thomas Jefferson had children by the negro women
slaves on his plantation at Monticello. The proof has
not been furnished, though the gossip has been per
sistent. " The chief offender among newspapers was
the Richmond Recorder, edited by a Scotchman
named Callender, who sought an asylum in this coun
try to escape punishment for libels published in Eng
land. He was not here long before he was arrested
and imprisoned under the sedition act and was one

NOTES 511
of those whom Jefferson pardoned on the day that he
became president. This incident brought him per
sonally to Jefferson's acquaintance, and for a time he
proved to be useful to the Democratic leaders as a
writer. Jefferson defended and shielded him as long
as his patience would permit, and aided him from time
to time with loans of money that were never repaid,
but was finally compeUed to repudiate him, when Cal-
lender turned upon his benefactor. ... He was
the author of several miserable scandals about Wash
ington. He attempted to blackmail Jefferson into
making him postmaster at Richmond, but Jefferson
had the moral courage to refuse, even though he knew
what to expect, and the penalty of his refusal was the
publication of a series of the most revolting stories
about his private Hfe, which were copied into the Fed-
erahst newspapers of the northern states with what
President Cleveland called ' ghoulish glee.' Some of
these stories were based upon local gossip at Charlottes
ville, and doubtless had a slender vein of truth, a
meagre excuse for existence, but Callender's vulgar
and malicious mind magnified and distorted them.
Jefferson never stooped to a denial, and his political
opponents chose to interpret his silence as an admis
sion of guilt. He was probably no more immoral than
Franklin, Washington, Hamilton, and other men of
his time. He was neither a St. Anthony nor a Don
Juan. Judged by the standard of his generation, his
vices were those of a gentleman, and such as did not
deprive him of the respect and confidence of the com
munity. " The scandals circulated by the Federalist news
papers were so generally believed that Thomas Moore,
the famous Irish poet, accepted them as true, and,
visiting the United States during the period of Jef
ferson's presidency, wrote some verses of which the
following is a sample:

512 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" ' The patriot, fresh from Freedom's councils come,
Now pleas'd, retires to lash his slaves at home ;
Or woo, perhaps, some black Aspasia's charms
And dream of Freedom in his bondmaid's arms.' '
" This poem may be found in the London edition
of the Poetical Works of Thomas Moore published
in 1853, and is embellished by a foot-note explaining
that the President of the United States was referred to.
" The local traditions attributed to Jefferson the
paternity of a distinguished man of the generation
following him who was prominently identified in the
development of the west, and whose mother, famous
for her beauty, and attractions, lived near Monticello.
Her husband was a disolute wretch and abandoned her
to the protection of friends. Jefferson looked after
her interests, advised her concerning the management
of her little property, educated her son, appointed him
to office, pushed him into political prominence, fur
nished him opportunities for advancement, and showed
an affectionate solicitude for his welfare. It is char
itable to suppose that this was due to a friendly rather
than a paternal interest.
" In early days, and up to a recent period, nearly
every mulatto by the name of Jefferson in Albemarle
county, and they were numerous, claimed decent from
the Sage of Monticello, which gratified their pride but
.seriously damaged his reputation, Jefferson does not
appear to have taken notice of these scandals, except
in a single instance. During the campaign of 1804
a respectable mulatto living in Ohio, named Madison
Jennings, boasted that he was a son of the president
and Sally Jennings, who was one of his slaves, and
Jefferson invoked his carefully kept record of vital
statistics at Monticello to prove an alibi. The date
of Madison Jennings' birth made it impossible for
Jefferson to have been his father, and Edward Bacon,
the overseer of the plantation, made a statement to a

NOTES 513
clergyman in which he gave circumstantial evidence
to prove Jefferson's innocence." — William Elory Cur
tis, The True Thomas Jefferson, pp. 311-313.
Page 156, note 2. Edward Everett, in the Gov
ernor's Address of 1836 to the General Court of
Massachusetts, as printed in the Documents of the
House of Representatives of that year, pages 29-31,
said on this subject: " The country has been greatly
agitated during the past year in relation to slavery,
and acts of illegal violence kindled on this subject
in different parts of the Union, which cannot be too
strongly deplored. . . . As the genius of our in
stitutions and the character of our people are entirely
repugnant to laws impairing the liberty of speech or
of press, even for the sake of repressing its abuses,
the patriotism of all classes of citizens must be in
voked to abstain from a discussion which, by exas
perating the master, can have no other effect than to
render more oppressive the condition of the slave ; and
which if not abandoned, there is great reason to fear
will prove the rock on which the Union will split.
Such a disastrous consummation, in addition to all its
remediless pohtical evils for every state of the Union,
could scarcely fail, sooner or later, to bring on a war
of extermination in the slaveholding states. On the
contrary, a conciliatory forbearance with regard to
this subject, in the non-slaveholding states, would
strengthen the hands of a numerous class of citizens at
the south, who desire the removal of the evil, whose
voice has often been heard for its abolition in legis
lative assemblies, but who are struck down and si
lenced by the agitation of the question abroad; and it
would leave this whole painful subject where the Con
stitution leaves it, and in the hands of an all wise
Providence." See James Freeman Clarke's Anti-Slav
ery Days, page 103.
Page 156, note 3. Harriet Martineau, in her " So-

