Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1880-07-14
came In low whisper, 1T is General Gar.
field, of Ohior"
Obituary.
RIPLEY.

George Ripley, for many years literary
critic of the New York Tribune, died
yesterday at his residence, on Fifth ava.
{, nue., New York, In his seventy-eiohtb
| year. He had been dangerously sick for
! some days, but it was hoped, until near
the last, that his very strong constitution
would carry him through. This antici-
patton has not been realized. Dr. Rinlev
two universities gave him the degree IF
LII. D.-was born at Greenfield, Mass
October 8, 1902 He was educated at
Harvard College, being graduate of the
class OF 1923, and of the Cambridge
DIVINITY School in 1926. A few mouths
la1er IN the last named year, he was or
Gained pastor of the Thirteenth Conpre-
gatlonal Unitarian Church of Boston.
nololng The position until March, 1871.
ne ha1 now become leader in the So
Iaileo iranscendental movement, and was
ulspose1 10 raolcallsm Ia practice as we'll
as 70 noVeitles In speculation. He was
leader in the formation of the Soc;sliet
community at Brook Farm. on which
dawthorne's Blithedale Romance wse
based The experiment was not
success, and the highly metaphysical
DaaE OF which he was CO editor with
Emerson and Margaret Fuller, and the
Fcnrsel Ute H0rbtnger of which he was
chlef editor, were also short lived, The
latter died in 1848, and in 1S49 he became
literary editor of the Tribune, which
position he held to his death, period off
more than thirty years. He found time
for other labors, also being associated
with Charles A Dana in the preparation
OF the New American Cyclopedia from
1897 to 1862. Earlier in lie he had com.
bated Andrew Norton who defended the
Unitarianism of Charming, Gannett, and
the Wares against the innovations of the
Trancendentalists, in his address on the
Latest Form of Infdelity. He likewise
wrole Discourses on the Philosophy of
Religion, published in 1886, and between
1888 and 1912 issued fourteen volumes of
Specimens of Foreign Standard Liter.
allure. In 1852, in conjunction with
Bayard Taylor, be published a Handbook
of Literature and Fine Arts.
The student of New England Trans
cendentalism will fad that he was one of
its ablest and most erudite champions. It
is, however. as a critic that he is best
known to the present generation of
readers. His wide reading and judicial
cast of mind admirably fitted him for this
position. If he ever failed of being i'm.
partial, 1t was through an excess of
charity for some obscure and struggling
author in whom he fancied that be saw
some faint glimmerings of ability. He
never INDUCED in fine writing, and was so
careful to reproduce all that was note.
worthy in any book of importance that
his longer reviews often saved the reader
the necessity of consulting the book itself.
He made the literary department one of
the strongest features of the Tribune, and
was undou Otedly the most candid and
painstaking of American literary critics.
He was singularly free from the tear of
expressing his real views, and never man.
ifested that captious spirit into which so
many reviewers fall, seemingly through
the fear of betraying their own want of
Judgment by praising what msy not after
all suit the public taste. A singularly
modest and falr-minded writer, his loss
will not easily be supplied.