Bot-S: Vol 28: The Classics

 In our present case scientific philologers 
are beginning to complain, with perfect truth and perfect 



244 FREEMAN 

justice from their own point of view, that the popular doc- 
trine of race confounds race and language. They tell us, 
and they do right to tell us, that language is no certain test 
of race, that men who speak the same tongue are not there- 
fore necessarily men of the same blood. And they tell us 
further, that from whatever quarter the alleged popular con- 
fusion came, it certainly did not come from any teaching of 
scientific philologers. 

The truth of all this cannot be called in question. We 
have too many instances in recorded history of nations lay- 
ing aside the use of one language and taking to the use of 
another, for anyone who cares for accuracy to set down 
language as any sure test of race. In fact, the studies of 
the philologer and those of the ethnologer strictly so called 
are quite distinct, and they deal with two wholly different 
sets of phenomena. The science of the ethnologer is strictly 
a physical science. He has to deal with purely physical 
phenomena; his business lies with the different varieties of 
the human body, and specially, to take that branch of his 
inquiries which most impresses the unlearned, with the vari- 
ous conformations of the human skull. His researches 
differ in nothing from those of the zoologist or the pale- 
ontologist, except that he has to deal with the physical 
phenomena of man, while they deal with the physical phe- 
nomena of other animals. He groups the different races of 
men, exactly as the others group the genera and species of 
living or extinct mammals or reptiles. The student of eth- 
nology as a physical science may indeed strengthen his con- 
clusions by evidence of other kinds, evidence from arms, 
ornaments, pottery, modes of burial. But all these are 
secondary; the primary ground of classification is the phys- 
ical conformation of man himself. As to language, the 
ethnological method, left to itself, can find out nothing 
whatever. The science of the ethnologer then is primarily 
physical; it is historical only in that secondary sense in 
■which paleontology, and geology itself, may fairly be called 
historical. It arranges the varieties of mankind according 
to a strictly physical classification; what the language of 
each variety may have been, it leaves to the professors of 
another branch of study to find out. 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 245 

The science of the philologer, on the other hand, is strictly S 
historical. There is doubtless a secondary sense in which 
purely philological science may be fairly called physical, 
just as there is a secondary sense in which pure ethnology 
may be called historical. That is to say, philology has to 
deal with physical phenomena, so far as it has to deal 
with the physical aspect of the sounds of which human 
language is made up. Its primary business, like the primary 
business of any other historical science, is to deal with phe- 
nomena which do not depend on physical laws, but which 
do depend on the human will. The science of language is, 
in this respect, like the science of human institutions or of 
human beliefs. Its subject-matter is not, like that of pure 
ethnology, what man is, but, like that of any other historical 
science, what man does. It is plain that no man's will can 
have any direct influence on the shape of his skull. I say 
no direct influence, because it is not for me to rule how far 
habits, places of abode, modes of life, a thousand things 
which do come under the control of the human will, may in- 
directly affect the physical conformation of a man himself 
or of his descendants. Some observers have made the re- 
mark that men of civilized nations who live in a degraded 
social state do actually approach to the physical type of in- 
ferior races. However this may be, it is quite certain, that 
as no man can by taking thought add a cubit to his stature, 
so no man can by taking thought make his skull brachyce- 
phalic or dolichocephalic. But the language which a man 
speak? does depend upon his will ; he can by taking thought 
make his speech Romance or Teutonic. No doubt he has in 
most cases practically no choice in the matter. The lan- 
guage which he speaks {9 practically determined for him by 
fashion, habit, early teaching, a crowd of things over which 
he has practically no control. But still the control is not 
physical and inevitable, as it is in the case of the shape of 
his skull. If we say that he cannot help speaking in a par- 
ticular way; that is, that he cannot help speaking a par- 
ticular language, this simply means that his circumstances 
are such that no other way of speaking presents itself to 
his mind. And in many cases, he has a real choice between 
two or more ways of speaking ; that is, between two or more 



246 FREEMAN 

languages. Every word that a man speaks is the result of 
a real, though doubtless unconscious, act of his free will. 
We are apt to speak of gradual changes in languages, as in 
institutions or anything else, as if they were the result of 
a physical law, acting upon beings who had no choice in the 
matter. Yet every change of the kind is simply the ag- 
gregate of various acts of the will on the part of all con- 
cerned. Every change in speech, every introduction of a 
new sound or a new word, was really the result of an act of 
the will of some one or other. The choice may have been 
unconscious; circumstances may have been such as prac- 
tically to give him but one choice; still he did choose; he 
spoke in one way, when there was no physical hinderance 
to his speaking in another way, when there was no physical 
compulsion to speak at all. The Gauls need not have changed 
their own language for Latin; the change was not the re- 
sult of a physical necessity, but of a number of acts of the 
will on the part of this and that Gaul. Moral causes directed 
their choice, and determined that Gaul should become a 
Latin-speaking land. But whether the skulls of the Gauls 
should be long or short, whether their hair should be black 
or yellow, those were points over which the Gauls them- 
selves had no direct control whatever. 

The study of men's skulls then is a study which is strictly 
\ physical, a study of facts over which the will of man has 
no direct control. The study of men's languages is strictly 
an historical study, a study of facts over which the will of 
man has a direct control. It follows therefore from the 
very nature of the two studies that language cannot be an 
absolutely certain test of physical descent. A man cannot, 
under any circumstances, choose his own skull; he may, 
under some circumstances, choose his own language. He must 
keep the skull which has been given him by his parents; he 
cannot, by any process of taking thought, determine what 
kind of skull he will hand on to his own children. But he 
may give up the use of the language which he has learned 
from his parents, and he may determine what language he 
will teach to his children. The physical characteristics of a 
race are unchangeable, or are changed only by influences 
over which the race itself has no direct control. The Ian- 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 217 

guage which the race speaks may be changed, either by a 
conscious act of the will or by that power of fashion which 
is in truth the aggregate of countless unconscious acts of 
the will. And, as the very nature of the case thus shows 
that language is no sure test of race, so the facts of recorded 
history equally prove the same truth. Both individuals and 
whole nations do in fact often exchange the language of 
their forefathers for some other language. A man settles 
in a foreign country. He learns the language of that coun- 
try; sometimes he forgets the use of his own language. His 
children may perhaps speak both tongues ; if they speak one 
tongue only, it will be the tongue of the country where they 
five. In a generation or two all trace of foreign origin will 
have passed away. Here then language is no test of race. 
If the great-grandchildren speak the language of their great- 
grandfathers, it will simply be as they may speak any other 
foreign language. Here are men who by speech belong to 
one nation, by actual descent to another. If they lose the 
physical characteristics of the race to which the original 
settler belonged, it will be due to inter-marriage, to climate, 
to some cause altogether independent of language. Every 
nation will have some adopted children of this kind, more or 
fewer; men who belong to it by speech, but who do not be- 
long to it by race. And what happens in the case of indi- 
viduals happens in the case of whole nations. The pages 
of history are crowded with cases in which nations have 
cast aside the tongue of their forefathers, and have taken 
instead the tongue of some other people. Greek in the East, 
Latin in the West, became the familiar speech of millions 
who had not a drop of Greek or Italian blood in their veins. 
The same has been the case in later times with Arabic, Per- 
sian, Spanish, German, English. Each of those tongues has 
become the familiar speech of vast regions where the mass of 
the people are not Arabian, Spanish, or English, otherwise 
than by adoption. The Briton of Cornwall has, slowly but 
in the end thoroughly, adopted the speech of England. In 
the American continent full-blooded Indians preside over 
commonwealths which speak the tongue of Cortes and Pi- 
zarro. In the lands to which all eyes are now turned, the 
Greek, who has been busily assimilating strangers ever since 



248 FREEMAN 

he first planted his colonies in Asia and Sicily, goes on busily 
assimilating his Albanian neighbors. And between rene- 
gades, janizaries, and mothers of all nations, the blood of 
many a Turk must be physically anything rather than 
Turkish. The inherent nature of the case, and the witness 
of recorded history, join together to prove that language is 
no certain test of race, and that the scientific philologers are 
doing good service to accuracy of expression and accuracy 
of thought by emphatically calling attention to the fact that 
language is no such test. 

But on the other hand, it is quite possible that the truth 
to which our attention is just now most fittingly called may, 
if put forth too broadly and without certain qualifications, 
lead to error quite as great as the error at which it is aimed. 
I do not suppose that anyone ever thought that language 
was, necessarily and in all cases, an absolute and certain 
test. If anybody does think so, he has put himself alto- 
gether out of court by shutting his eyes to the most manifest 
facts of the case. But there can be no doubt that many 
people have given too much importance to language as a test 
of race. Though they have not wholly forgotten the facts 
which tell the other way, they have not brought them out 
with enough prominence. But I can also believe that many 
people have written and spoken on the subject in a way 
which cannot be justified from a strictly scientific point of 
view, but which may have been fully justified from the 
point of view of the writers and speakers themselves. It 
may often happen that a way of speaking may not be scien- 
tifically accurate, but may yet be quite near enough to the 
truth for the purposes of the matter in hand. It may, for 
some practical or even historical purpose, be really more true 
than the statement which is scientifically more exact. Lan- 
guage is no certain test of race; but if a man, struck by this 
wholesome warning, should run off into the belief that lan- 
guage and race have absolutely nothing to do with one an- 
other, he had better have gone without the warning. For in 
such a case the last error would be worse than the first. The 
natural instinct of mankind connects race and language. It 
does not assume that language is an infallible test of race; 
but it does assume that language and race have something 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 249 

to do with one another. It assumes, that though language 
is not an accurately scientific test of race, yet it is a rough 
and ready test which does for many practical purposes. To 
make something more of an exact definition, one might say, 
that though language is not a test of race, it is, in the ab- 
sence of evidence to the contrary, a presumption of race; 
that though it is not a test of race, yet it is a test of some- 
thing which, for many practical purposes, is the same as race. 
Professor Max Miiller warned us long ago that we must 
not speak of a Celtic skull. Mr. Sayce has more lately 
warned us that we must not infer from community of Aryan 
speech that there is any kindred in blood between this or 
that Englishman and this or that Hindoo. And both warn- 
ings are scientifically true. Yet anyone who begins his 
studies on these matters with Professor Miiller's famous 
Oxford Essay will practically come to another way of look- 
ing at things. He will fill his mind with a vivid picture of 
the great Aryan family, as yet one, dwelling in one place, 
speaking one tongue, having already taken the first steps 
towards settled society, recognizing the domestic relations, 
possessing the first rudiments of government and religion, 
and calling all these first elements of culture by names of 
which traces still abide here and there among the many na- 
tions of the common stock. He will go on to draw pictures 
equally vivid of the several branches of the family parting 
of! from the primeval home. One great branch he will see 
going to the southeast, to become the forefathers of the vast, 
yet isolated colony in the Asiatic lands of Persia and India. 
He watches the remaining mass sending off wave after 
wave, to become the forefathers of the nations of historical 
Europe. He traces out how each branch starts with its own 
share of the common stock — how the language, the creed, 
the institutions, once common to all, grow up into different, 
yet kindred, shapes, among the many parted branches which 
grew up, each with an independent life and strength of its 
own. This is what our instructors set before us as the true 
origin of nations and their languages. And, in drawing out 
the picture, we cannot avoid, our teachers themselves do 
not avoid, the use of words which imply that the strictly 
family relation, the relation of community of blood, is at 