514 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
ciety in America," vol. I, pages 126—127, American
ed. of 1837, describes this event: "Upon consulta
tion the ladies agreed that they should never have
sought the perilous duty of defending Hberty of opin
ion and speech at the last crisis ; but as such a service
seemed manifestly appointed to them the women were
ready. On the 21st of October they met at the office
of their association [Boston Female Anti-slavery So
ciety], 46 Washington street. Twenty-five reached
the room by going three-quarters of an hour before
the appointed time. Five more made their way up
with difficulty through the crowd. A hundred more
were turned back by the mob. They knew that a
handbill had been circulated on the Exchange and
posted on the City Hall and throughout the city, the
day before, which had declared that Thompson, the
abolitionist, was to address them, and invited the citi
zens, under promise of pecuniary reward, to ' smoke
Thompson out and bring him to a tar-kettle before
dark.' The ladies had been warned that they would
be killed, ' as sure as fate,' if they showed themselves
on their own premises that day. They therefore in
formed the mayor that they expected to be attacked.
The reply of the city marshal was, ' You give us a
great deal of trouble.' The committee-room was sur
rounded, and gazed into by a howling, shrieking mob
of gentlemen, while the ladies sat perfectly still, await
ing the striking of the clock. When it struck, they
opened their meeting. They were questioned as to
whether Thompson was there in disguise, to which they
made no reply. They began as usual with prayer.
The mob shouting, ' Hurra ! here comes Judge
Lynch!' Before they had done the partition gave
way, and the gentlemen hurled themselves at the lady
who was presiding. The secretary having risen, and
begun to read her report, rendered inaudible by the up
roar, the mayor entered, and insisted on their going

NOTES 515
home to save their lives. The purpose of the meet
ing was answered ; they had asserted their principle,
and they now passed out, two by two, amidst the
execration of some thousands of gentlemen, persons
who had silver shrines to protect. The ladies to the
number of fifty walked to the house of one of their
number, and were presently struck to the heart by the
news that Garrison was in the hands of the mob."
This was the * mob of gentlemen of property and
standing,' dressed in broadcloth, who attacked Gar
rison immediately following this episode.
Page 156, note 4. Garrison wrote to George W-
Benson, September 17, 1835 : " I suppose you have
heard of the presentation of a stout gallows to me, at
23 Brighton street, Boston, by order of Judge Lynch.
It was destroyed by the city authorities. I regret that
it was not preserved for our Anti-slavery Museum.
Thompson has presented a brickbat to it, but this
would have been a more substantial curiosity." Gar
rison's biography by his children, vol. I, page 519.
Page 156, note 5. The Georgia Senate, Novem
ber 30, 1831, passed a resolution offering a reward of
$5000 to any person " who shall arrest, bring to trial
and prosecute to conviction under the laws of this
state the editor of a certain paper called the Lib
erator." The proclamation of the governor was based
on this resolution, and was continued without being
rescinded for several years. Garrison's Life by his
children, vol. I, page 249.
Page 156, note 6. This reference is to vol. II, page
89, of the Memoir of Dr. Channing, by W. H. Chan
ning. Page 157, note 7. The Autobiography of Dr. Ly
man Beecher wiU afford a good illustration of this
tendency to condemn Unitarianism. He writes of it,
vol. II, page 53. " It was as fire in my bones ; my
mind was heating, heating, heating." Again, page 56:

516 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
" It is scarcely necessary to add that the system of
Unitarianism, in all its forms, Dr. Beecher regarded
as the deadly foe of human happiness, whose direct
tendency was to prevent true conviction and conver
sion, and leave men bound hand and foot under the
power of the adversary. He could not be loyal to
Christ, benevolent to men, or true to his own convic
tions without making war on such a system."
Page 161, note 8. This was not the general opin
ion of the men of Channing's own period. George
Ticknor, traveling in Europe, and dining daily with
the arbiters of opinion in all countries, wrote home
to Boston in 1836 : " Channing's is already much
greater than I had supposed, not so extra live as that
of Washington Irving, but almost as much so, and
decidedly higher. . . . Mrs. SomerviUe, Miss
Joanna Bailey, and several other persons, declaring to
me that he was generally regarded as the best writer
of English prose alive." In April, 1838, Mr. Tick
nor dined at Lord Holland's, with Pazzo di Borgo
and the Earl of Albemarle, and he noted that " Lord
Holland, Lord Albemarle, and Mr. Allen talked about
Dr. Channing as the best writer of English alive."
Dr. Chalmers praised Channing for his intellectual
power and eloquence; and Turguenev was a great ad
mirer of Channing. See George Ticknor's Life, Let
ters and Journals. IV
PRESCOTT AS AN HISTORIAN
The sixth number of the Massachusetts Quarterly
Review, for March, 1849, contained Parker's discus
sion of the Character of Mr. Prescott as an Historian.
The following books were placed in review, and their
titles were printed at the beginning of the article:
The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isa-

