Produced by The James J Kelly Library of St GregorysUniversity and Alev AkmanTHE AMERICAN SPIRIT IN LITERATUREA CHRONICLE OF GREAT INTERPRETERSBy Bliss PerryCONTENTS     I THE PIONEERS     II THE FIRST COLONIAL LITERATURE     III THE THIRD AND FOURTH GENERATION     IV THE REVOLUTION     V THE KNICKERBOCKER GROUP     VI THE TRANSCENDENTALISTS     VII ROMANCE POETRY AND HISTORY     VIII POE AND WHITMAN     IX UNION AND LIBERTY     X A NEW NATION     BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTETHE AMERICAN SPIRIT IN LITERATURECHAPTER I THE PIONEERSThe United States of America has been from the beginning in a perpetualchange The physical and mental restlessness of the American and thetemporary nature of many of his arrangements are largely due to theexperimental character of the exploration and development of thiscontinent The new energies released by the settlement of the colonieswere indeed guided by stern determination wise forethought andinventive skill but no one has ever really known the outcome of theexperiment It is a story of faith of   Effort and expectation and desire   And something evermore about to beAn Alexander Hamilton may urge with passionate force the adoption of theConstitution without any firm conviction as to its permanence The mostclearsighted American of the Civil War period recognized this elementof uncertainty in our American adventure when he declared We arenow testing whether this nation or any nation so conceived and sodedicated can long endure More than fifty years have passed sincethat war rearmed the binding force of the Constitution and apparentlysealed the perpetuity of the Union Yet the gigantic economic and socialchanges now in progress are serving to show that the United States hasits full share of the anxieties which beset all human institutions inthis daily altering worldWe are but strangers in an inn but passengers in a ship said RogerWilliams This sense of the transiency of human effort the perishablenature of human institutions was quick in the consciousness of thegentleman adventurers and sober Puritan citizens who emigrated fromEngland to the New World It had been a familiar note in the poetry ofthat Elizabethan period which had followed with such breathless interestthe exploration of America It was a conception which could be sharedalike by a saint like John Cotton or a soldier of fortune like JohnSmith Men are tentdwellers Today they settle here and tomorrow theyhave struck camp and are gone We are strangers and sojourners as allour fathers wereThis instinct of the camper has stamped itself upon American life andthought Venturesomeness physical and moral daring resourcefulnessin emergencies indifference to negligible details wastefulnessof materials boundless hope and confidence in the morrow arecharacteristics of the American It is scarcely an exaggeration tosay that the good American has been he who has most resembled a goodcamper He has had robust healthunless or until he has abused itatolerant disposition and an ability to apply his fingers or his brainto many unrelated and unexpected tasks He is disposed to blaze his owntrail He has a touch of prodigality and withal a knack of keepinghis tent or his affairs in better order than they seem Above all hehas been ever ready to break camp when he feels the impulse to wanderHe likes to be footloose If he does not build his roads as solidlyas the Roman roads were built nor his houses like the English housesit is because he feels that he is here today and gone tomorrow If hehas squandered the physical resources of his neighborhood cutting theforests recklessly exhausting the soil surrendering water power andminerals into a few farclutching fingers he has done it because heexpects like Voltaires Signor Pococurante to have a new gardentomorrow built on a nobler plan When New York State grew too crowdedfor Coopers LeatherStocking he shouldered his pack whistled to hisdog glanced at the sun and struck a beeline for the MississippiNothing could be more typical of the first three hundred years ofAmerican historyThe traits of the pioneer have thus been the characteristic traits ofthe American in action The memories of successive generations havetended to stress these qualities to the neglect of others Everyonewho has enjoyed the free life of the woods will confess that his ownjudgment upon his casual summer associates turns quite naturally andalmost exclusively upon their characteristics as woodsmen Out of thewoods these gentlemen may be more or less admirable divines pedantsmen of affairs but the verdict of their companions in the forest isbased chiefly upon the single question of their adaptability to theenvironment of the camp Are they quick of eye and foot skillful withrod and gun cheerful on rainy days ready to do a little more thantheir share of drudgery If so memory holds themSome such unconscious selection as this has been at work in theclassification of our representative men The building of the nation andthe literary expression of its purpose and ideals are tasks which havecalled forth the strength of a great variety of individuals Some ofthese men have proved to be peculiarly fitted for a specific serviceirrespective of the question of their general intellectual powers ortheir rank as judged by the standard of European performance in the samefield Thus the battle of New Orleans in European eyes a mere bit offrontier fighting made Andrew Jackson a hero as indubitably as if hehad defeated Napoleon at Waterloo It gave him the PresidencyThe analogy holds in literature Certain expressions of Americansentiment or conviction have served to summarize or to clarify thespirit of the nation The authors of these productions have frequentlywon the recognition and affection of their contemporaries by means ofprose and verse quite unsuited to sustain the test of severe criticalstandards Neither Longfellows Excelsior nor Poes Bells norWhittiers Maud Muller is among the best poems of the three writersin question yet there was something in each of these productions whichcaught the fancy of a whole American generation It expressed one phaseof the