250 FREEMAN 

the root of the whole matter. We cannot help talking about 
the family and its branches, about parents, children, brothers, 
sisters, cousins. The nomenclature of natural kindred ex- 
actly fits the case; it fits it so exactly that no other nomen- 
clature could enable us to set forth the case with any clear- 
ness. Yet we cannot be absolutely certain that there was 
any real community of blood in the whole story. We really 
know nothing of the origin of language or the origin of 
society. We may make a thousand ingenious guesses; but 
we cannot prove any of them. It may be that the group 
which came together, and which formed the primeval society 
w T hich spoke the primeval Aryan tongue, were not brought 
together by community of blood, but by some other cause 
which threw them in one another's way. If we accept the 
Hebrew genealogies, they need not have had any community 
of blood nearer than common descent from Adam and Noah. 
That is, they need not have been all children of Shem, of 
Ham, or of Japheth ; some children of Shem, some of Ham, 
and some of Japheth may have been led by some cause to 
settle together. Or if we believe in independent creations 
of men, or in the development of men out of mollusks, the 
whole of the original society need not have been descendants 
of the same man or the same mollusk. In short, there is no 
theory of the origin of man which requires us to believe that 
the primeval Aryans were a natural family; they may have 
been more like an accidental party of fellow-travelers. And 
if we accept them as a natural family, it does not follow that 
the various branches which grew into separate races and 
nations, speaking separate though kindred languages, were 
necessarily marked off by more immediate kindred. It may 
be that there is no nearer kindred in blood between this or 
that Persian, this or that Greek, this or that Teuton, than 
the general kindred of all Aryans. For, when this or that 
party marched off from the common home, it does not fol- 
low that those who marched off together were necessarily 
immediate brothers or cousins. The party which grew into 
Hindoos or Teutons may not have been made up exclusively 
of one set of near kinsfolk. Some of the children of the 
same parents or forefathers may have marohed one way, 
while others marched another way, or stayed behind. We 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 251 

may, if we piease, indulge our fancy by conceiving that there 
may actually be family distinctions older than distinctions 
of nation and race. It may be that the Gothic Amali and the 
Roman Mmilii — I throw out the idea as a mere illustration — 
were branches of a family which had taken a name before 
the division of Teuton and Italian. Some of the members 
of that family may have joined the band of which came the 
Goths, while other members joined the band of which came 
the Romans. There is no difference but the length of time 
to distinguish such a supposed case from the case of an 
English family, one branch of which settled in the seven- 
teenth century at Boston in Massachusetts, while another 
branch stayed behind at Boston in Holland. Mr. Sayce 
says truly that the use of a kindred language does not prove 
that the Englishman and the Hindoo are really akin in race ; 
for, as he adds, many Hindoos are men of non-Aryan race 
who have simply learned to speak tongues of Sanscrit origin. 
He might have gone on to say, with equal truth, that there 
is no positive certainty that there was any community in 
blood among the original Aryan group itself, and that if we 
admit such community of blood in the original Aryan group, 
it does not follow that there is any further special kindred 
between Hindoo and Hindoo or between Englishman and 
Englishman. The original group may not have been a 
family, but an artificial union. And if it was a family, those 
of its members who marched together east or west or north 
or south may have had no tie of kindred beyond the com- 
mon cousinship of all. 

Now the tendency of this kind of argument is to lead to 
something a good deal more startling than the doctrine that 
language is no certain test of race. Its tendency is to go 
on further, and to show that race is no certain test of com- 
munity of blood. And this comes pretty nearly to saying 
that there is no such thing as race at all. For our whole 
conception of race starts from the idea of community of 
blood If the word " race " does not mean community of 
blood, it is hard to see what it does mean. Yet it is certain 
that there can be no positive proof of real community of 
blood, even among those groups of mankind which we in- 
stinctively speak of as families and races. It is not merely 



252 FREEMAN 

that the blocd has been mingled in after-times; there is no 
positive proof that there was any community of blood in 
the beginning. No living Englishman can prove with abso- 
lute certainty that he comes in the male line of any of the 
Teutonic settlers in Britain in the fifth or sixth centuries. 
I say in the male line, because anyone who is descended 
from any English king can prove such descent, though he 
can prove it only through a long and complicated web of 
female successions. But we may be sure that in no other 
case can such a pedigree be proved by the kind of proof 
which lawyers would require to make out the title to an 
estate or a peerage. The actual forefathers of the modern 
Englishman may chance to have been, not true-born Angles 
or Saxons, but Britons, Scots, in later days Frenchmen, 
Flemings, men of any other nation who learned to speak 
English and took to themselves English names. But sup- 
posing that a man could make out such a pedigree, suppos- 
ing that he could prove that he came in the male line of 
some follower of Hengest or Cerdic, he would be no nearer 
to proving original community of blood either in the par- 
ticular Teutonic race or in the general Aryan family. If 
direct evidence is demanded, we must give up the whole 
doctrine of families and races, as far as we take language, 
manners, institutions, anything but physical conformation, 
as the distinguishing marks of races and families. That is 
to say, if we wish never to use any word of whose accuracy 
we cannot be perfectly certain, we must leave off speaking 
of races and families at all from any but the purely physical 
side. We must content ourselves with saying that certain 
groups of mankind have a common history, that they have 
languages, creeds, and institutions in common, but that we 
have no evidence whatever to show how they came to have 
languages, creeds, and institutions in common. We cannot 
say for certain what was the tie which brought the members 
of the original group together, any more than we can name 
the exact time and the exact place when and where they 
came together. 

We may thus seem to be landed in a howling wilderness 
of scientific uncertainty. The result of pushing our in- 
quiries so far may seem to be to show that we really know 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 253 

nothing at all. But in truth the uncertainty is no greater 
than the uncertainty which attends all inquiries in the his- 
torical sciences. Though a historical fact may be recorded 
in the most trustworthy documents, though it may have hap- 
pened in our own times, though we may have seen it happen 
with our own eyes, yet we cannot have the same certainty 
about it as the mathematician has about the proposition 
which he proves to absolute demonstration. We cannot have 
even that lower degree of certainty which the geologist has 
with regard to the order of succession between this and that 
stratum. For in all historical inquiries we are dealing with 
facts which themselves come within the control of human 
will and human caprice, and the evidence for which depends 
on the trustworthiness of human informants, who may either 
purposely deceive or unwittingly mislead. A man may lie; 
he may err. The triangles and the rocks can neither lie nor 
err. I may with my own eyes see a certain man do a cer- 
tain act ; he may tell me himself, or some one else may tell 
me, that he is the same man who did some other act ; but as 
to his statement I cannot have absolute certainty, and no one 
but myself can have absolute certainty as to the statement 
which I make as to the facts which I saw with my own 
eyes. Historical evidence may range through every degree, 
from the barest likelihood to that undoubted moral certainty 
on which every man acts without hesitation in practical af- 
fairs. But it cannot get beyond this last standard. If, then, 
we are ever to use words like race, family, or even nation, to 
denote groups of mankind marked off by any kind of his- 
torical, as distinguished from physical, characteristics, we 
must be content to use those words, as we use many other 
words, without being able to prove that our use of them is 
accurate, as mathematicians judge of accuracy. I cannot be 
quite sure that William the Conqueror landed at Pevensey, 
though I have strong reasons for believing that he did so. 
And I have strong reasons for believing many facts about 
race and language about which I am much further from be- 
ing quite sure than I am about William's landing at Peven- 
sey. In short, in all these matters, we must be satisfied to 
let presumption very largely take the place of actual proof; 
and, if we only let presumption in, most of our difficulties 



254 FREEMAN 



at once fly away. Language is no certain test of race; but 
it is a presumption of race. Community of race, as we com- 
monly understand race, is no certain proof of original com- 
munity of blood; but it is a presumption of original com- 
munity of blood. The presumption amounts to moral proof, 
if only we do not insist on proving such physical community 
of blood as would satisfy a genealogist. It amounts to moral 
proof, if all that we seek is to establish a relation in which 
the community of blood is the leading idea, and in which 
where natural community of blood does not exist, its place 
is supplied by something which by a legal fiction is looked 
upon as its equivalent. 