NOTES 517i
beUa the Catholic. By WiUiam H. Prescott, &c, &c
Boston, 1838. 3 vols. 8vo.
History of the Conquest of Mexico, with a Pre-
Hminary View of the Ancient Mexican Civilization and
the Life of the Conquerer, Hernando Cortes. By
William H. Prescott, &c, &c. New York, 1845. 3
vols. 8vo.
¦ History of the Conquest of Peru, with a Prelimi
nary View of the Civilization of the Incas. By Wil
liam H. Prescott, &c, &c. New York, 1847. 2 vols.
8vo. This review was reprinted by Miss Cobbe in the sec
ond volume of her edition, entitled Critical Writings.
In his Life and Correspondence, vol. II, page 10,
Weiss says of the manner in which this and the suc-r
ceeding article were prepared : " Before he under
took to review Mr. Prescott's popular histories he
spent all the leisure time which he could command
during seven months, in reading the authorities. He
read everything excepting some MSS. in the posses
sion of Mr. Prescott himself, and thus he verified
nearly every citation made in the eight volumes which
were under review. The first article contains an ad
mirable statement of the office and duty of an his
torian. This is derived from his own humane and
philosophical spirit, criticizing in the interest of the
future of the people all the best histories yet written of
the past."
The biography of Prescott was written by George
Ticknor, Boston, 1864. In the series of American
Men of Letters is a biographical and critical study
by RoUo Ogden ; and in the English Men of Letters
is one by Harry Thurston Peck.
Page 173, note 1. The name of the writer of this
article is not given in Poole's Index of Periodical Lit
erature. It appeared in vol. 64, June, 1839.
Page 189, note 2. The review of the work on Peru
was not written.

518 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
V
PRESCOTT'S CONQUEST OF MEXICO
In his first article on Prescott as an historian Parker
gave special attention to the work on Ferdinand and
Isabella. This was followed in the Massachusetts
Quarterly Review for September, 1849, by the pres
ent study, of the History of Mexico. It appears that
Parker had it in mind to write also of the History
of Peru, but this article was not produced. The Mex
ico was reprinted by Miss Cobbe in her Critical Writ
ings, the second volume of her edition of Parker's
works. Page 221, note 1. James Cowles Prichard, 1786-
1848, was the founder of the science of ethnology in
England. A graduate of Oxford, a physician in Bris
tol, he published in 1813 his " Researches into the
Physical History of Man," two volumes, later expanded
to five. In this work he taught the unity of the human
species as acted upon by causes which have produced
the several races. He showed also that the Celts be
long to the Aryan family of races. This idea he de
veloped, in 1831, in his " Eastern Origin of the Celtic
Nations." His most important work was his " Nat
ural History of Man," 1843, which is still a standard
for ethnologists, though their investigations have been
widely extended since his day. VI
HILDRETH'S UNITED STATES
The History of the United States, by Richard Hil
dreth, three volumes, New York, 1849, was the sub
ject of a critical article in the June number of the
Massachusetts Quarterly Review, for 1850. It was

NOTES 519
written in the same spirit as the articles on Prescott,
though perhaps with less exacting preparation. Miss
Cobbe reprinted it in the Critical Writings, vol. II, of
the complete works edited by her.
Richard Hildreth was born in Deerfield, Mass., June
22, 1807. He graduated at Harvard, studied law,
became editor of the Boston Daily Atlas, which repre
sented the views of Rufus Choate, Caleb Cushing, and
others of that school in politics. Favoring General
Harrison for president, he wrote a campaign biog
raphy of him in 1839. For a period he was at
Demerara, British Guiana, as an editor, and wrote
an account of that country. On his return he was
connected with the New York Tribune for several
years, and contributed to the " American Cyclopedia."
In 1861 he was made consul at Trieste, which position
ill-health compelled him to abandon, and, going to
Florence, he died there July 11, 1865. He wrote the
first American anti-slavery novel, " The Slave ; or,
Memoirs of Archy Moore," 1836. It was reprinted
as " The White Slave," 1852. He also published a
" History of Banks, Banking and Paper Currency,"
1837; "Despotism of America," 1840; "Theory of
Morals," 1844; "Japan as it Was and Is," 1855.
He added three volumes to his " History of the United
States," in 1852, bringing it down to the end of the
first term of Monroe's administration. The work is
free from prejudice, vigorous in criticism of men and
events, and fearless in stating the truth.
Page 270, note 1. Red Republic refers to the name
of " Red RepubHcans " given by the French to those
who held radical republican doctrines, which they
would maintain even at the cost of bloodshed. The
term " bonnets rouges " was also applied to them be
cause of the red caps worn at the period of the revo
lution. Page 272, note 2. This reference to those who were

