Choice Specimens of American Literature, and Literary Reader Part 28

=_198._= ESTIMATE OF COLERIDGE.

That Coleridge with his mental pockets full of gold, and with a mine in fee wherefrom he not only replenished his daily purse but enriched his neighbors, should now and then borrow a guinea, is a fact at which we should rather smile than frown, or, more fitly, pa.s.s by without special sensation, seeing what has been the practice of the highest,--a practice which may with full ethical a.s.sent be regarded as a privilege inherent in their supremacy, the free use of all knowledge collected and experience acquired, no matter when, where, or by whom, being a natural right of him _who has the genius to turn it to best account_. That in certain cases where acknowledgment was due it was not made, we may ascribe to opinion; or to defects which broke the complete rotundity of such a circle of endowments that without this breach they would have swollen their possessor to almost preterhuman proportions, empowering him to "bestride the narrow world like a Colossus."

Let the truth be spoken of all men. Let no man's greatness be a bar to full utterance; but let temperance and charity--duties peculiarly imperative when uttering derogatory truth--be especially observed towards a resplendent suffering brother like Coleridge, suffering from his own weakness, but on that very account ent.i.tled to a tenderer consideration from those who are themselves endowed to feel and claim something more than common human affinity with a nature so large and so susceptive. Could but a t.i.the of the fresh insights he has given us be allowed as an offset against his short-comings, never, from any scholar of sound sensibilities, would a whisper be heard against his name. Under the coa.r.s.e, rusty, one-p.r.o.nged spur of sectarian or political rancor, or from the knawing consciousness of sterile inferiority to a creative mind, plenty of people are ready and eager to try, with their net-work of flimsy phrases, to cramp the play of a giant's limbs, or, with the slow slimy poison of envy and malice, to spot and deform his beauty and his symmetry. To such, to the half-eyed and the half-souled, to the prosaic and the unsympathetic, be left all harsh condemnation of Coleridge.

For the living, not for the dead, are these inadequate words spoken. The writings of Coleridge--in tone high, refined, n.o.ble; in expression rich, choice, copious; in spirit as pure as the sun's light; intellectually of rare breadth and mellowness and brilliancy--are a healthful power in literature, their influence solely for good, warming, strengthening, elevating. As for Coleridge himself, his is an immortal name; and as he walks through the ages his robes adjusting themselves with varying grace, in harmony with the mutations of opinion, his inward life will be ever fresh to his fellow-men, while his detractors will be shaken from him as _gryllidoe_ from the tunic of the superb Diana.

=_Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-_= (Manual pp. 478, 503, 531.)

From "Essays," Second Series.

=_199._= INFLUENCE OF NATURE.

There are days which occur in this climate, at almost any season of the year, wherein the world reaches its perfection; when the air, the heavenly bodies, and the earth, make a harmony, as if Nature would indulge her offspring; when, in these bleak upper sides of the planet, nothing is to desire that we have heard of the happiest lat.i.tudes, and we bask in the s.h.i.+ning hours of Florida and Cuba; when everything that has life gives sign of satisfaction, and the cattle that lie on the ground seem to have great and tranquil thoughts. These halcyons may be looked for with a little more a.s.surance in that pure October weather which we distinguish by the name of Indian summer. The day, immeasurably long, sleeps over the broad hills, and warm, wide fields. To have lived through all its sunny hours seems longevity enough. The solitary places do not seem quite lonely. At the gates of the forest, the surprised man of the world is forced to leave his city estimates of great and small, wise and foolish. The knapsack of custom falls off his back with the first step he makes into these precincts. Here is sanct.i.ty which shames our religions, and reality which discredits our heroes.

From "Society and Solitude."

=_200._= THE POWER OF CHILDHOOD.

The perfection of the providence for childhood is easily acknowledged.

The care which covers the seed of the tree under tough husks and, stony cases, provides, for the human plant, the mother's breast and the father's house. The size of the nestler is comic, and its tiny beseeching weakness is compensated perfectly by the happy patronizing look of the mother, who is a sort of high reposing Providence toward it.

Welcome to the parents the puny straggler, strong in his weakness, his little arms more irresistible than the soldier's, his lips touched with persuasion which Chatham and Pericles in manhood had not. His unaffected lamentations when he lifts up his voice on high, or, more beautiful, the sobbing child,--the face all liquid grief, as he tries to swallow his vexation,--soften all hearts to pity, and to mirthful and clamorous compa.s.sion. The small despot asks so little that all reason and all nature are on his side. His ignorance is more charming than all knowledge, and his little sins more bewitching than any virtue. His flesh is angels' flesh, all alive. "Infancy," said Coleridge, "presents body and spirit in unity: the body is all animated." All day, between his three or four sleeps, he coos like a pigeon-house, sputters, and spurs, and puts on his faces of importance; and when he fasts, the little Pharisee fails not to sound his trumpet before him. By lamp-light he delights in shadows on the wall; by daylight, in yellow and scarlet.