If, then, we do not ask for scientific, for what we may 
call physical, accuracy, but if we are satisfied with the kind 
of proof which is all that we can ever get in the historical 
sciences — if we are satisfied to speak in a way which is true 
for popular and practical purposes — then we may say that 
language has a great deal to do with race, as race is com- 
monly understood, and that race has a great deal to do with 
community of blood. If we once admit the Roman doctrine 
of adoption, our whole course is clear. The natural family 
is the starting-point of everything; but we must give the 
natural family the power of artificially enlarging itself by 
admitting adoptive members. A group of mankind is thus 
formed, in which it does not follow that all the members 
have any natural community of blood, but in which com- 
munity of blood is the starting-point, in which those who are 
connected by natural community of blood form the original 
body within whose circle the artificial members are admit- 
ted. A group of mankind thus formed is something quite 
different from a fortuitous concurrence of atoms. Three or 
four brothers by blood, with a fourth or fifth man whom 
they agree to look on as filling in everything the same place 
as a brother by blood, form a group which is quite unlike 
a union of four or five men, none of whom is bound by any 
tie of blood to any of the others. In the latter kind of union 
the notion of kindred does not come in at all. In the former 
kind the notion of kindred is the groundwork of everything; 
it determines the character of every relation and every ac- 
tion, even though the kindred between some members of the 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 255 

society and others may be owing to a legal fiction and not 
to natural descent. All that we know of the growth of 
tribes, races, nations, leads us to believe that they grew in this 
way. Natural kindred was the groundwork, the leading and 
determining idea; but, by one of those legal fictions which 
have such an influence on all institutions, adoption was in 
certain cases allowed to count as natural kindred. 2 

The usage of all language shows that community of blood 
was the leading idea in forming the greater and smaller 
groups of mankind. Words like pdkov > y£vo$ y gens, natio, 
kin, all point to the natural family as the origin of all so- 
ciety. The family in the narrower sense, the children of one 
father in one house, grew into a more extended family, the 
gens. Such were the Alkmaionidai, the Julii, or the Scyldin- 
gas, the real or artificial descendants of a real or supposed 
forefather. The nature of the gens has been set forth often 
enough. If it is a mistake to fancy that every Julius or 
Cornelius was the natural kinsman of every other Julius or 
Cornelius, it is equally a mistake to think that the gens Julia 
or Cornelia was in its origin a mere artificial association, 
into which the idea of natural kindred did not enter. It is 
indeed possible that really artificial gentes, groups of men 
of whom it might chance that none were natural kinsmen, 
were formed in later times after the model of the original 
gentes. Still such imitation would bear witness to the origi- 
nal conception of the gens. It would be the doctrine of 
adoption turned the other way ; instead of a father adopting 
a son, a number of men would agree to adopt a common 
father. The family then grew into the gens; the union o£ 
gentes formed the State, the political community, which in 
its first form was commonly a tribe. Then came the nation, 
formed of a union of tribes. Kindred, real or artificial, is 
the one basis on which all society and all government have 
grown up. 

Now it is plain, that as soon as we admit the doctrine of 
artificial kindred — that is, as soon as we allow the exercise 

2 I am here applying to this particular purpose a line of thought which 
both myself and others have often applied to other purposes. See, above 
all, Sir Henry Maine's lecture " On Kinship as the Basis of Society " in 
the lectures on the "Early History of Institutions"; I would refer also to 
my own lecture on " The State " in " Comparative Politics." 



256 FREEMAN 

of the law of adoption — physical purity of race is at an end. 
Adoption treats a man as if he were the son of a certain 
father; it cannot really make him the son of that father. If 
a brachycephalic father adopts a dolichocephalic son, the 
legal act cannot change the shape of the adopted son's skull. 
I will not undertake to say whether, not indeed the rite of 
adoption, but the influences and circumstances which would 
spring from it, might not, in the course of generations, affect 
even the skull of the man who entered a certain gens, tribe, 
or nation by artificial adoption only. If by any chance the 
adopted son spoke a different language from the adopted 
father, the rite of adoption itself would not of itself change 
his language. But it would bring him under influences which 
would make him adopt the language of his new gens by a 
conscious act of the will, and which would make his chil- 
dren adopt it by the same unconscious act of the will by 
which each child adopts the language of his parents. The 
adopted son, still more the son of the adopted son, became, 
in speech, in feelings, in worship, in everything but physical 
descent, one with the gens into which he was adopted. He 
became one of that gens for all practical, political, historical 
purposes. It is only the physiologist who could deny his 
right to his new position. The nature of the process is well 
expressed by a phrase of our own law. When the nation — 
the word itself keeps about it the remembrance of birth as 
the groundwork of everything — adopts a new citizen, that 'is, 
a new child of the State, he is said to be naturalized. That 
is, a legal process puts him in the same position, and gives 
him the same rights, as a man who is a citizen and a son 
by birth. It is. assumed that the rights of citizenship come 
by nature — that is, by birth. The stranger is admitted to 
them only by a kind of artificial birth; he is naturalized by 
law; his children are in a generation or two naturalized in 
fact. There is now no practical distinction between the 
Englishman whose forefathers landed with William, or even 
between the Englishman whose forefathers sought shelter 
from Alva or from Louis XIV, and the Englishman whose 
forefathers landed with Hengest. It is for the physiologist 
to say whether any difference can be traced in their several 
skulls; for all practical purposes, historical or political, 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 257 

all distinction between these several classes has passed 
away. 

We may, in short, say that the law of adoption runs 
through everything, and that it may be practised on every 
scale. What adoption is at the hands of the family, nat- 
uralization is at the hands of the State. And the same proc- 
ess extends itself from adopted or naturalized individuals 
to large classes of men, indeed to whole nations. When the 
process takes place on this scale, we may best call it assimila- 
tion. Thus Rome assimilated the continental nations of 
western Europe to that degree that, allowing for a few 
survivals here and there, not only Italy, but Gaul and Spain, 
became Roman. The people of those lands, admitted step by 
step to the Roman franchise, adopted the name and tongue 
of Romans. It must soon have been hard to distinguish the 
Roman colonist in Gaul or Spain from the native Gaul or 
Spaniard who had, as far as .in him lay, put on the guise of a 
Roman. This process of assimilation has gone on every- 
where and at all times. When two nations come in this way 
into close contact with one another, it depends on a crowd of 
circumstances which shall assimilate the other, or whether 
they shall remain distinct without assimilation either way. 
Sometimes the conquerors assimilate their subjects; some- 
times they are assimilated by their subjects; sometimes con- 
querors and subjects remain distinct forever. When assimi- 
lation either way does take place, the direction which it takes 
in each particular case will depend, partly on their respective 
numbers, partly on their degrees of civilization. A small 
number of less civilized conquerors will easily be lost among 
a greater number of more civilized subjects, and that even 
though they give their name to the land and people which 
they conquer. The modern Frenchman represents, not the 
conquering Frank, but the conquered Gaul, or, as he called 
himself, the conquered Roman. The modern Bulgarian rep- 
resents, not the Finnish conqueror, but the conquered Slave. 
The modern Russian represents, not the Scandinavian ruler, 
but the Slave who sent for the Scandinavian to rule over 
him. And so we might go on with endless other cases. The 
point is that the process of adoption, naturalization, assimi- 
lation, has gone on everywhere. No nation can boast o£ 

Vol. 28—1 HC 



^ 



258 FREEMAN 

absolute purity of blood, though no doubt some nations come 
much nearer to it than others. When I speak of purity of 
blood, I leave out of sight the darker questions which I have 
already raised with regard to the groups of mankind in days 
before recorded history. I assume great groups like Celtic, 
Teutonic, Slavonic, as having what we may call a real cor- 
porate existence, however we may hold that that corporate 
existence began. My present point is that no existing nation 
is, in the physiologist's sense of purity, purely Celtic, Teu- 
tonic, Slavonic, or anything else. All races have assimilated 
a greater or less amount of foreign elements. Taking this 
standard, one which comes more nearly within the range of 
our actual knowledge than the possibilities of unrecorded 
times, we may again say that, from the purely scientific or 
physiological point of view, not only is language no test of 
race, but that, at all events among the great nations of the 
world, there is no such thing as purity of race at all. 

But, while we admit this truth, while we even insist upon 
it from the strictly scientific point of view, we must be al- 
lowed to look at it with different eyes from a more practical 
standing point. This is the standing point, whether of his- 
tory which is the politics of the past, or of politics which 
are the history of the present. From this point of view, we 
may say unhesitatingly that there are such things as races 
and nations, and that to the grouping of those races and na- 
tions language is the best guide. We cannot undertake to 
define with any philosophical precision the exact distinction 
between race and race, between nation and nation. Nor can 
we undertake to define with the like precision in what way 
the distinctions between race and race, between nation and 
nation, began. But all analogy leads us to believe that tribes, 
nations, races, were all formed according to the original 
model of the family, the family which starts from the idea of 
the community of blood, but which allows artificial adoption 
to be its legal equivalent. In all cases of adoption, naturali- 
zation, assimilation, whether of individuals or of large 
classes of men, the adopted person or class is adopted into an 
existing community. Their adoption undoubtedly influences 
the community into which they are adopted. It at once de- 
stroys any claim on the part of that community to purity of 



RACK AND LANGUAGE 259 

blood, and it influences the adopting community in many 
ways, physical and moral. A family, a tribe, or a nation, 
which has largely recruited itself by adopted members, can- 
not be the same as one which has never practised adoption at 
all, but all whose members come of the original stock. But 
the influence which the adopting community exercises upon 
its adopted members is far greater than any influence which 
they exercise upon it. It cannot change their blood; it can- 
not give them new natural forefathers ; but it may do every- 
thing short of this; it may make them, in speech, in feeling, 
in thought, and in habit, genuine members of the community 
which has artificially made them its own. While there is 
not in any nation, in any race, any such thing as strict purity 
of blood, yet there is in each nation, in each race, a domi- 
nant element — or rather something more than an element — 
something which is the true essence of the race or nation, 
something which sets its standard and determines its char- 
acter, something which draws to itself and assimilates to 
itself all other elements. It so works that all other elements 
are not coequal elements with itself, but mere infusions 
poured into an already existing body. Doubtless these in- 
fusions do in some measure influence the body which as- 
similates them; but the influence which they exercise is as 
nothing compared to the influence which they undergo. We 
may say that they modify the character of the body into 
which they are assimilated ; they do not effect its personality. 
Thus, assuming the great groups of mankind as primary 
facts, the origin of which lies beyond our certain knowledge, 
we may speak of families and races, of the great Aryan 
family and of the races into which it parted, as groups which 
have a real, practical existence, as groups founded on the 
ruling primeval idea of kindred, even though in many cases 
the kindred may not be by natural descent, but only by law 
of adoption. The Celtic, Teutonic, Slavonic races of man 
are real living and abiding groups, the distinction between 
which we must accept among the primary facts of history. 
And they go on as living and abiding groups, even though 
we know that each of them has assimilated many adopted 
members, sometimes from other branches of the Aryan 
family, sometimes from races of men alien to the whole 