520 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
called doughfaces has been already explained. They
faced both ways as between the political issues of the
day, or were ready to turn any way that would make
to their own advantage.
Page 283, note 3. Michel Chevalier was a French
economist and geographer, who visited the United
States in 1834. Among his works were " Des interets
materiels en France: travaux publics," Bruxelles,
1838 ; " Cours d'economie politique," 3 vols., Paris,
1850 ; " Mexique, ancien et modern," Paris, 1863 ;
" L'industrie et l'octroi de Paris," Paris, 1866 ; and
many articles on geographical and economic subjects.
He wrote " Lettre sur l'Amerique du Nord," 2 vols.,
Bruxelles, 1837, and also " Histoire et description des
des voies de communication aux Etats-Unis," 2 vols.,
Paris, 1840-41. It is the first of these works to
which Parker refers, which was translated as " Society,
Manners, and Politics in the United States, being
a series of letters on North America," translated from
the third Paris edition, Boston, 1839. Thomas
GamaHel Bradford, the translator, says in his preface:
" M. Chevalier was sent to this country in 1834 under
the patronage of Thiers, then Minister of the In
terior in France, to inspect our public works. But,
attracted by the novel spectacle presented by society
in the United States, he extended the time of his stay
and the sphere of his observations amongst us, and
spent nearly two years in visiting nearly all parts of
the Union, and studying the workings of our social
and political machinery. His letters gave the results
of his observations, the impressions made on his mind,
his speculations in regard to the future destiny of our
institutions, rather than a detailed narrative of facts
and events, which, however, is introduced when neces
sary for illustration or proof. It will be found that
M- Chevalier has studied with diligence and sagacity,
drawn his conclusions with caution and discrimination,

NOTES 521
and stated his views in a clear, forcible, and interest
ing manner. He seems to be perfectly free from any
narrowness and prejudice, ready to recognize whatever
is good or of good tendency, whether in character,
manners, habits or opinions, without regard to mere
personal likes or dislikes, and to be equally frank in
condemning, whenever he perceives, in our practices,
a violation of our own principles or of those of an
enlightened philosophy. He tells many home truths
to aU parties and classes. . . ." Chevalier's work
is regarded as one of the best which has been written
about the United States, because of its impartiality
and because of his keenness of observation.
Page 289, note 4- The article by George Raphall
Noyes on Whether the Deity of the Messiah be a
Doctrine of the Old Testament, published in the Chris
tian Examiner for January, 1836, is that indicated.
The Attorney General of Massachusetts talked of
prosecuting the author, but he finally decided not to
do so. Dr. Noyes, 1798—1868, was the minister of
the Unitarian church in Petersham, Mass., and pro
fessor of Hebrew literature and other oriental lan
guages in Harvard College after 1840. He pub
lished translations of the New Testament, and of the
poetical books of the Old Testament.
Page 289, note 5. Parker's sermon of 1841 at
South Boston, on the Transient and Permanent in
Christianity, was threatened in this manner. It was
mere newspaper writing, however. VII
MACAULAY'S HISTORY OF ENGLAND
The study of the first two volumes of Macaulay's
history appeared in the Massachusetts Quarterly Re
view for June, 1849, with the title, "Macaulay's

522 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
History of England." It has never been reprinted,
having been for some unknown reason overlooked by
Miss Cobbe. VIII
BUCKLE'S HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION
Buckle's first volume of his History of Civilization
in England, London, 1857, deeply interested Parker
on its appearance; and this study of it was published
in the Christian Examiner for March, 1858, vol. 64.
This monthly review succeeded other Unitarian peri
odicals in 1824, under the editorship of John Gorham
Palfrey. At the time of the pubhcation of this article
the editors were Frederic H. Hedge and Edward Ever
ett Hale. The article on Buckle was included by Miss
Cobbe in her twelfth volume, Autobiographical and
Miscellaneous. Writing to Prof. Henry D. Rogers of Edinburgh,
on December 29, 1857, Parker said of Buckle's work,
then recently published : " I think it a great book,
and know none so important since the Novum Or-
ganum of Bacon. I mean none in English. Of
course I except the Principia of Newton. This is a
Novum Organum in the department of history — the
study of man; it is a restauratio maxima. Nobody
here ever heard the name of Henry Thomas Buckle
before. If you can tell me, I wish you would; and
also what is thought of the book in that northern
Athens where you dwell. In many particulars it re
minds me of the Vestiges of the Natural History of
Creation. I don't always agree with the author, even
in matters of ' great pith and moment ;' but always
think him a great man. His learning also is admira
ble." — Weiss, vol. I, page 334.
Parker wrote to Buckle, sent him his article and
his works. Weiss prints at the end of his first volume

