The Arkansaw traveler., 1884-12-06
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Julian Hawtherae.l

l uQA h8Ak tO 0S ANuMSWGSa Vy NAAN G1z89AGNGL and conduct of his wife. Especially w,ll this be the case when the man ia of . higAly organized and sensitive tempera- nent, and most of all, perhaps, when his professional pursuits are sedentary and imaginative rather than active and prac. ticaL Nathaniel Hawthorne vas Rartic- ularly susceptible to influences of this kind, and all the available evidence goes to show that the most fortunate event of his life was probably his marriage with Sophia Peabody. To attempt to explain aud describe his career without taking this event into consideratiea would, therefore, be like trying to imagine sun without heat or q day without sun, Nothing seems likely than that he would have accomplished his work in literature independent of her sympathy ar d com panionship. Not that she afforded him any direct and liberal assistance in the l'compoSition of his books and stories her gifts were wholly unsuited to such em- ploYment and no one apprehended more keenly than she the soiitariness and un- iqaeness of his genius, insomach that she would have deeWed it something not far removed from proclamation to have offered to advise or sway him in regard to his literary productions. She believed in his inspiration, and her office was to pio- mote, so far as in her lay, the favorable ness of the conditions under which i, should manifest itself. As food and re- pose nourish and refresh the body, so did she refresh and nourish her husbands mind and heart. Her feminine intuition coresponded to his masculine insight she felt the truth that he saw, and his recognition of this pure faculty in her and his reverence for it endowed his per ception with that tender humanity in which 1t otherwise might have been de- icient. Her lohy and assured ideals kept him to belief n the reality and verseity of his own. In the warmth and light of such companionship as her he could not fall into the coldness and gloom of a sell fish intellectual habit. She revived h.s confidence and courage by the touch of her gentle humor and cheerfulness {; before her unshakable hope fitness and serenity his constitution al tendency to Ill. foreboding and diseouragemen, vanished away.
 Nor was she of less value to him on the merely intellectual side. Her mental faculties were finely balanced and of great capacity; her taste was by nature highly refined and was rendered exquis- itely so by cultivation. Her learning and accomplishments were rate and varied, and yet she was always childlike in hei modesty and simplicity. She read Latin, Greek and Hebrew; she was familiar with history; and in drawing, painting and sculpture she showed loving talent not far removed from original genius Thus she was able to meet at all points her husbands meditativc and theorc,ic needs with substantial and practical gratifea- ton. Awaking to her he found in her the sottened and humanized realization of his dreams. In all this she acted less of defined purpose than unconsciously and insunctively, folio wing the natural pTomptings of her heart as nodded and enlightened by her love. Whit she did was done so well because she could not do otherwise. Her husband apL reciated her, but she had no appreciation of her self. She only felt what a privilege it was to love and minister to such a man and to be loved by him. For he was not, as 50 many men are, a merely passive and complacent absorber of all this devotion. What she gave he returned she never touched him without a response; she never called to him without ap echo. He never became so familiar with her minis trations, unccasing though these were, as to accept them as matter of course. The springs of gratitude and recognition could not run dry in him his wife always remained to him son of mystery of goodness and helpfulness. He protected her, championed her and cherished her in all ways that a man may ? woman but, half playfully and all earnestly, he avouched her superority over himself, and in a certain class Of questions re- lating to practical morality and do- mestic expediency he always deferred to and availed himself of her judgment and counsel.
 This was no make believe or hollow humility on his part he believed and was delighted to believe, in the higher purity end Gas it ~ere) angelic wisdom of her feminina nature and if he ever ascrihed wisdom to himself 1t was on the ground that he accepted her views upon all mat;sTs as to which mere worldly ex- perience and ssgacity were uncertain guides. In comparing himself with her (supposing him to have done such a
  count his vat intellectual power and ca- pscity. Intellect, in his opinion, was but an accident of organiz ation or inheritance, and could be almost entirely divorced from purity and elevation of character upon the basis of which only could a mans value as a creature of God be finally estimated. He deemed the culti- vstion and improvement of the intellect to be mainly selfish and instructive {; whereas goodness of ck .racter was the result of merely Christian and regenes. ated effort From this point of view Ha~thorpe's attitude towards his wife becomes natural and comprehensible enough and no doubt as some writer has suggested, no one but he knew how great was his debt to her. When said that the life of Hawthorne could not be understood apart from that of his wife, might have added that without her as-