260 FREEMAN 

Aryan stock. These races which, in a strictly physiological 
point of view, have no existence at all, have a real existence 
from the more practical point of view of history and politics. 
The Bulgarian calls to the Russian for help, and the Rus- 
sian answers to his call for help, on the ground of their 
being alike members of the one Slavonic race. It may be 
that, if we could trace out the actual pedigree of this or 
that Bulgarian, of this or that Russian, we might either find 
that there was no real kindred between them, or we might 
find that there was a real kindred, but a kindred which must 
be traced up to another stock than that of the Slaves. In point 
of actual blood, instead of both being Slaves, it may be that 
one of them comes, it may be that both of them come of a 
stock which is not Slavonic or even Aryan. The Bulgarian 
may chance to be a Bulgarian in a truer sense than he thinks 
for; he may come of the blood of those original Finnish con- 
querors who gave the Bulgarian name to the Slaves among 
whom they were merged. And if this or that Bulgarian may 
chance to come of the stock of Finnish conquerors assimi- 
lated by their Slavonic subjects, this or that Russian may 
chance to come of the stock of Finnish subjects assimilated 
by their Slavonic conquerors. It may then so happen that 
the cry for help goes up, and is answered on a ground of 
kindred which in the eye of the physiologist has no exist- 
ence. Or it may happen that the kindred is real in a way 
which neither the suppliant nor his helper thinks of. But in 
either case, for the practical purposes of human life, the plea 
is a good plea; the kindred on which it is founded is a real 
kindred. It is good by the law of adoption. It is good by 
the law the force of which we all admit whenever we count 
a man as an Englishman whose forefathers, two generations 
or twenty generations back, came to our shores as strangers. 
For all practical purposes, for all the purposes which guide 
men's actions, public or private, the Russian and the Bul- 
garian, kinsmen so long parted, perhaps in very truth no nat- 
ural kinsmen at all, are members of the same race, bound 
together by the common sentiment of race. They belong to 
the same race, exactly as an Englishman whose forefathers 
came into Britain fourteen hundred years back, and an Eng- 
lishman whose forefathers came only one or two hundred 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 261 

years back, are like members of the same nation, bound to- 
gether by a tie of common nationality. 

And now, having ruled that races and nations, though 
largely formed by the workings of an artificial law, are still 
real and living things, groups in which the idea of kindred 
is the idea around which everything has grown, how are we 
to define our races and our nations? How are we to mark 
them off one from the other ? Bearing in mind the cautions 
and qualifications which have been already given, bearing in 
mind large classes of exceptions which will presently be 
spoken of, I say unhesitatingly that for practical purposes 
there is one test, and one only, and that that test is language. 
It is hardly needful to show that races and nations cannot be 
defined by the merely political arrangements which group 
men under various governments. For some purposes of 
ordinary language, for some purposes of ordinary politics, 
we are tempted, sometimes driven, to take this standard. 
And in some parts -of the world, in our own western Europe 
for instance, nations and governments do, in a rough way, 
fairly answer to one another. And, in any case, political di- 
visions are not without their influence on the formation of 
national divisions, while national divisions ought to have 
the greatest influence on political divisions. That is to say, 
prima facie a nation and government should coincide. I 
say only prima facie; for this is assuredly no inflexible rule; 
there are often good reasons why it should be otherwise; 
only, whenever it is otherwise, there should be some good 
reason forthcoming. It might even be true that in no case did 
a government and a nation exactly coincide, and yet it would 
none the less be the rule that a government and a nation 
should coincide. That is to say, so far as a nation and a 
government coincide, we accept it as the natural state of 
things, and ask no question as to the cause. So far as they 
do not coincide, we mark the case as exceptional, by asking 
what is the cause. And by saying that a government and a 
nation should coincide we mean that, as far as possible, the 
boundaries of governments should be so laid out as to agree 
with the boundaries of nations. That is, we assume the na- 
tion as something already existing, something primary, to 



262 FREEMAN 

which the secondary arrangements of government should, as 
far as possible, conform. How then do we define the nation, 
which is, if there is no especial reason to the contrary, to 
fix the limits of a government? Primarily, I say, as a rule, 
but a rule subject to exception — as a prima facie standard, 
subject to special reasons to the contrary — we define the 
nation by language. We may at least apply the test nega- 
tively. It would be unsafe to rule that all speakers of the 
same language must have a common nationality ; but we may 
safely say that where there is not community of language, 
there is no common nationality in the highest sense. It is 
true that without community of language there may be an 
artificial nationality, a nationality which may be good for all 
political purposes, and which may engender a common na- 
tional feeling. Still this is not quite the same thing as that 
fuller national unity which is felt where there is community 
of language. In fact, mankind instinctively takes language 
as the badge of nationality. We so far take it as the 
badge, that we instinctively assume community of language 
in a nation as the rule, and we set down anything that de- 
parts from that rule as an exception. The first idea sug- 
gested by the word Frenchman or German or any other 
national name, is that he is a man who speaks French or 
German as his mother-tongue. We take for granted, in the 
absence of anything to make us think otherwise, that a 
Frenchman is a speaker of French, and that a speaker of 
French is a Frenchman. Where in any case it is other- 
wise, we mark that case as an exception, and we ask the 
special cause. Again, the rule is none the less the rule, 
nor the exceptions the exceptions, because the exceptions 
may easily outnumber the instances which conform to the 
rule. The rule is still the rule, because we take the in- 
stances which conform to it as a matter of course, while 
in every case which does not conform to it we ask for 
the explanation. All the larger countries of Europe pro- 
vide us with exceptions; but we treat them all as excep- 
tions. We do not ask why a native of France speaks French. 
But when a native of France speaks as his mother-tongue 
some other tongue than French, when French, or something 
which poguiaily passes for French, is spoken as his mother- 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 263 

tongue by someone who is not a native of France, we at 
once ask the reason. And the reason will be found in each 
case in some special historical cause which withdraws that 
case from the operation of the general law. A very good 
reason can be given why French, or something which popu- 
larly passes for French, is spoken in parts of Belgium and 
Switzerland, whose inhabitants are certainly not French- 
men. But the reason has to be given, and it may fairly be 
asked. 

In the like sort, if we turn to our own country, whenever 
within the bounds of Great Britain we find any tongue 
spoken other than English, we at once ask the reason, and 
we learn the special historic cause. In a part of France and 
a part of Great Britain we find tongues spoken which differ 
alike from English and from French, but which are strongly 
akin to one another. We find that these are the survivals 
of a group of tongues once common to Gaul and Britain, 
but which the settlement of other nations, the introduction 
and the growth of other tongues, have brought down to the 
level of survivals. So again we find islands which both 
speech and geographical position seem to mark as French, 
but which are dependencies, and loyal dependencies, of the 
English crown. We soon learn the cause of the phenomenon 
which seems so strange. Those islands are the remains of a 
State and a people which adopted the French tongue, but 
which, while it remained one, did not become a part of the 
French State. That people brought England by force of 
arms under the rule of their own sovereigns. The greater 
part of that people were afterward conquered by France, 
and gradually became French in feeling as well as in lan- 
guage. But a remnant clave to their connection with the 
land which their forefathers had conquered, and that rem- 
nant, while keeping the French tongue, never became French 
in feeling. This last case, that of the Norman islands, is 
a specially instructive one. Normandy and England were 
politically connected, while language and geography pointed 
rather to a union between Normandy and France. In the 
case of continental Normandy, where the geographical tie 
was strongest, language and geography together could carry 
the day, and the continental Norman became a Frenchman. 



264 FREEMAN 

In the islands, where the geographical tie was less strong, 
political traditions and manifest interest carried the day 
against language and a weaker geographical tie. The insu- 
lar Norman did not become a Frenchman. But neither did 
he become an Englishman. He alone remained Norman, 
keeping his own tongue and his own laws, but attached to 
the English crown by a tie at once of tradition and of ad- 
vantage. Between States of the relative size of England 
and the Norman islands, the relation naturally becomes a 
relation of dependence on the part of the smaller members 
of the union. But it is well to remember that our fore- 
fathers never conquered the forefathers of the men of the 
Norman islands, but that their forefathers did once con- 
quer ours. 

These instances, and countless others, bear out the posi- 
tion that, while community of language is the most obvious 
sign of common nationality, while it is the main element, or 
something more than an element, in the formation of na- 
tionality, the rule is open to exceptions of all kinds, and 
that the influence of language is at all times liable to be 
overruled by other influences. But all the exceptions con- 
firm the rule, because we specially remark those cases which 
contradict the rule, and we do not specially remark those 
cases which do not conform to it. 

In the cases which we have just spoken of, the growth of 
the nation as marked out by language, and the growth of the 
exceptions to the rule of language, have both come through 
the gradual, unconscious working of historical causes. 
Union under the same government, or separation under sep- 
arate governments, has been among the foremost of those 
historical causes. The French nation consists of the people 
of all that extent of continuous territory which has been 
brought under the rule of the French kings. But the work- 
ing of the cause has been gradual and unconscious. There 
was no moment when anyone deliberately proposed to form 
a French nation by joining together all the separate duchies 
and countries which spoke the French tongue. Since the 
French nation has been formed, men have proposed to annex 
this or that land on the ground that its people spoke the 
French tongue, or perhaps only some tongue akin to the 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 265 

French tongue. But the formation of the French nation 
itself was the work of historical causes, the work doubtless 
of a settled policy acting through many generations, but not 
the work of any conscious theory about races and languages. 
It is a special mark of our time, a special mark of the in- 
fluence which doctrines about race and language have had 
on men's minds, that we have seen great nations united by 
processes in which theories of race and language really have 
had much to do with bringing about their union. If states- 
men have not been themselves moved by such theories, they 
have at least found that it suited their purpose to make 
use of such theories as a means of working on the minds of 
others. In the reunion of the severed German and Italian 
nations the conscious feeling of nationality, and the accept- 
ance of a common language as the outward badge of 
nationality, had no small share. Poets sang of language as 
the badge of national union; statesmen made it the badge, 
so far as political considerations did not lead them to do 
anything else. The revivified kingdom of Italy is very far 
from taking in all the speakers of the Italian tongue. Lu- 
gano, Trent, Aquileia — to take places which are clearly 
Italian, and not to bring in places of more doubtful nation- 
ality, like the cities of Istria and Dalmatia — form no part 
of the Italian political body, and Corsica is not under the 
same rule as the other two great neighboring islands. But 
the fact that all these places do not belong to the Italian 
body at once suggests the twofold question, why they do not 
belong to it, and whether they ought not to belong to it. 
History easily answers the first question ; it may perhaps also 
answer the second question in a way which will say Yes 
as regards one place and No as regards another. Ticino 
must not lose her higher freedom; Trieste must remain the 
needful mouth for southern Germany; Dalmatia must not 
be cut off from the Slavonic mainland; Corsica would seem 
to have sacrificed national feeling to personal hero-worship. 
But it is certainly hard to see why Trent and Aquileia should 
be kept apart from the Italian body. On the other hand, 
the revivified Italian kingdom contains very little which is 
not Italian in speech. It is perhaps by a somewhat elastic 
view of language that the dialect of Piedmont and the dia- 



266 FREEMAN 

lect of Sicily are classed under one head; still, as a matter 
of fact, they have a single classical standard, and they are 
universally accepted as varieties of the same tongue. But 
it is only in a few Alpine valleys that languages are spoken 
which, whether Romance or Teutonic, are in any case not 
Italian. The reunion of Italy, in short, took in all that was 
Italian, save when some political cause hindered the rule of 
language from being followed. Of anything not Italian by 
speech so little has been taken in that the non-Italian parts 
of Italy, Burgundian Aosta and the Seven German Com- 
munes — if these last still keep their Teutonic language — fall 
under the rule that there are some things too small for laws 
to pay heed to. 