NOTES 523
the letters of Buckle, and in the second volume are
the letters which passed between them as the result
of Parker's attempt to see the historian. In his first
letter Buckle stated that he was familiar with Parker's
writings, and in aU of his letters his expression of
admiration was considerable.
The two volumes of the "Life and Writings of
Buckle," by Alfred Henry Huth, reprints the corre
spondence, and indicates the appreciation of Parker on
the part of Buckle to have been lively, and most
friendly, in so far as their brief correspondence made
this possible. John Mackinnon Robertson, in his
" Buckle and His Critics," devotes a chapter to Parker
and his article. " Parker's criticism seems to have
been, with one exception [Saturday Review, July 11,
1857, by a Mr. Sanders], that which interested Buckle
the most of those which he lived to read, and it might
well do so, being the performance of a widely read
and exceptionally conscientious critic." He speaks
of Parker's painstaking, with a quantity of result
hardly, commensurate with the copious and conscien
tious preparation. Robertson subjects all who have
written of Buckle to a severe arraignment, with rarest
exceptions; and his dissent from Parker's conclusions
is in no degree singular for him.
Buckle appears to have had a considerable influence
on Parker's later thinking. This is seen in the series
of sermons on the revelation of God in matter and
mind which is printed in this edition of Parker's
works for the first time. It did not lessen in any de
gree the vigor and completeness of his idealism, but
it gave him an enlarged conception of man's relations
to the universe and the influence of economic conditions
on human progress.
Page 376, note 1. Azote, nitrogen, the name given
it by Lavoisier, and still used in France. Azotized,
nitrogenous.

524 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Page 386, note 2. The Crimean war, to which
Parker often made reference in his sermons and lec
tures. Page 410, note 3. Joseph Francois Lafitau, 1670-
1746, was a French missionary to Canada. In 1724
he published at Rome, in two volumes, his " Moeurs
des sauvages ameriquains compares aux moeurs des
premiers temps." This is one of the standard early
works on the life of the Indians. Lord Monboddo,
1714-1799, was the author of " Origin and Progress
of Language," and " Ancient Metaphysics." He
collected facts about savage peoples, and in some re
spects anticipated Darwin as to the origin of man in
animal life. Christopher Meiners, 1747-1810, was a
German historian, who wrote on the history of re
ligion, philosophy and science.
Page 410, note 4- Several accounts of the nurtur
ing of boys by wolves are given in " A Journey
through the Kingdom of Oude in 1849-1850." By
Major-General Sir W. H. Sleeman. London, Bentley,
1858, two vols. These narratives are in vol. I, pages
208—222. Sleeman also wrote books on the Thugs,
and various works on political economy. See Tylor,
" Primitive Culture," vol. I, page 281, for a genuine
interpretation of these stories about wolves.
Page 4^-0, note 5. An account of the stealing of a
girl by an orang outang is given in " The Prison of
Weltervreden ; and a Glance at the East Indian Archi
pelago." By Walter M. Gibson. New York, J. C.
Riker, 1855. Probably other incidents narrated in
this book are referred to by Parker.
Page 4H> n°te 6. The education of negroes was
forbidden by law in the South, and the punishment was
severe. Page 418, note 7. Laurens Perseus Hickok, 1798-
1888, was a Congregational minister, professor in
Western Reserve College, Auburn Theological Semi-

NOTES 525
nary, Union College, and president of the latter in
stitution, 1866-1868. He published works on
Moral Science," 1853; Mental Science," 1854; " Ra-
™nf Cosmology," 1858; "Rational Psychology,"
1861 ; Logic of Reason," 1874. He was regarded
as a strong thinker in his day, but Parker's judgment
has not held good.
IX
HENRY WARD BEECHER
In the Atlantic Monthly for May, 1858, the first
volume, appeared this review of the work of the great
Brooklyn preacher, based on a compilation of Beecher's
sayings in his sermons and lectures. It was Parker's
only contribution to the Atlantic Monthly, and one of
the last of his literary articles. It has not been re
printed. Beecher lectured in the course conducted by the
Parker fraternity, in 1858, and was severely criti
cised in various evangelical journals. He replied in
the Independent for January 6 and 13, 1859- Both
articles were printed in pamphlet form. The first was
on " Total Depravity," in reply to the charge that he
had denied it. The second article was on " Working
with Errorists," and especially applied to his delivery
of the lecture to such a society, usually regarded as
propagandist of infidehty of the worst kind. " We
beheve in the right of free speech," Beecher replied,
" even by men whose speech, when delivered, we can
not believe." " What a pitiful thing it is to see men
who have the chance of saying what they believe, who
do say it two hundred times a year, who write it, sing
it, speak it, and fight it; who by all these social af
firmations, by aU their Hfe-work, by all positive and
most solemn testimonies, are placed beyond miscon
ception, — always nervous lest they should sit down

