New-York tribune., 1903-07-12
EXUBERANCE.
4 Timely Plea for It's Civilization.
From The Academy and Literature.

From The Academy and Literature
Ihere Is a generous and high spirited quality
or writing which of late has been rare In our
literature. Authors with all their many virtues
OF sobrlety, lucidity and truthfuress have
seemed sometimes little thin and prin For
fifty years they have been rather paIe and sad
and serious as though with thinking overrnuch
or from too great care for the comfort and sal
walton Of others, and even in their mirth there
mas remained something shamefaced and self
conscious as with men who make believe 10
reVeI on toast and water. Writers on the whole
are we, suppose, richer than they were, and
AII6Hl look Ior d growing IuXur1ance and wealth
Of temperament to correspond with their fort
unes But whether 1t come of their high Iiv-
ing and plain thinking, or whether the cause lie
OF city life, it is certain that literature, in spite
OF the quantity of books, has been srnitten with
a kind Of chilliness, a moderation. a caution a
sensitveness, depression, dropping, IneIan-
choiy a squeamIshness. a green sickness,
mediocrity, a wasting. a sterity and a NOPE
from which all suffer
1t is the quality Of exuberance that has been
lost There is kind of writing that swens with
fecundity and glOWS with mirth. 1t is large and
easy and unrestrained Shake it, and 1t drops
fatness; tap it. and it spOuts wine. OF pru-
dence it knows nothing, and it laughs at mod
GRAFTON as Leviathan at the shaking Of a spear.
II loves the gifts of the sunburued old earth,
and counts them over again and again like a
child counting his birthday toys. Its voice IS
deep and mellow, with laugh far down in the
throat. 1t grows. like a gOuTd with sitting in
the sun, and ii loves best the plentiful lands Of
vine and olive, calm rivers and gray poplar
trees. Yet once it has been found in all its law
lsh abundance even under our own distempered
sky, for only three men in the worlds history
have possessed eXuberance in full perfection.
and one Of them was Falstaff- The other TWO
were AriStOphanes and Rabelais.
But there are a certain few besides ~ hose fort
uUe it has been to be born with some gill run
let, tierce, puncheOn hOgshead bucketfUl
butt of it in their blood, which is merrsly
asserting itself like the dash of the tar brusl'
visible in lambs wool hair and the Sulf Of q
laughing mouth Such certainly was Dumas. Who
had il almost in brimming measure. might lie
-l1 frlrT1 q
such was Cyrano. a. was evident from the
pTomontOry of his nose Such might NIc-Or
Hugo have been, had he not turned portento-si
and Whitman. had he but laughed and Swift,
had he not dwelt, as Coleridge said. in dry
Place. and Jean Paul, had he not dweIt in Ger
many. But from England We may admit Field
ing into the over1owing fellowship, and Smol-
lett and Sterne and Boz and Byron when he is
not giving himself airs. And We would gladly
take in Meredith did he not think such a
plaguey lot a few more still might be counted,
hut many would claim entrance against whom
the tavern door must be shut, for, though there
is no blacklist II the realm of Abundantia, the
, ,1-!Iptiua OF exuberance is vUlgarity-