The New York herald., 1922-10-15


final pages from the pen of John Bur-
roughs, written mainly during the closing
months of his life, contain an unexpected
richness of substance. the ripened judg-
ments resulting from a lifelong intimacy
with Just few favorite books and authors.
Consequently it is not volume TO be read
in a critical spirit, with an eye alert for
minor points with which to take issue, but
rather with the pleasurable expectation
that comes from hearing once again Ia
miliar friendly voice saying many wise
and profitable things.
More than a third Of the pages are de-
voted to a study of Emerson and his
journals. Emerson was one OF the earliest
and most enduring of the influences on the
life and thought of John Burroughs, and
this final summing up is one that no future
student of the author of Representative
Men" can afford to ignore:
Emerson stands apart from the other
poets and essayists of New England and
of English literature generally, as of
prophet of the moral idea. His
poems are the fruit of Oriental mysti-
cism and bardic fervor grated upon the
shrewd, parsimonious, New England
puritanc stock The stress and wild,
uncertain melody of his poetry is like
that of the wind harp. No writing sur
passes his in it's Elusive, myst
cal suggestiveness, and its cryptic char
acter. 1t is Yankee wit and shrewd-
ness on one side, and Oriental devout-
ness, pantheism and symbolism on the
other. Saadi or HafM or Omar might
have fathered him. but only New Eng
land mother could have born him.
That any one with mind like Emer-
sons took no interest in natural knowledge
for its own sake seems to Burroughs we'll
nigh incredible; and he quotes Emersons
dictum that "all Linnaus's and Buttons
volumes contain not one line of poetry"
adding the caustic comment, "one almost
feels as if this were idealism gone to
seed.'
For my own part continues Mr.. Bur-
roughs) l find the life histories of the
wild creatures about me intensely inter-
esting without any ulterior considera-
tions. / am not looking for ethical or
poetic values. 1 am looking for natural
truths. 1 am less interested in the SER
mons in stones than l am in the life
under the stones. l had rather see
worm cast it's skin than see a king
crowned. had rather see Phoebe build
ing her mud nest than the preacher
writing his sermon.
Probably the most satisfactory and
profitable single essay in the volume is
"a Critical Glance Into Darwin" 1t is
never safe, he tells us, to question Dar-
wins facts, but it is always safe to ques
ton any mans theories; and as for Dar-
wins theories, "he has already been shorn
of his selection doctrines as completely as
Samson was shorn of his locks" Neverthe-
less, shorn though he is, his significance
is not lessened: "He is still the most i'm
pressive figure in modern biological
science" and his simplicity and devotion to
truth are a precious heritage to the world
at large.
Darwin's work is monumental because
he belongs-to the class of monumental
men. The doctrine of evolution as ap-
piled to animate nature reached it's COM
plete evolution in his mind He
taught US how to cross-question the
very gods of life in their council cham
bers he showed us what significance
attaches TO the simplest facts of natural
history. All the world now
travels along the course he established