526 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
with somebody or speak with somebody, and so lose
an immaculate reputation for soundness! Therefore
men peep out from their systems as prisoners in jail
peep out of barred windows, but dare not come out
for fear some sharp sheriff of the faith should arrest
them." In view of Parker's appreciation of Henry. Ward
Beecher, it is interesting to note that he did not ad
mire the theology of Dr. Lyman Beecher, the father,
as may be seen from a record made in his diary at a
period considerably subsequent to that of Beecher's
preaching in Boston.
" March 31, 1852. Old Dr. Beecher came to see
me, and spent an hour and a half. ' Tell me who
you are,' he said, ' where you came from, and how you
got so far from the common track.' I did so, and
we had a quiet talk. He is genial, generous, active-
minded, and expressed a strong sympathy for me, and
a good deal of feeling of kindliness towards me."
In a letter written from Santa Cruz, in 1859, Parker
gave an account of his early acquaintance with Lyman
Beecher and the repulsive effect produced upon his
mind by his theology. This was in the winter of
1831—32, when Beecher was using every effort to
revive the older phases of theology in Boston.
" For a year," Parker wrote, " though born and
bred among Unitarians, I had attended the preachings
of Dr. Lyman Beecher, the most powerful orthodox
minister in New England, then in the full blaze of his
talents and reputation, and stirred with polemic zeal
against ' Unitarians, Universalists, Papists, and Infi
dels.' I went through one of his ' protracted meet
ings,' listening to the fiery words of excited men, and
hearing the most frightful doctrines set forth in ser
mon, song, and prayer. I greatly respect the talents,
the zeal, and the enterprise of that able man, who cer
tainly taught me much; but I came away with no

NOTES 527
confidence in his theology. The better I understand
it, the more self-contradictory, unnatural, and hate
ful did it seem. A year of his preaching about fin
ished all my respect for the Calvinistic scheme of the
ology." — Weiss, vol. I, p, 57.
Page 427, note 1. In the biography of H. W.
Beecher by W. C. Beecher and S. Scoville, page 289,
it is stated : " Mr. Beecher gave himself unreservedly
to this contest." "My church," Beecher himself
wrote, " voted me all the time that I thought to be
required to go out into the community and speak and
canvass the state of New York. I went into that
canvass, spoke twice and often three times a week,
having the whole day to myself — that is, making all
the speeches that were made. I was sent principally
to what was called the Silver-Gray district or counties
— the old-time Whigs that were attempting to run a
candidate between Fremont and Buchanan. I gen
erally made a three hours' speech a day in the open air
to audiences of from eight to ten thousand people."
Beecher advocated the election of John C. Fremont in
this campaign of 1856.
Page 4®7> note 2. John Parker Hale of New
Hampshire is the one indicated in this quotation. In
1852 he was the candidate of the Free-Soil party for
president. When a monument to his memory was
dedicated in Washington, Frederick Douglas said:
¦" No statue of patriot, statesman, or philanthropist
of our times will convey to aftercoming generations a
lesson of moral heroism more sublime."

X i
LIFE AND CHARACTER OF DR. FOLLEN
This was the first of Parker's many studies of lit
erary and political leaders prominent in American life.

528 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
It is interesting to contrast it with those devoted to
Franklin and Webster, and to note how his powers of
characterization had grown. It appeared in The Dial
for January, 1843. The work reviewed was The
Works of Charles Follen, with a Memoir of his Life.
In five volumes. Boston, Hilliard, Gray & Co., 1841.
The first volume contained the memoir by his wife.
The second volume contained sermons, the third Lec
tures on Moral Philosophy, the fourth Schiller's Life
and Dramas, and the fifth Miscellaneous Writings, in
cluding the inaugural address in 1831 on the occasion
of the author's induction into the professorship of the
German language and literature at Harvard College.
No reprint of it has hitherto appeared.
The Dial was a quarterly devoted to the ideas repre
sented by the transcendendalist movement, and was
published from July, 1840, to April, 1844. For the
first two years it was edited by Margaret Fuller, with
the aid of George Ripley for the earlier numbers. The
last two years the Dial was under the control of Emer
son, with Thoreau as his efficient aid. For several
months Elizabeth Peabody was the publisher, and she
was also one of the contributors. Among the writers
not already named were Alcott, Lowell, Charles A.
Dana, Cranch, Dwight, W. E. Channing, Hedge, Cur
tis, and L. M. Child. Many of Emerson's best poems
appeared in its pages. Parker was one of the most
voluminous of its contributors. Twelve of his essays
were printed in the Dial, also verses and book-reviews.
Emerson wrote in his " Historic Notes of Life and Let
ters in New England," that " some numbers had an
instant exhausting sale because of papers by Theodore
Parker." In the same essay, Emerson wrote of Parker's re
lations to the whole movement, and as to his char
acter as preacher and reformer. " Parker was our
Savonarola," he wrote, " an excellent scholar, in frank