Carry him out of doors,--he is overpowered by the light and the extent of natural objects, and is silent. Then presently begins his use of his fingers, and he studies power, the lesson of his race. First it appears in no great harm, in architectural tastes. Out of blocks, thread-spools, cards, and checkers, he will build his pyramid with the gravity of Palladio. With an acoustic apparatus of whistle and rattle, he explores the laws of sound. But chiefly, like his senior countrymen, the young American studies new and speedier modes of transportation. Mistrusting the cunning of his small legs, he wishes to ride on the necks and shoulders of all flesh. The small enchanter nothing can withstand, no seniority of age, no gravity of character; uncles, aunts, grandsires, grandams, fall an easy prey: he conforms to n.o.body, all conform to him; all caper and make mouths, and babble, and chirrup to him. On the strongest shoulders he rides, and pulls the hair of laurelled heads.

=_201._= MAN MUST WORK IN HARMONY WITH PRINCIPLES.

Civilization depends on morality. Everything good in man leans on what is higher. This rule holds in small as in great. Thus, all our strength and success in the work of our hands depend on our borrowing the aid of the elements. You have seen a carpenter on a ladder with a broad-axe, chopping upward chips from a beam. How awkward! At what disadvantage he works! But see him on the ground, dressing his timber under him. Now, not his feeble muscles, but the force of gravity brings down the axe; that is to say, the planet itself splits his stick. The farmer had much ill-temper, laziness, and s.h.i.+rking, to endure from his hand-sawyers until one day he bethought him to put his saw-mill on the edge of a waterfall; and the river never tires of turning his wheel; the river is good-natured, and never hints an objection.

We had letters to send: couriers could not go fast enough, nor far enough; broke their wagons, foundered their horses, bad roads in spring, snow-drifts in winter, heat in summer, could not get the horses out of a walk. But we found out that the air and earth were full of electricity; and always going our way,--just the way we wanted to send. _Would he take a message?_ Just as lief as not; had nothing else to do; would carry it in no time. Only one doubt occurred, one staggering objection,--he had no carpet bag, no visible pockets, no hands, not so much as a mouth, to carry a letter. But, after much thought and many experiments, we managed to meet the conditions, and to fold up the letter in such invisible compact form as he could carry in those invisible pockets of his, never wrought by needle and thread,--and it went like a charm.

I admire still more than the saw-mill the skill which, on the sea-sh.o.r.e, makes the tides drive the wheels and grind corn, and which thus engages the a.s.sistance of the moon like a hired hand, to grind, and wind, and pump, and saw, and split stone, and roll iron.

Now that is the wisdom of a man, in every instance of his labor, to hitch his wagon to a star, and see his ch.o.r.e done by the G.o.ds themselves. That is the way we are strong, by borrowing the might of the elements. The forces of steam, gravity, galvanism, light, magnets, wind, fire, serve us day by day, and cost us nothing.

Our astronomy is full of examples of calling in the aid of these magnificent helpers. Thus, on a planet so small as ours, the want of an adequate base for astronomical measurements is early felt, as, for example, in detecting the parallax of a star. But the astronomer, having by an observation fixed the place of a star, by so simple an expedient as waiting six months, and then repeating his observation, contrived to put the diameter of the earth's...o...b..t, say two hundred millions of miles, between his first observation and his second, and this line afforded him a respectable base for his triangle.

All our arts aim to win this vantage. We cannot bring the heavenly powers to us, but, if we will only choose our jobs in directions in which they travel, they will undertake them with the greatest pleasure.

It is a peremptory rule with them, that _they never go out of their road_. We are dapper little busybodies, and run this way and that way superserviceably; but they swerve never from their foreordained paths,--neither the sun, nor the moon, nor a bubble of air, nor a mote of dust.

And as our handiworks borrow the elements, so all our social and political action leans on principles. To accomplish anything excellent, the will must work for catholic and universal ends. A puny creature walled in on every side, as Daniel wrote,--

"Unless above himself he can, Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!"

but when his will leans on a principle, when, he is the vehicle of ideas, he borrows their omnipotence. Gibraltar may be strong, but ideas are impregnable, and bestow on the hero their invincibility. "It was a great instruction," said a saint in Cromwell's war, "that the best courages are but beams of the Almighty." Hitch your wagon to a star. Let us not f.a.g in paltry works which serve our pot and bag alone. Let us not lie and steal. No G.o.d will help. We shall find all their teams going the other way. Charles's Wain, Great Bear, Orion, Leo, Hercules: every G.o.d will leave us. Work rather for those interests which the divinities honor and promote,--justice, love, freedom, knowledge, utility.

=_202._= RULES FOR READING.

Be sure, then, to read no mean books. Shun the sp.a.w.n of the press on the gossip of the hour. Do not read what you shall learn without asking, in the street and the train. Dr. Johnson said, "he always went into stately shops;" and good travelers stop at the best hotels; for, though they cost more, they do not cost much more, and there is the good company and the best information. In like manner, the scholar knows that the famed books contain, first and last, the best thoughts and facts. Now and then, by rarest luck, in some foolish grub street is the gem we want.