But it must not be forgotten that all this simply means 
that in the lands of which we have just been speaking the 
process of adoption has been carried out on the largest scale. 
Nations, with languages as their rough practical test, have 
been formed ; but they have been formed with very little re- 
gard to physical purity of blood. In short, throughout west- 
ern Europe assimilation has been the rule. That is to say, in 
any of the great divisions of Western Europe, though the 
land may have been settled and conquered over and over 
again, yet the mass of the people of the land have been 
drawn to some one national type. Either some one among 
the races inhabiting the land has taught the others to put on 
its likeness, or else a new national type has arisen which has 
elements drawn from several of those races. Thus the mod- 
ern Frenchman may be defined as produced by the union of 
blood which is mainly Celtic with a speech which is mainly 
Latin, and with an historical polity which is mainly Teutonic. 
That is, he is neither Gaul, Roman, nor Frank, but a fourth 
type, which has drawn important elements from all three. 
Within modern France this new national type has so far as- 
similated all others as to make everything else merely excep- 
tional. The Fleming of one corner, the Basque of another, 
even the far more important Breton of a third corner, have 
all in this way become mere exceptions to the general type of 
the country. If we pass into our own islands we shall find 
that the same process has been at work. If we look to Great 
Britain only, we shall find that, though the means have not 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 267 

been the same, yet the end has been gained hardly less thor- 
oughly than in France. For all real political purposes, for 
everything which concerns a nation in the face of other na- 
tions, Great Britain is as thoroughly united as France is. 
Englishmen, Scotchmen, Welshmen feel themselves one peo- 
ple in the general affairs of the world. A secession of 
Scotland or Wales is as unlikely as a secession of Normandy 
or Languedoc. The part of the island which is not thor- 
oughly assimilated in langauge, that part which still speaks 
Welsh or Gaelic, is larger in proportion than the non-French 
part of modern France. But however much either the 
northern or the western Briton may, in a fit of antiquarian 
politics, declaim against the Saxon, for all practical political 
purposes he and the Saxon are one. The distinction between 
the southern and the northern English — for the men of 
Lothian and Fife must allow me to call them by this last 
name — is, speaking politically and without ethnological or 
linguistic precision, much as if France and Aquitaine had 
been two kingdoms united on equal terms, instead of Aqui- 
taine being merged in France. When we cross into Ireland, 
we indeed find another state of things, and one which comes 
nearer to some of the phenomena which we shall come to in 
other parts of the world. Ireland is, most unhappily, not so 
firmly united to Great Britain as the different parts of 
Great Britain are to one another. Still even here the di- 
vision arises quite as much from geographical and his- 
torical causes as from distinctions of race strictly so called. 
If Ireland had had no wrongs, still two great islands can 
never be so thoroughly united a& a continuous territory can 
be. On the other hand, in point of language, the discon- 
tented part of the United Kingdom is much less strongly 
marked off than that fraction of the contented part which 
is not thoroughly assimilated. Irish is certainly not the lan- 
guage of Ireland in at all the same degree in which Welsh 
is the language of Wales. The Saxon has commonly to be 
denounced in the Saxon tongue. 

In some other parts of Western Europe, as in the Spanish 
and Scandinavian peninsulas, the coincidence of language 
and nationality is stronger than it is in France, Britain, or 
even Italy. No one speaks Spanish except in Spain or in 



268 FREEMAN 

the colonies of Spain. And within Spain the proportion of 
those who do not speak Spanish, namely the Basque rem- 
nant, is smaller than the non-assimilated element in Britain 
and France. Here two things are to be marked: First, the 
modern Spanish nation has been formed, like the French, by 
a great process of assimilation; secondly, the actual na- 
tional arrangements of the Spanish peninsula are wholly due 
to historical causes, we might almost say historical accidents, 
and those of very recent date. Spain and Portugal are 
separate kingdoms, and w r e look on their inhabitants as 
forming separate nations. But this is simply because a queen 
of Castile in the fifteenth century married a king of Aragon. 
Had Isabella married a king of Portugal we should now 
talk of Spain and Aragon as we now talk of Spain and 
Portugal, and we should count Portugal for part of Spain. 
In language, in history, in everything else, Aragon was 
really more distinct from Castile than Portugal was. The 
king of Castile was already spoken of as king of Spain, and 
Portugal would have merged in the Spanish kingdom at last 
as easily as Aragon did. In Scandinavia, on the other hand, 
there must have been less assimilation than anywhere else. 
In the present kingdoms of Norway and Sweden there must 
be a nearer approach to actual purity of blood than in any 
other part of Europe. One cannot fancy that much Finnish 
blood has been assimilated, and there have been no conquests 
or settlements later than that of the Northmen themselves. 

When we pass into central Europe we shall find a some- 
what different state of things. The distinctions of race seem 
to be more lasting. While the national unity of the German 
Empire is greater than that of either France or Great 
Britain, it has not only subjects of other languages, but 
actually, 'discontented subjects, in three corners, on its 
French, its Danish, and its Polish frontiers. We ask the 
reason, and it will be at once answered that the discontent 
of all three is the result of recent conquest, in two cases 
of very recent conquest indeed. But this is one o4 the very 
points to be marked; the strong national unity of the Ger- 
man Empire has been largely the result of assimilation; 
and these three parts, where recent conquest has not yet 
been followed by assimilation, are chiefly important because 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 269 

in all three cases, the discontented territory is geographi- 
cally continuous with a territory of its own speech outside 
the Empire. This does not prove that assimilation can never 
take place, but it will undoubtedly make the process longer 
and harder. 

So again, wherever German-speaking people dwell outside 
the bounds of the revived German State, as well as when 
that revived German State contains other than German- 
speaking people, we ask the reason and we can find it. 
Political reasons forbade the immediate annexation of 
Austria, Tyrol, and Salzburg. Combined political and 
geographical reasons, and, if we look a little deeper, ethno- 
logical reasons too, forbade the annexation of Courland, 
Livonia, and Esthonia. Some reason or other will, it may 
be hoped, always be found to hinder the annexation of 
lands which, like Zurich and Berne, have reached a higher 
political level. Outlying brethren in Transsilvania or at 
Saratof again come under the rule " ' De minimis non curat 
lex" In all these cases the rule that nationality and lan- 
guage should go together yields to unavoidable circum- 
stances. But, on the other hand, where French or Danish 
or Slavonic or Lithuanian is spoken within the bounds of 
the new empire, the principle that language is the badge of 
nationality, that without community of language nationality 
is imperfect, shows itself in another shape. One main object 
of modern policy is to bring these exceptional districts 
under the general rule by spreading the German language 
in them. Everywhere, in short, wherever a power is sup- 
posed to be founded on nationality, the common feeling of 
mankind instinctively takes language as the test of nation- 
ality. We assume language as the test of a nation, without 
going into any minute questions as to the physical purity o£ 
blood in that nation. A continuous territory, living under 
the same government and speaking the same tongue, forms 
a nation for all practical purposes. If some of its inhabi- 
tants do not belong to the original stock of blood, they at 
least belong to it by adoption. 

The question may now fairly be asked, What is the case 
in those parte of the world where people who are confess- 
edly of different races and languages inhabit a continuous 



270 FREEMAN 

territory and live under the same government? How do 
we define nationality in such cases as these? The answer 
will be very different in different cases, according to the 
means by which the different national elements in such a 
territory have been brought together. They may form 
what I have already called an artificial nation, united by 
an act of its own free will. Or it may be simply a case 
where distinct nations, distinct in everything which can be 
looked on as forming a nation, except the possession of an 
independent government, are brought together, by whatever 
causes, under a common ruler. The former case is very 
distinctly an exception which proves the rule, and the latter 
is, though in quite another way, an exception which proves 
the rule also. Both cases may need somewhat more in the 
way of definition. We will begin with the first, the case 
of a nation which has been formed out of elements which 
differ in language, but which still have been brought 
together so as to form an artificial nation. In the growth 
of the chief nations of western Europe the principle which 
was consciously or unconsciously followed has been that the 
nation should be marked out by language, and the use of 
any tongue other than the dominant tongue of the nation 
should be at least exceptional. But there is one nation in 
Europe, one which has a full right to be called a nation in 
a political sense, which has been formed on the directly 
opposite principle. The Swiss Confederation has been 
formed by the union of certain dertached fragments of the 
German, Italian, and Burgundian nations. It may indeed be 
said that the process has been in some sort a process of 
adoption, that the Italian and Burgundian elements have 
been incorporated into an already existing German body; 
that, as those elements were once subjects or dependents 
or protected allies, the case is one of clients or freedmen 
who have been admitted to the full privileges of the gens. 
This is undoubtedly true, and it is equally true of a large 
part of the German element itself. Throughout the Con- 
federation allies and subjects have been raised to the rank of 
confederates. But the former position of the component 
elements does not matter for our purpose. As a matter of 
fact, the foreign dependencies have all been admitted into 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 271 

the Confederation on equal terms. German is undoubtedly 
the language of a great majority of the Confederation; but 
the two recognized Romance languages are each the speech, 
not of a mere fragment or survival, like Welsh in Britain 
or Breton in France, but of a large minority forming a 
visible element in the general body. The three languages 
are all of them alike recognized as national languages, 
though, as if to keep up the universal rule that there should 
be some exceptions to all rules, a fourth language still lives 
on within the bounds of the Confederation, which is not 
admitted to the rights of the other three, but is left in the 
state of a fragment or a survival. 3 Is such an artificial 
body as this to be called a nation ? It is plainly not a nation 
by blood or by speech. It can hardly be called a nation by 
adoption. For, if we chose to say that the three elements 
have all agreed to adopt one another as brethren, yet it has 
been adoption without assimilation. Yet surely the Swiss 
Confederation is a nation. It is not a mere power, in which 
various nations are brought together, whether willingly, or 
unwillingly, under a common ruler, but without any further 
tie of union. For all political purposes the Swiss Confed- 
eration is a nation, a nation capable of as strong and true 
national feeling as any other nation. Yet it is a nation 
purely artificial, one in no way defined by blood or speech. 
It thus proves the rule in two ways. We at once feel that 
this artificially formed nation, which has no common lan- 
guage, but each of whose elements speaks a language com- 
mon to itself with some other nation, is something different 
from those nations which are defined by a universal or at 
least a predominant language. We mark it as an exception, 
as something different from other cases. And when we see 
how nearly this artificial nation comes, in every point but 
that of language, to the likeness of those nations which are 
defined by language, we see that it is a nation defined by 
language which sets the standard, and after the model of 

8 While the Swiss Confederation recognizes German, French, and Italian 
as all alike national languages, the independent Romance language, which 
is still used in some parts of the Canton of Graubiinden, that which is 
known specially as Romansch, is not recognized. It is left in the same 
position in which Welsh and Gaelic are left in Great Britain, in which 
Basque, Breton, Provencal, Walloon, and Flemish are left within the bor- 
ders of that French kingdom which has grown so as to take them all in. 



272 FREEMAN 

which the artificial nation forms itself. The case of the 
Swiss Confederation and its claim to rank as a nation would 
be like the case of those gentes, if any such there were, 
which did not spring even from the expansion of an original 
family, but which were artificially formed in imitation of 
those which did, and which, instead of a real or traditional 
forefather, chose for themselves an adopted one. 

In the Swiss Confederation, then, we have a case of a 
nation formed by an artificial process, but which still is 
undoubtedly a nation in the face of other nations. We now 
come to the other class, in which nationality and language 
keep the connection which they have elsewhere, but in which 
nations do not even in the roughest way answer to govern- 
ments. We have only to go into the Eastern lands of 
Europe to find a state of things in which the notion of 
nationality, as marked out by language and national feeling, 
has altogether parted company from the notion of political 
government. It must be remembered that this state of things 
is not confined to the nations which are or have lately been 
under the yoke of the Turk. It extends also to the nations 
or fragments of nations which make up the Austro-Hunga- 
rian monarchy. In all the lands held by these two powers 
we come across phenomena of geography, race, and lan- 
guage, which stand out in marked contrast with anything to 
which we are used in western Europe. We may perhaps 
better understand what these phenomena are if we suppose 
a state of things which sounds absurd in the West, but 
which has its exact parallel in many parts of the East. Let 
us suppose that in a journey through England we came suc- 
cessively to districts, towns, or villages, where we found, one 
after another, first, Britons speaking Welsh ; then Romans 
speaking Latin ; then Saxons or Angles, speaking an older 
form of our own tongue ; then Scandinavians speaking Dan- 
ish; then Normans speaking Old-French; lastly, perhaps a 
settlement of Flemings, Huguenots, or Palatines, still remain- 
ing a distinct people and speaking their own tongue. Or let 
us suppose a journey through northern France, in which we 
found at different stages, the original Gaul, the Roman, the 
Frank, the Saxon of Bayeux, the Dane of Coutances, each 
remaining a distinct people, each of them keeping the tongue 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 273 

which they first brought with them into the land. Let us 
suppose further that, in many of these cases, a religious dis- 
tinction was added to a national distinction. Let us conceive 
one village Roman Catholic, another Anglican, others Non- 
conformist of various types, even if we do not call up any 
remnants of the worshippers of Jupiter or of Woden. All 
this seems absurd in any Western country, and absurd 
enough it is. But the absurdity of the West is the living 
reality of the East. There we may still find all the chief 
races which have ever occupied the country, still remaining 
distinct, still keeping separate tongues, and those for the 
most part, their own original tongues. Within the present 
and late European dominions of the Turk, the original races, 
those whom we find there at the first beginnings of history, 
are all there still, and two of them keep their original 
tongues. They form three distinct nations. First of all there 
are the Greeks. We have not here to deal with them as the 
representatives of. that branch of the Roman Empire which 
adopted their speech, but simply as one of the original ele- 
ments in the population of the Eastern peninsula. Known 
almost down to our own day by their historical name of 
Romans, they have now fallen back on the name of Hellenes. 
And to that name they have a perfectly good claim. If the 
modern Greeks are not all true Hellenes, they are an aggre- 
gate of adopted Hellenes gathered round and assimilated to 
a true Hellenic kernel. Here we see the oldest recorded 
inhabitants of a large part of the land abiding, and abiding 
in a very different case from the remnants of the Celt and 
the Iberian in Western Europe. The Greeks are no survival 
of a nation; they are a true and living nation — a nation 
whose importance is quite out of proportion to its extent in 
mere numbers. They still abide, the predominant race in 
their own ancient and again independent land, the predomi- 
nant race in those provinces of the continental Turkish 
dominion which formed part of their ancient land, the 
predominant race through all the shores and islands of the 
iEgsean and of part of the Euxine also. In near neighborhood 
to the Greeks still live another race of equal antiquity, the 
Skipetar or Albanians. These, as I believe is no longer 
doubted, represent the ancient Illyrians. The exact degree 



274 FREEMAN 

of their ethnical kindred with the Greeks is a scientific 
question which need not here be considered; but the facts 
that they are more largely intermingled with the Greeks 
than any of the other neighboring nations, that they show 
a special power of identifying themselves with the Greeks — 
a power, so to speak, of becoming Greeks and making part 
of the artificial Greek nation, are matters of practical his- 
tory. It must never be forgotten that, among the worthies 
of the Greek War of Independence, some of the noblest were 
not of Hellenic but Albanian blood. The Orthodox Albanian 
easily turns into a Greek; and the Mahometan Albanian is 
something which is broadly distinguished from a Turk. He 
has, as he well may have, a strong national feeling, and that 
national feeling has sometimes got the better of religious 
divisions. If Albania is among the most backward parts of 
the peninsula, still it is, by all accounts, the part where there 
is most hope of men of different religions joining together 
against the common enemy. 

Here then are two ancient races, the Greeks and another 
race, not indeed so advanced, so important, or so widely 
spread, but a race which equally keeps a real national being. 
There is also a third ancient race which survives as a distinct 
people, though they have for ages adopted a foreign lan- 
guage. These are the Vlachs or Roumans, the surviving 
representatives of the great race, call it Thracian or any 
other, which at the beginning of history held the great inland 
mass of the Eastern peninsula, with the Illyrians to the west 
of them and the Greeks to the south. Every one knows that 
in the modern principality of Roumania and in the adjoining 
parts of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, there is to be seen 
that phenomenon so unique in the East, a people who not 
only, as the Greeks did till lately, still keep the Roman name, 
but who speak neither Greek nor Turkish, neither Slave nor 
Skipetar, but a dialect of Latin, a tongue akin, not to the 
tongues of any of their neighbors, but to the tongues of Gaul, 
Italy, and Spain. And any one who has given any real atten- 
tion to this matter knows that the same race is to be found, 
scattered here and there, if in some parts only as wandering 
shepherds, in the Slavonic, Albanian, and Greek lands south 
of the Danube. The assumption has commonly been that 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 275 

this outlying Romance people owe their Romance character 
to the Roman colonization of Dacia under Trajan. In this 
view, the modern Roumans would be the descendants of 
Trajan's colonists and of Dacians who had learned of them 
to adopt the speech and manners of Rome. But when we 
remember that Dacia was the first Roman province to be 
given up — that the modern Roumania was for ages the high- 
way of every barbarian tribe on its way from the East to the 
West — that the land has been conquered and settled and 
forsaken over and over again — it would be passing strange 
if this should be the one land, and its people the one race, to 
keep the Latin tongue when it has been forgotten in all the 
neighboring countries. In fact, this idea has been completely 
dispersed by modern research. The establishment of the 
Roumans in Dacia is of comparatively recent date, beginning 
only in the thirteenth century. The Roumans of Wallachia, 
Moldavia, and Transsilvania, are isolated from the scattered 
Rouman remnant on Pindos and elsewhere. They represent 
that part of the inhabitants of the peninsula which became 
Latin, while the Greeks remained Greek, and the Illyrians 
remained barbarian. Their lands, Moesia, Thrace specially 
so called, and Dacia, were added to the empire at various 
times from Augustus to Trajan. That they should gradually 
adopt the Latin language is in no sort wonderful. Their posi- 
tion with regard to Rome was exactly the same as that of 
Gaul and Spain. Where Greek civilization had been firmly 
established, Latin could nowhere displace it. Where Greek 
civilization was unknown, Latin overcame the barbarian 
tongue. It would naturally do so in this part of the East 
exactly as it did in the West. 4 

Here then we have in the southeastern peninsula three 
nations which have all lived on to all appearances from the 
very beginnings of European history, three distinct na- 
tions, speaking three distinct languages. We have nothing 
answering to this in the West. It needs no proof that the 
speakers of Celtic and Basque in Gaul and in Spain do not 
hold the same position in western Europe which the Greeks, 
Albanians, and Roumans do in eastern Europe. In the 

4 On Rouman history I have followed Roesler's " Romanische Studien r 
and Jirecek's " Geschichte der Bulgaren." 



276 FREEMAN 

East the most ancient inhabitants of the land are still there, 
not as scraps or survivals, not as fragments of nations 
lingering on in corners, but as nations in the strictest sense, 
nations whose national being forms an element in every 
modern and political question. They all have their memories, 
their grievances, and their hopes; and their memories, their 
grievances, and their hopes are all of a practical and political 
kind. Highlanders, Welshmen, Bretons, French Basques, 
whatever we say of the Spanish brethren, have doubt- 
less memories, but they have hardly political grievances or 
hopes. Ireland may have political grievances; it certainly 
has political hopes; but they are not exactly of the same 
kind as the grievances or hopes of the Greek, the Albanian, 
and the Rouman. Let Home Rule succeed to the extent of 
setting up an independent king and parliament of Ireland, 
yet the language and civilization of that king and parliament 
would still be English. Ireland would form an English State, 
politically hostile, it may be, to Great Britain, but still an 
English State. No Greek, Albanian or Rouman State 
would be in the same way either Turkish or Austrian. 

On these primitive and abiding races came, as on other 
parts of Europe, the Roman conquest. That conquest planted 
Latin colonies on the Dalmatian coast, where the Latin 
tongue still remains in its Italian variety as the speech of 
literature and city life; it Romanized one great part of the 
earlier inhabitants: it had the great political effect of all, 
that of planting the Roman power in a Greek city, and 
thereby creating a State, and in the end a nation, which was 
Roman on one side, and Greek on the other. Then came the 
wandering of the nations, on which, as regards men of our 
own race, we need not dwell. The Goths marched at will 
through the Eastern Empire ; but no Teutonic settlement was 
ever made within its bounds, no lasting Teutonic settlement 
was ever made even on its border. The part of the Teuton 
in the West was played, far less perfectly indeed, by the 
Slave in the East. He is there what the Teuton is here, the 
great representative of what we may call the modern Euro- 
pean races, those whose part in history began after the 
establishment of the Rouman power. The differences be- 
tween the position of the two races are chiefly these. The 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 277 

Slave in the East has pre-Roman races standing alongside of 
him in a way in which the Teuton has not in the West. On 
the Greeks and Albanians he has had but little influence; on 
the Rouman and his language his influence has been far 
greater, but hardly so great as the influence of the Teuton 
on the Romance nations and languages of western Europe. 
The Slave too stands alongside of races which have come in 
since his own coming, in a way in which the Teuton in the 
West is still further from doing. That is to say, besides 
Greeks, Albanians, and Roumans, he stands alongside of 
Bulgarians, Magyars, and Turks, who have nothing to 
answer to them in the West. The Slave, in the time of his 
coming, in the nature of his settlement, answers roughly to 
the Teuton ; his position is what that of the Teuton would be 
if western Europe had been brought under the power of an 
alien race at some time later than his own settlement. The 
Slaves undoubtedly form the greatest element in the popula- 
tion of the Eastern peninsula, and they once reached more 
widely still. Taking the Slavonic name in its widest mean- 
ing, they occupy all the lands from the Danube and its great 
tributaries southward to the strictly Greek border. The 
exceptions are where earlier races remain, Greek or Italian 
on the coast-line, Albanian in the mountains. The Slaves 
hold the heart of the peninsula, and they hold more than the 
peninsula itself. The Slave lives equally on both sides of 
what is or was the frontier of the Austrian and Ottoman 
empires; indeed, but for another set of causes which have 
affected eastern Europe, the Slave might have reached unin- 
terruptedly from the Baltic to the iEgaean. 

This last set of causes are those which specially distin- 
guish the histories of eastern and of western Europe ; a set of 
causes which, though exactly twelve hundred years old, 5 are 
still fresh and living, and which are the special causes which 
have aggravated the special difficulties of the last five hun- 
dred years. In Western Europe, though we have had plenty 
of political conquests, we have had no national migrations 
since the days of the Teutonic settlements — at least, if we 
may extend these last so as to take in the Scandinavian set- 

5 It should be remembered that, as the year 1879 saw the beginning of the 
liberated Bulgarian State, the year 679 saw the beginning of the first Bul- 
garian kingdom south of the Danube. 



278 FREEMAN 

tlements in Britain and Gaul. The Teuton has pressed to 
the East at the expense of the Slave and the Old-Prussian: 
the borders between the Romance and the Teutonic nations 
in the West have fluctuated; but no third set of nations has 
come in, strange alike to the Roman and the Teuton and to 
the whole Aryan family. As the Huns of Attila showed 
themselves in western Europe as passing ravagers, so did the 
Magyars at a later day; so did the Ottoman Turks in a day 
later still, when they besieged Vienna and laid waste the 
Venetian mainland. But all these Turanian invaders 
appeared in western Europe simply as passing invaders; in 
eastern Europe their part has been widely different. Besides 
the temporary dominion of Avars, Patzinaks, Chazars, 
Cumans, and a crowd of others, three bodies of more abid- 
ing settlers, the Bulgarians, the Magyars, and the Mongol 
conquerors of Russia, have come in by one path; a fourth, 
the Ottoman Turks, have come in by another path. Among 
all these invasions we have one case of thorough assimila- 
tion, and only one. The original Finnish Bulgarians have, 
like Western conquerors, been lost among Slavonic subjects 
and neighbors. The geographical function of the Magyar 
has been to keep the two great groups of Slavonic nations 
apart. To his coming, more than to any other cause, we 
may attribute the great historical gap which separates the 
Slave of the Baltic from his southern kinsfolk. The work 
of the Ottoman Turk we all know. These latter settlers re- 
main alongside of the Slave, just as the Slave remains along- 
side of the earlier settlers. The Slavonized Bulgarians are 
the only instance of assimilation such as we are used to in 
the West. All the other races, old and new, from the Alba- 
nian to the Ottoman, are still there, each keeping its national 
being and its national speech. And in one part of the ancient 
Dacia we must add quite a distinct element, the element of 
Teutonic occupation in a form unlike any in which we see 
it in the West, in the shape of the Saxons of Transsilvania. 
We have thus worked out our point in detail. While in 
each Western country some one of the various races which 
have settled in it has, speaking roughly, assimilated the 
others, in the lands which are left under the rule of the 
Turk, or which have been lately delivered from his rule, all 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 279 

the races that have ever settled in the country still abide side 
by side. So when we pass into the lands which form the 
Austro-Hungarian monarchy, we find that that composite 
dominion is just as much opposed as the dominion of the 
Turk is to those ideas of nationality towards which Western 
Europe has been long feeling its way. We have seen by the 
example of Switzerland that it is possible to make an arti- 
ficial nation out of fragments which have split off from three 
several nations. But the Austro-Hungarian monarchy is not 
a nation, not even an artificial nation of this kind. Its ele- 
ments are not bound together in the same way as the three 
elements of the Swiss Confederation. It does indeed contain 
one whole nation in the form of the Magyars ; we might say 
that it contains two, if we reckon the Czechs for a distinct 
nation. Of its other elements, we may for the moment set 
aside those parts of Germany which are so strangely united 
with the crowns of Hungary and Dalmatia. In those parts 
of the monarchy which come/ within the more strictly East- 
ern lands — the Roman and the Rouman — we may so distin- 
guish the Romance-speaking inhabitants of Dalmatia and 
the Romance-speaking inhabitants of Transsilvania. The 
Slave of the north and of the south, the Magyar conqueror, 
the Saxon immigrant, all abide as distinct races. That the 
Ottoman is not to be added to our list in Hungary, while he 
is to be added in lands farther south, is simply because he has 
been driven out of Hungary, while he is allowed to abide in 
lands farther south. No point is more important to insist 
on now than the fact that the Ottoman once held the greater 
part of Hungary by exactly the same right, the right of the 
strongest, as that by which he still holds Macedonia and 
Epeiros. It is simply the result of a century of warfare, 
from Sobieski to Joseph II, which fixed the boundary which 
only yesterday seemed eternal to diplomatists, but which now 
seems to have vanished. The boundary has advanced and 
gone back over and over again. As Buda once was Turkish, 
Belgrade has more than once been Austrian. The whole of 
the southeastern lands, Austrian, Turkish, and independent, 
from the Carpathian Mountains southward, present the 
same characteristic of permanence and distinctness among 
the several races which occupy them. The several races may 



280 FREEMAN 

lie, here in large continuous masses, there in small detached 
settlements; but there they all are in their distinctness. 
There is among them plenty of living and active national 
feeling; but while in the West political arrangements for the 
most part follow the great lines of national feeling, in the 
East the only way in which national feeling can show itself 
is by protesting, whether in arms or otherwise, against exist- 
ing political arrangements. Save the Magyars alone, the 
ruling race in the Hungarian kingdom, there is no case in 
those lands in which the whole continuous territory inhab- 
ited by speakers of the same tongue is placed under a sep- 
arate national government of its own. And, even in this 
case, the identity between nation and government is imper- 
fect in two ways. It is imperfect, because, after all, though 
Hungary has a separate national government in internal 
matters, yet it is not the Hungarian kingdom, but the Aus- 
tro-Hungarian monarchy of which it forms a part, which 
counts as a power among the other powers of Europe. And 
the national character of the Hungarian government is 
equally imperfect from the other side. It is national as 
regards the Magyar; it is not national as regards the Slave, 
the Saxon, and the Rouman. Since the liberation of part 
of Bulgaria, no whole European nation is under the rule of 
the Turk. No one nation of the southeast peninsula forms a 
single national government. One fragment of a nation is 
free under a national government, another fragment is ruled 
by civilized strangers, a third is trampled down by barba- 
rians. The existing States of Greece, Roumania, and Servia 
are far from taking in the whole of the Greek, Rouman, and 
Servian nations. In all these lands, Austrian, Turkish, and 
independent, there is no difficulty in marking off the several 
nations; only in no case do the nations answer to any 
existing political power. 

