New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-05-24

1t is the very life for literature q mean Ior
ones own not that of another); fifty years OIL
residence in the home of ones forefathers per-
yaded by reading, by walking in the WOODS anu
the daily addition of sentence to sentence
1.-THE result of Mr.. Cabot's biography is once
more the impression that he [EmersonJ serves
and will not wear out, and that indeed we Cali
not afford to drop him." says Mr.. James IN
closing His instrument makes him precious
He did something better than any one else; ne
had a particular faculty, which has not oeen
| surpassed for speaking to the soul with VOICE
of dfrectness and authority There nave oeeh
many spiritual voices appealing. consolns. re-
assuring exhorting, or even denouncing or ter
rifying. but none has had just that f1rmness and
inst +ba+ Duritv To US to-day there is
something in il that says it is connected some
! how with the virtue of the world, has wrought
and achieved, lived In thousands OF minds, pro-
| duced a mass Of character and life. Or
course the way he spoke was on the whole. the
wav most convenient TO him: but he differs
from most men of letters Of the same degree or
credit In failing to strike US as having achieved
a style. This achievement is usually the br1oe
or toll money the journey to poster1ty; ana
| Il Emerson goes on his way, as ne clearly ap-
pears to be doing. on the strength of his mes
sage alone the case Will be rare, the exception
striking and the honor great
MATTHEW ARNoLo's ESTIMATE.
OF wider and probably of more enduring
| fame is Matthew Arnold's estimate in his Dis
courses in America first delivered in Bos-
ton a generation ago, and now accepted
| w those who then so angered, as
spoken in fairness and inspiring in its appre-
citation Of at least great phase of F.merson's
genius This is the paper in which Mr.. Arnold
speaks of those voices in the air at Oxford in his
UNDERGRADUATE days which haunted his memory
still the voices of Newman and Carlyle and
Goethe-and Emerson, your American New
man." he calls him Strangely enough, at this
centennial season. IN the May Century maya
zine in a paper on Thomas Arnold. Matthew's
next Younger brother it is shown that he. too
was influenced by Emerson. by Emerson and
| George Sand and by them more than by any
other forces, far more than by Newman. In
1.-THE Spiritual East Wind" which Matthew Ar
mold said blew upon the group Of young men OF
which himself and Arthur Clough were the lead
ers for Thomas Arnold, Emerson and George
Sand were the saving touch of sun and warmth.
Forty years later his brilliant brother had found
no cause to doubt the grace and worth Of Elmer
| sons message.
| With the form in which Emerson couched his
message however, Arnold did quarrel more
downrightly than James Through the inesti-
4
The Bridge of Longfelow, School Days Of
Whittier" he says is OF more poetic worth
| perhaps, than all the verse OF Emerson"
II do not, then, place Emerson among the
| great poets" Arnold continues. But go fur
| the- and say that / do not place him among
| the great writer's the great men OF letters He
! further denies that Emerson is philosopher.
| And as an illustration OF the truth Of both
propositions he quotes Emerson's own words
| to Carlyle: Here sit and read and write, with
very little system. and. as far as regards COM
position, with the most fragnentary result:
paragraphs incomprehensible each sentence an
| Infinitely repeant particle" But then he de-
! clares that he has given up to ''envious Time
all OF Emerson Time can claim, and he finds
| a remainder to live to posterity.
| And this remainder Is largely what James
| finds permanent, what Arnold and his
brother and Clough in their youth more than
half a century ago, what is still stirring the
! souls OF hundreds of college men to-day Cfor, in
spite OF many contrary statements, in Harvard
and other colleges to-day, Emerson is read per-
haps widely than ever before)-Emerson s
spiritual call to insight and Independence. his
that iron string" He is the friend and alder -
SO Arnold puts IT, ''of those who would live IN
the Spirit
LAS Wordsworth's poetry is in my Judgment
the most important work done In verse in our
language. during the present century. so Elmer
sons Essays are. think. the most important
work done in prose-" are Arnolds words of
praise. and he thus closes his paper: You
cannot prize MN 100 mucn nor heed him
- toe diligently. He has lessons for both the
branches of our race. figure him to my mind
visible upon earth still. still standing here
by Boston Bay or at his own Concord in his
habit as he lived, but Of heightened stature and
shining feature, with one hand stretched out
toward the East, 10 our laden and laboring
England; the other toward the ever growing
West to his own dearly loved America-great
intelligent. sensual. avaTicious America To
he shows for guidance his lucid freedom. his
cheerfulness and hope; to you his dignity. deli
Cacy, serenity, elevation"
VIEW OF CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT