The Hickman courier. [volume] (Hickman, Ky.) 1859-current, 1881-08-19
! Morld,s Thinkers.

| The Iuelyidual might and worth of
| the thlniSen depends upon quiet and Sc
renity. kIhe best thought has been
| evolved from minds free from carking
care and the grinding despotism of petty
circumstances. Upon individual celeb
rity depends the might of a nations lit
erature. The worlds greatest authors
have been Enumerated inside of a hun
dred numpegs the great authors of any
one natIoacan be told upon the fin
gers. IhsiaRnlesof Shakespeare, Chau-
| Ger, Mllto1 ope, and Wordsworth rep
resent EHt as greatness in the field of
In srlnls ssly. with her myriad paint
ers, sculI and architects, the htera-
tuye Of e - g.y .anfned to only only
worlds greatest poets, Boccaccio, Pc
tarch, Michael Angelo, and Raphael
the latter ones merely sOnnetteers.
Spain bad her Calderon, Cervantes, and
Lope de Vega. although the latter was
only monstrously prolific tritier in the
world of letters. Little Portugal has
only her one poet, Camoens. Germany,
the fatherland of thought, has but few
bright geniuses whose names will survive
a thousand years Goethe, Schiller, Less
ing. Rnhter-and France none at all of
that dignity. not excepting Racine, Rat
belais. Voltaire, and Hugo.
Our own country, it may be said in all
humility, has not produced one author
of sucl classic prowess that he may vie
with snv of the authors above MEN
toned. Aen Emerson and Longfeliow
will not - permitted to live In the ar
chives of ne INT their celebrity has
been can - led by the verdict of futur
itv As ~ they can be placed on no
higher pc than Tennyson and Car
lyle. TIsbonly will te the truth about
in Gresk, the mother of all nations
in literatrEa. the school of all later am
bitions. tlRre are five famous names of
the first magnitude, Homes, Kschylus,
Plutarch. Plato, Demosthenes III Rome
as many more, Horace, Virgil, Caesar,
Cicero, and Juvenal. They have given
humanity assurance of its greatness !;
they are now as hostages OF humanity
in the realkl of perpetuity. Their breth-
ren Of loVk degree are gradually sink
ing out Ofssight IN the limbo OF obhv-
ion. Those nations which failed to pro
duce any distinguishing lights in lit
erature, Will in time come to be consld-
cred merely barbarous, or at best, medi-
ocre.
The Middle Ages have been called the
Dark Ages darkness, ignorance, and
superstition are said TO have prevailed.
The monks were said TO have slept their
lives away the whole period has been
depicted as if it were ahideOus nightmare.
Tins Is a mistaken impression. 1T the
reader Will but consider ours as a new
world. quite apart from the old classic
world-iust as the world that began with
Noah was different from the world that
began VIII Adam-he will see a new
light dawning on this glorious Renais-
sance of thought-the spring-tlme OF a
new eI=.,Ss7t terature. The times of the
GeES E6spglish Reformations, and
s7scl - --s-.ssssse ieEolutioHs
may &. sbnipafsa to the summer.
time follSsistk, with fierce aud fiery
heats aud our own degenerate, OF
rather mature day, is the autumn of this
great era of thought; ; we are now in the
sere and yellow leaf, as regards itera-
ture, and the occasional Raphaelite
glints of color. against a soberer back
ground, are only the gorgeous dyes and
tints of early autumn, presaSlng blight.
-KokoBio (Ild. Tribune.