But in the best circles is the best information. If you should transfer the amount of your reading day by day from the newspaper to the standard authors.--But who dare speak of such a thing.

The three practical rules, then, which I have to offer, are: 1st. Never read any book that is not a year old. 2d. Never read any but famed books. 3d. Never read any but what you like; or, in Shakespeare's phrase,

"No profit goes where is no pleasure ta'en: In brief, sir, study what you most affect."

Montaigne says, "Books are a languid pleasure;" but I find certain books vital and spermatic, not leaving the reader what he was: he shuts the book a richer man. I would never willingly read any others than such.

=_John Russell Bartlett, 1805-._=

From the "Personal Narrative of Explorations," &c.

=_203._= LYNCH LAW AT EL PASO.

On the present occasion, circ.u.mstances rendered it necessary for safety, as well as for the purpose of warning the desperate gang who were now about to have their deserts, that all should be doubly armed. In the court-room, therefore, where one of the most solemn scenes of human experience was enacting, all were armed save the prisoners. There sat the judge, with a pistol lying on the table before him; the clerks and attorneys wore revolvers at their sides; and the jurors were either armed with similar weapons, or carried with them the unerring rifle. The members of the commission and citizens, who were either guarding the prisoners or protecting the court, carried by their sides a revolver, a rifle, or a fowling-piece, thus presenting a scene more characteristic of feudal times than of the nineteenth century. The fair but sun-burnt complexion of the American portion of the jury, with their weapons resting against their shoulders, and pipes in their mouths, presented a striking contrast to the swarthy features of the Mexicans, m.u.f.fled in checkered _serapes_, holding their broad-brimmed glazed hats in their hands, and delicate cigarritos in their lips. The reckless, unconcerned appearance of the prisoners, whose unshaven faces and dishevelled hair gave them the appearance of Italian bandits rather than of Americans or Englishmen, the grave and determined bearing of the bench; the varied costume and expression of the spectators and members of the Commission, clad in serapes, blankets, or overcoats, with their different weapons, and generally with long beards, made altogether one of the most remarkable groups which ever graced a court-room....

The evidence being closed, a few remarks were now made by the prosecuting attorney, followed by the charge of the judge, when the case was given to the jury. In a short time they returned into court with a verdict of guilty, against William Craig, Marcus Butler, and John Wade; upon whom the judge then p.r.o.nounced sentence of death.

The prisoners were now escorted to the little plaza or open square in front of the village church, where the priest met them, to give such consolation as his holy office would afford. But their conduct, notwithstanding the desire on the part of all to afford them every comfort their position was susceptible of, continued reckless and indifferent, even to the last moment. Butler alone was affected. He wept bitterly, and excited much sympathy by his youthful appearance, being but 21 years of age. His companions begged him "not to cry, as he could die but once."

The sun was setting when they arrived at the place of execution. The a.s.sembled spectators formed a guard around a small alamo, or poplar tree, which had been selected for the gallows. It was fast growing dark, and the busy movements of a large number of the a.s.sociates of the condemned, dividing and collecting again in small bodies at different points around and outside of the party, and then approaching nearer to the centre, proved that an attack was meditated, if the slightest opportunity should be given. But the sentence of the law was carried into effect.

=_Nathaniel Parker Willis, 1807-1867._= (Manual, pp. 504, 519.)

From "Pencillings by the Way."

=_204._= THE AMERICAN ABROAD.

It is a queer feeling to find oneself a _foreigner_. One can not realize long at a time how his face or his manners should have become peculiar; and after looking at a print for five minutes in a shop-window, or dipping into an English book, or in any manner throwing off the mental habit of the instant, the curious gaze of the pa.s.ser-by, or the accent of a strange language, strikes one very singularly. Paris is full of foreigners of all nations, and of course physiognomies of all characters may be met everywhere; but, differing as the European nations do decidedly from each other, they differ still more from the American. Our countrymen, as a cla.s.s, are distinguishable wherever they are met; not as Americans however, for of the habits and manners of Our country, people know nothing this side the water. But there is something in an American face, of which I never was aware till I met them in Europe, that is altogether peculiar. The French take the Americans to be English; but an Englishman, while he presumes him his countryman, shows a curiosity to know who he is, which is very foreign to his usual indifference. As far as I can a.n.a.lyze it, it is the independent, self-possessed bearing of a man unused to look up to any one as his superior in rank, united to the inquisitive, sensitive, communicative expression which is the index to our national character. The first is seldom possessed in England but by a man of decided rank, and the latter is never possessed by an Englishman at all. The two are united in no other nation. Nothing is easier than to tell the rank of an Englishman, and nothing puzzles an European more than to know how to rate the pretensions of an American....

From "Ephemera."

=_205._= CHARACTER AND WRITINGS OF JAMES HILLHOUSE.