NOTES 529
and affectionate communication with the best minds
of the day, yet the tribune of the people, and the
stout reformer to urge and defend every cause of our
humanity with and for the humblest of mankind. He
was no artist. Highly refined persons might easily
miss in him the element of beauty. What he said was
mere fact, almost offended you, so bald and detached ;
little cared he. He stood altogether for practical
truth, and so to the last. He used every day and
hour of his short life, and his character appeared in
the last moments with the same firm control as in the
midday of strength. I habituaUy apply to him the
words of a French philosopher who speaks of ' the
man of nature who abominates the steam-engine and
the factory. His vast lungs breathe independence
with the air of the mountains and the woods.' "
Parker contributed to every number of the first vol
ume of the Dial, and to all but one of the second.
In the first number appeared an article on " The Di
vine Presence in Nature and the Soul;" in the second,
" A Lesson for the Day," and " Truth against the
World: A Parable of Paul;" in the third, "German
Literature ;" and in the fourth, " Thoughts on La
bor." To the first number of the second volume he
contributed a paper on " The Pharisees," and also
two poems entitled "Protean Wishes." He did not
have anything in the second number, but in the third
was printed his article on " Primitive Christianity," re
viewing Dorneris Christology. The first and the last
numbers of the third volume had nothing from his
pen, but in the second was printed his review of the
Holhs Street Council that tried John Pierpont, which
attracted much attention ; and in the third, his paper
on "The Life and Character of Dr. Follen.'^ He
had but one article in the fourth volume, that in the
second number reviewing the work of Charles Hennell,
an English idealist and radical, on the "Origin of

530 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
Christianity." Parker was in Europe from Septem
ber, 1843, for a year, and this will doubtless account
for his failure to write for the last volume more
largely. Seven of Parker's contributions to the Dial
were reprinted in his " Critical and Miscellaneous
Writings," published in 1843 ; and these were " A Les
son for the Day," " German Literature," " Truth
against the World," "Thoughts on Labor," "The
Pharisees," " Primitive Christianity," and " Thoughts
on Theology."
For details as to the history of the Dial, see The
Journal of Speculative Philosophy, edited by William
T. Harris, for July, 1885, where there is printed an
extended article by George Wilhs Cooke, with a com
plete list of the contributors. Also An Historical
and Biographical Introduction to Accompany, The
Dial as reprinted in numbers for the Rowfant Club,
by George Wilhs Cooke. In two volumes, Cleveland,
the Rowfant Club, 1902. This last work is in two
volumes of about five hundred pages, gives a detailed
history of the transcendental movement, the Dial as its
organ, with biographical sketches of all the contribu
tors. A word ought to be added in regard to the author
of the admirable biography of Dr. FoUen. Mrs. Fol
len was Eliza Lee Cabot, of an old and cultivated Bos
ton family. She was born August 15, 1787, and
married Dr. Follen in 1828. She was the first editor
of a children's paper in this country, the " Child's
Friend" being under her control from 1843 to 1850.
She published several books for children. Her books
included " The Well-Spent Hour," 1827; " The Skep
tic," 1855; "Poems," 1839; "To Mothers in the
Free States," 1855; "Anti-Slavery Hymns and
Songs," 1855 ; " Twilight Stories," 1858, and " Home
Dramas," 1859. She not only wrote an interesting
biography of Dr. Follen, but she edited his works with

NOTES 531
skill. She prepared her son, together with other boys,
for Harvard College. She was an ardent opponent
of slavery, and wrote much in behalf of the abolition
cause. Page 448, note 1. Appendix to Life of Charles
Follen, page 585, where is published a poem by him
entitled Das Grosse Lied. On page 593 is a transla
tion, evidently by his own hand. Other poems are
also printed, both in German and English.
Page 449, note 2. David Walker, a negro, pub
lished his " Appeal to Colored Citizens " in 1829, is
suing it from his store in Brattle street, Boston. See
Story of Garrison's Life by his children, vol. I, pages
160—1, where a detailed account of the book and its
author is given in a footnote.
Page 449, note 3. John Bowring, 1792-1872,
Enghsh linguist, political economist, and diplomatist.
He was editor of Westminster Review, edited works
of Bentham, was a member of Parliament, governor of
Hong-Kong, and held important diplomatic positions.
He made many translations, was a Unitarian, and
wrote many excellent hymns.
Page 449, note 4. Clement C. Biddle, 1784-1855,
was a diligent student of economics and issued an an
notated edition of J. B. Say's " Political Economy "
shortly after the war of 1812, besides editing Prin-
sep's translation of the same work. He was present
at the free-trade convention held in Philadelphia, in
1831, and was at that time influential in shaping the
financial policy of the national government.
Page %56, note 5. Frances Wright, 1795-1852,
was born in Scotland, imbibed ideas of French philos
ophers, visited the United States in 1818. In 1821
she published in London Views of Society and Man
ners in America. After visiting France, she returned
to the United States in 1825, purchased a large farm
near Memphis in Tennessee, and established there a

