The times. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1890-1903, 1894-01-07
JAMES RUSSELL LOUELL.
Extinct from Mr.. Leslie stephens Address
Mt the dwelling Of the Memorial.

have 10 answer the question, why Is
IL that we have come hlther TO-DAY 10
pay honor 10 Lowclrs memory?
one obvious and true reason, though
Il Ia far from being the only reason. VIII
suggest itself 20 any one who visits THIS
ancient Abbey and pauses at the Poet
! Corner. In the long line OF iilustrious
men whose monuments make that
place OF pilgrimage for all our race. OF
| the great masters who have handed down
the torch OF literature from Chaucer to
| Tennyson, there IS not one. think, who
would not acknowledge In Lowell
| kindred spirit. There IS hardly one OF
them who was more clearly marked out
By innate qualities OF mind and character
for the calling-I may venture TO say the
high caling-of man OF letters. There
IS no one, I think. who has ever taken
I'D that calling with more entire devotion.
Lowell had inherited no stinted share Of
the spirit Of great predecessors. A true
poet. who always spoke from his heart.
and therefore always spoke nobly, and
one OF the most delightful essayists I'm
the language, he might claim no mean
place I'm their ranks. OF those great men
many would admit that they had found
no more penctrative and sympathetic
reader of the deepest thought than
Lowell. ] speak as though they were
still among us. For Lowell always
thought and spoke Of them not as men
long dead and gone but as OF friends
with whom he held daily converse
When ne dscoursed upon the ElZabethan
dramatists. one might fancy that he had
Just parted from Shakespeare and Ben
Jonson at the door Of the Globe Theatre.
and was about TO join them for a supper
Of the gods at the Mermaid Tavern.
This power was derived from rare COM
bination of qualities. A trained student
and a thorough scholar, he delighted
even in the minutiae of criticism, in
pathological and grammatical niceties.
and in the delicate canons Of versifica-
ton. He had, too. the voracious appetite
of your true book-worm; he was d man
born to grapple with Libraries, and TO
absorb and assimilate whole Iiteratures
No Dryasdust Of them all could have a /
more ardent love Of antiquarian research. |
though no man was less of what we /
generally mean by a Dryasdust. A Dry 1
as dust u.s. as Lowell has said an "un-
conscious humorist" a man who is the |
slave. not the master of his fancies; and /
who. in the ardor OF curiosity-hunting.
has lost the due sense Of the relative
importance Of things. From any such
weakness Lowell was preserved not less
by his imaginative sympathy than by his
inimtable gift of humOr. AS a true
humorist he could perceive that there
were bores three or four hundred years
ago, and knew that a bore does not cease
TO be bore because he has been left
upon dusty shelves through the inter
vening centuries. He was therefore the
master. not the slave Of his fancies: and
II for a moment he could play with them,
he could always take us into his con-
hdence with a quiet smile which showed
that he knew the real worth Of his
treasures. To such powers IT was owing
that Lowell has not been equalled since
Ire days Of the congenial Charles Lamb
m that criticism that has been called the
overs criticism, the irresistible appre-
'iation OF old writer's, which springs
rom similarity of heart and character.
from Harpers Weekly.