The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1892-12-20

certain unanimity;" all men are visited,
but all do not hear, and OF those VINO
hear only the poet, the priest, anu cue
hero, give an answer which whole socie,
ties OF men can hear aud understand
Action is what is wanted, not words
alone: action that shall life society, the
state, the civilization OF which the poet
feels himself part, 10 higher plane.
THIS was WhiJtier's program. or some,
thing like il, and this he grandly carried
out i'm anti-slavery agitation, in the
championship OF New England ideas IN
general and in the proclamation OF eter,
nal goodness on the part OF God, ana OF
love to our fellowmen, rs the true touh-
daton of society aud the condition OF
progress
And so we reach the remarkable state
OF things that certain ideas grow ripe In
New England aud out Of IT, through
Whittier. and around his personality.
| Ills poetry, which AT first sight seems TO
| center in very few unchanglng ideas, 10
which he is always returning, is really
| not the poetry of quietism at all. While he
| appears to the careless reader TO be sank
IN self-centered contemplation OF
ing and everywhere expounding
the one unchanging truth as not
| only The joy-bringing solution OF
the riddle Of life, but also as the motive
| aud key of action. But he knows that the
| truth which is identical with Godhead,
| face TO face: we see IL only in the re1ec-
| ton, in the example in the symbol.
| When we reach this point of vie ", we are
very near 10 Whittier. And here we mist
| pause aud look around us, for this ~
| what he calls being Among the HIS"
| W Whittier, whether very great poet or
| not, is in this respect like the very great
| ess, that his writings are one long
| panorama of symbolisms BY symbol
ism is meant not allegory, not an indl
rect way OF getting at truth, not dream
| or shadow, but the only process by
| which on the highest planes of
thought the individual can ever be made
| TO represent the universal, namely, Dy
giving us living pictures, instantaneous
| revelations of the unseen. IL ~ not
| simply in Whittier's My Psalm that
he throws the windows OF his soul wide
open to the sun. He is barometer of
| spiritual Impressions, register or at
| mospheric changes through the throbbing
heats and keen electrical ally-surcharged
/ December OF poets tife. But who was
this original, and what can we NIX upon
as his poetic ancestry
The other great New Englanders are
4 better known To us. Emerson represents
the New England intellect refined and
distilled in a theological alembic, but re-
| fined and distilled in the way the streams
purify thems ,lves, by flowing over New
England granite. lie is the result OF a
| long process OF amelioration of the
original stock in the new sur
roundings. Hawthorne occupies a
similar rank In the realm OF magma
tion aud fancy. You can trace the result
tant forces in these two, despite the mys'
teries of genius, with AN approach To the
calculations which accompany aud even
fortell all race amelioration among living
things They are New England's nobi-
ity; the highest strain we have produced.
| But how Is IL with Whittier Does he
not represent that sudden up and Quitting
| of power which reveals to us that great
forces have been slowly working und er
the surface in unseen channels, aud ac-
| cordng to unknown laws, until their
very outburst in some splendid phenom-
| enon becomes the revelation OF the law !!
Genius is al ways mysterious, both in ori-
| gin aud manifestation, but the more |
| reflect on WbitLiers, the more does IL
seem to me strangely beautiful evolu-
| ton of primal forces But this evolu-
tion is not an amel!oration. 1t seems to
| be rather an instance OF atovism. III a
| paradox may be for moment permitted,
| Whittier is the most national American
poet, because he Is also the most English,
| l. e., because be represents certain lnde-
structible forces in Euglish-Amerlcan
| literature, which had sunk below the sur
face in both countries. In Whittier the
great English nation of the early seven
teenth century, the nation which as yet
knew not Dryden and Pope, has lowered
| uKalu. L 90 not mean lut WuDle
or the whole literature, but that part OF
IL which will be seen further On TO live
again in our poet.
Before going any further should like
TO make it perfectly PLAIN what the
present essay aims at. L believe that
| Whittier's truest ana most lasting great
ness lies in the fact that he is the poet
of Quikerism not OF Quakerism AS asect,
! but or luakeFIsm as Une continuous ex-
ponent of the Inner Life, both in man aud
nature There nave been times in Eng
| lish literature, when authors who be-
longed TO the Established Church, or TO
| Catholicism, or To the Nou-coutormist IS.
or TO no church at all have hau the
burden OF utterance OF these truths, each
| in his own way; while Quakerism, rs
religious and not "A literary force, was
| silent. IL Is the peculiar glory OF u laker
| ism Jhat when other vices were drowned
in loud chauJings of creeds, in the pro-
| mulgaUion of stralteuing doSmas, or when
the nation ran the ark OF religious
thought aground in the shadows OF ra-
tionaism, Frlelds kept on the even
tenor of sneir way, living the Inner ldfe,
until Que came VINO could aud did give II
fnal aud lasting expression in forms of
beauty, for them and their surrouudin ngs,
and for tue world, as Tar AS II had ears tu
hear.
Every other accomplishment OF Whit
tier consider subordinate To tnis. HIS
auti-slavery agitation, important though
, | H. WAS, becomes really la the last analy-
! sis only part of his training for hi:
higher work We may rejoice that he
, lived TO sec what he foresaw, In the free
ing OF an oppressed race but from tn,
I point OF view of literature aud OF th,
! student OF poets development, th'
glory was in tue effort aud la the added
{ strength and breadth II gave him. Odly
+ by paths such - these could Whitte
, combine in himself the devotion aud self
, sacrifice and deep inner life Of Thoma,
T kempis. with the decision, the shrewd
| practical sense OF tine man OF affairs. Thi,
I very evening Whittier's auti-slaver,
T efforts will form the principal theme o
!, an address by William Lloyd Garrison n
{ Brooklyn. With this part OF the subjec
; la the hands OF man 80 well qualine
To speak OF this Stress aud strain %
h years that did the work of centuries,
! Whittier. career ss su apostle OF aboii
i ton may be passed over with prophet!
! on the present occasion. That Nhittie
IA worked so alone aud 50 unbefriended an,
- II