532 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
colony of free negroes. As this was opposed to the
laws of the state, she took the negroes to Hayti. In
1833 she began to lecture against slavery, and for the
freedom of women. She spoke with great liberty, was
a severe critic of existing social restrictions, and was
bitterly opposed. She joined Robert Owen in his
community at New Harmony, Indiana, and edited the
paper published there. She married, in 1838, d'Arus-
mont, whose ideas were similar to her own ; but they
soon separated, and she lived in Cincinnati with her
daughter until her death. She published several
works, including "A Few Days in Athens," 1822;
" Popular Lectures on Free Inquiry," 1829. She was
a free thinker, and was usually called an infidel. Biog
raphies have been published of her in London by John
Windt, and in Cincinnati by Amos Gilbert.
Page 4® 1> note 6. Follen was an intimate friend
and great admirer of Dr. Channing, and this refer
ence is probably to him.
XI
GERMAN LITERATURE
The third number of the Dial, January, 1841, con
tained this article. It was included by Parker in his
Critical and Miscellaneous Writings, 1843. Miss
Cobbe gave it a place in the ninth volume of her edi
tion of Parker's works, being the first volume of the
Critical Writings. The work reviewed had this title-
page: German Literature, translated from the German of
Wolfgang Menzel. By C. C. Felton. In three vol
umes. Boston, Hilliard, Gray and Company, 1840.
These volumes were included in the series of " Speci
mens of Foreign Standard Literature," edited by
George Ripley, and published in Boston by Hilliard,
Gray and Company, from 1838 to 1842. The first

NOTES 533
two volumes were " Philosophical Miscellanies," trans
lated by Ripley himself, from Cousin, Jouffroy, and (
Benjamin Constant. The third volume included John '
S. Dwight's translations from Goethe, Schiller, and
other German poets. The fourth was " Eckermann's
Conversations with Goethe," translated by Margaret
Fuller. Then followed Jouffroy's "Introduction to
Ethics," in two volumes, translated by William Henry
Channing. Menzel's work came next, and it was fol
lowed by De Wette's " Theodore or the Skeptic's Con
version," translated by James Freeman Clarke. There
followed De Wette's " Human Life or Practical
Ethics," in translation by Samuel Osgood. The series
concluded with Songs and Ballads from the German,
translated by Charles T. Brooks. It was planned to
include several other French and German works, but
the series probably did not prove a financial success.
Page 4^7, note 1. The anglicizing the Heinrich
must be regarded as a concession on the part of Parker
to the general ignorance of German at this period.
Page 4?9> n°te 2. Mezentius was a mythological
king of Etrusca, famous for cruelty, said to have
formed an alliance with Rutulianus. The word is used
as synonymous with fabulous giants, therefore coupled
with Goliath.
Page 485, note 3. Wolfgang Menzel, 1798-1873,
after graduating from Bonn, lived at Stuttgart, and
was a member of the landtag of Wurtemberg. He
published a clever volume of poems called " Streck-
verse," in 1827, which was followed in 1829 and 1830
by "Riibezahl" and "Narcissus." A romance of
the thirty years' war, entitled " Furare," was pub
lished in 1851. He edited the " Literaturblatt "from
1825 to 1848, and from 1852 onwards. His History
of German Literature appeared in 1830 in three vol
umes, and in a revised edition of 1836 in four. He
wrote a history of the war of 1866 with Austria, and

534 THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR
one on the Franco-Prussian war of 1871- He also
produced numerous other works. In his " Social
Forces in German Literature," Prof. Kuno Francke
says of him : " It is a mistake to think of Wolfgang
Menzel, the intellectual father of modern Anti-Semi
tism, as an irreconcilable enemy of Borne and Heine.
His estimate of both men, in his Die deutsche Literatur,
volume four of 1836, belongs to the best that has been
said about either."
Page 494> n°te 4- Cornelius Conway Felton, 1807-
1862, was a teacher in the Round-hill school at North
ampton, a Latin tutor at Harvard, a professor in
Greek there, and in 1834 took the chair of Greek Ht
erature. In 1860 he became president of Harvard
College, which position he held until his death. He
published translations of Guyot's " Earth and Man,"
a revised edition of Smith's " History, of Greece,"
" Selections from Modern Greek Writers," and " Fa
miliar Letters from Europe." His chief work was
his " Greece, Ancient and Modern," lectures at the
LoweU Institute, which was published in 1867, in two
volumes, Boston.

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