In all these cases, where nationality and government are 
altogether divorced, language becomes yet more distinctly 
the test of nationality than it is in Western lands where 
nationality and government do to some extent coincide. 
And when nationality and language do not coincide in the 
East, it is owing to another cause, of which also we know 
nothing in the West. In many cases religion takes the place 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 281 

of nationality; or rather the ideas of religion and nationality 
can hardly be distinguished. In the West a man's nationality 
is in no way affected by the religion which he professes, or 
even by his change from one religion to another. In the 
East it is otherwise. The Christian renegade who embraces 
Islam becomes for most practical purposes a Turk. Even 
if, as in Crete and Bosnia, he keeps his Greek or Slavonic 
language, he remains Greek or Slave only in a secondary 
sense. For the first principle of the Mahometan religion, the 
lordship of the true believer over the infidel, cuts off the 
possibility of any true national fellowship between the true 
believer and the infidel. Even the Greek or Armenian who 
embraces the Latin creed goes far toward parting with his 
nationality as well as with his religion. For the adoption of 
the Latin creed implies what is in some sort the adoption 
of a new allegiance, the accepting of the authority of the 
Roman bishop. In the Armenian indeed we are come very 
near to the phenomena of the further East, where names 
like Parsee and Hindoo, names in themselves as strictly 
ethnical as Englishman or Frenchman, have come to express 
distinctions in which religion and nationality are absolutely 
the same thing. Of this whole class of phenomena the Jew 
is of course the crowning example. But we speak of these 
matters here only as bringing in an element in the definition 
of nationality to which we are unused in the West. But it 
quite comes within our present subject to give one definition 
from the southeastern lands. What is the Greek? Clearly 
he who is at once a Greek in speech and Orthodox in faith. 
The Hellenic Mussulmans in Crete, even the Hellenic Latins 
in some of the other islands, are at the most imperfect mem- 
bers of the Hellenic body. The utmost that can be said is 
that they keep the power of again entering that body, either 
by their own return to the national faith, or by such a 
change in the state of things as shall make difference in 
religion no longer inconsistent with true national fellowship. 

Thus, wherever we go, we find language to be the rough 
practical test of nationality. The exceptions are many ; they 
may perhaps outnumber the instances which conform to the 
rule. Still they are exceptions. Community of language 



282 FREEMAN 

does not imply community of blood; it might be added that 
diversity of language does not imply diversity of blood. But 
community of language is, in the absence of any evidence to 
the contrary, a presumption of the community of blood, and 
it is proof of something which for practical purposes is the 
same as community of blood. To talk of " the Latin race" 
is in strictness absurd. We know that the so-called race is 
simply made up of those nations which adopted the Latin 
language. The Celtic, Teutonic, and Slavonic races may con- 
ceivably have been formed by a like artificial process. But 
the presumption is the other way; and if such a process ever 
took place, it took place long before history began. The 
Celtic, Teutonic, and Slavonic races come before us as 
groups of mankind marked out by the test of language. 
Within those races separate nations are again marked out 
by a stricter application of the test of language. Within 
the race we may have languages which are clearly akin to 
each other, but which need not be mutually intelligible. 
Within the nation we have only dialects which are mutually 
intelligible, or which, at all events, gather round some one 
central dialect which is intelligible to all. We take this stand- 
ard of races and nations, fully aware that it will not stand a 
physiological test, but holding that for all practical purposes 
adoption must pass as equivalent to natural descent. And, 
among the practical purposes which are affected by the facts 
of race and nationality, w r e must, as long as a man is what 
he is, as long as he has not been created afresh according 
to some new scientific pattern, not shrink from reckoning 
those generous emotions which, in the present state of 
European feeling, are beginning to bind together the greater 
as well as the lesser groups of mankind. The sympathies of 
men are beginning to reach wider than could have been 
dreamed of a century ago. The feeling which was once 
confined to the mere household extended itself to the tribe 
or city. From the tribe or city it extended itself to the 
nation ; from the nation it is beginning to extend itself to the 
whole race. In some cases it can extend itself to the whole 
race far more easily than in others. In some cases historical 
causes have made nations of the same race bitter enemies, 
while they have made nations of different races friendly 



RACE AND LANGUAGE 283 

allies. The same thing happened in earlier days between 
tribes and cities of the same nation. But, when hindrances 
of this kind do not exist, the feeling of race, as something 
beyond the narrower feeling of nationality, is beginning 
to be a powerful agent in the feelings and actions of men 
and of nations. A long series of mutual wrongs, conquest, 
and oppression on one side, avenged by conquest and oppres- 
sion on the other side, have made the Slave of Poland and the 
Slave of Russia the bitterest of enemies. No such hindrance 
exists to stop the flow of natural and generous feeling 
between the Slave of Russia and the Slave of the southeastern 
lands. Those whose statesmanship consists in some hand-to- 
mouth shift for the moment, whose wisdom consists in refus- 
ing to look either back to the past or onward to the future, 
cannot understand this great fact of our times; and what 
they cannot understand they mock at. But the fact exists, 
and does its work in spite of them. And it does its work 
none the less because in some cases the feeling of sympathy 
is awakened by a claim of kindred, where, in the sense of 
the physiologist or the genealogist, there is no kindred at all. 
The practical view, historical or political, will accept as 
members of this or that race or nation many members whom 
the physiologist would shut out, whom the English lawyer 
would shut out, but whom the Roman lawyer would gladly 
welcome to every privilege of the stock on which they were 
grafted. The line of the Scipios, of the Caesars, and of the 
Antonines was continued by adoption; and for all practical 
purposes the nations of the earth have agreed to follow the 
examples set them by their masters. 



TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 
SAMUEL PEPYS 

BY 

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (1850-94), novelist, essay- 
ist, and poet, vuas descended from a famous family of lighthouse 
builders. He was born at Edinburgh, Scotland, and was intended 
for the ancestral profession of engineer. Abandoning this, he 
tried law with no better success, and finally devoted himself to 
his destined vocation of letters. 

Stevenson began his career with the writing of essays, then 
issued two charming volumes of humorous and contemplative 
travel, "An Inland Voyage" and "Travels with a Donkey in the 
Cevennes"; then collected in his "New Arabian Nights" a num- 
ber of fanciful short stories he had been publishing in a maga- 
zine. In 1883 he first caught the attention of the larger public 
with "Treasure Island" one of the best, and probably the best 
written, boys' story in the language. His most sensational suc- 
cess was "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" ; but 
a much higher literary quality appears in such novels as "The 
Master of Ballantrae," "Kidnapped," and "Catriona," in which 
he to some extent follows the tradition of Scott, with far greater 
finish of style, but without Scott's fine spontaneity and uncon- 
sciousness. He published also three small volumes of verse, 
some of it of great charm and delicacy. 

Stevenson was essentially an artist in words. The modern 
desire for subtlety of cadence and for the rendering of fine 
shades of expression is seen in a high degree in all he wrote, 
and his work has the merits and defects that accompany this 
extreme preoccupation with style. But he had also great virtues 
of matter. He was a superb story-teller, an acute and sensitive 
critic, a genial and whole-hearted lover of life. In the essay on 
"Truth of Intercourse" will be found an example of his gracious 
and tactful moralizing ; in "Samuel Pepys," a penetrating inter- 
pretation of one of the most amazing pieces of self-revelation in 
the annals of literature. 



286 



TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 



AMONG sayings that have a currency in spite of 
l\ being wholly false upon the face of them for the sake 
-*--*-■ of a half-truth upon another subject which is acci- 
dentally combined with error, one of the grossest and 
broadest conveys the monstrous proposition that it is easy 
to tell the truth and hard to tell a lie. I wish heartily it 
were. But the truth is one; it has first to be discovered, 
then justly and exactly uttered. Even with instruments 
specially contrived for such a purpose — with a foot rule, a 
level, or a theodolite — it is not easy to be exact; it is easier, 
alas ! to be inexact. From those who mark # the divisions 
on a scale to those who measure the boundaries of empires 
or the distance of the heavenly stars, it is by careful method 
and minute, unwearying attention that men rise even to 
material exactness or to sure knowledge even of external 
and constant things. But it is easier to draw the outline of 
a mountain than the changing appearance of a face; and 
truth in human relations is of this more intangible and 
dubious order: hard to seize, harder to communicate. Ve- 
racity to facts in a loose, colloquial sense — not to say that 
I have been in Malabar when as a matter of fact I was 
never out of England, not to say that I have read Cervantes 
in the original when as a matter of fact I know not one 
syllable of Spanish — this, indeed, is easy and to the same 
degree unimportant in itself. Lies of this sort, according 
to circumstances, may or may not be important; in a cer- 
tain sense even they may or may not be false. The habitual 
liar may be a very honest fellow, and live truly with his wife 
and friends; while another man who never told a formal 
falsehood in his life may yet be himself one lie — heart and 
face, from top to bottom. This is the kind of lie which 
poisons intimacy. And, vice versa, veracity to sentiment, 

287 



288 STEVENSON 

truth in a relation, truth to your own heart and your friends, 
never to feign or falsify emotion — that is the truth which 
makes love possible and mankind happy. 

L'art de bien dire is but a drawing-room accomplishment 
unless it be pressed into the service of the truth. The diffi- 
culty of literature is not to write, but to write what you 
mean; not to affect your reader, but to affect him pre- 
cisely as you wish. This is commonly understood in the 
case of books or set orations; even in making your will, 
or writing an explicit letter, some difficulty is admitted by 
the world. But one thing you can never make Philistine 
natures understand; one thing, which yet lies on the surface, 
remains as unseizable to their wits as a high flight of meta- 
physics — namely, that the business of life is mainly carried 
on by means of this difficult art of literature, and according 
to a man's proficiency in that art shall be the freedom and 
the fulness of his intercourse with other men. Anybody, it is 
supposed, can say what he means; and, in spite of their 
notorious experience to the contrary, people so continue to 
suppose. Now, I simply open the last book I have been 
reading — Mr. Leland's captivating English Gipsies. " It is 
said," I find on p. 7, " that those who can converse with Irish 
peasants in their own native tongue form far higher opin- 
ions of their appreciation of the beautiful, and of the ele- 
ments of humour and pathos in their hearts, than to those 
who know their thoughts only through the medium of 
English. I know from my own observations that this is 
quite the case with the Indians of North America, and it 
is unquestionably so with the gipsy." In short, where a man 
has not a full possession of the language, the most impor- 
tant, because the most amiable, qualities of his nature have 
to lie buried and fallow; for the pleasure of comradeship, 
and the intellectual part of love, rest upon these very 
" elements of humour and pathos." Here is a man opulent in 
both, and for lack of a medium he can put none of it out 
to interest in the market of affection ! But what is thus 
made plain to our apprehensions in the case of a foreign 
language is partially true even with the tongue we learned in 
childhood. Indeed, we all speak different dialects ; one shall 
be copious and exact, another loose and meagre; but the 



TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 289 

speech of the ideal talker shall correspond and fit upon 
the truth of fact — not clumsily, obscuring lineaments, like 
a mantle, but cleanly adhering, like an athlete's skin. And 
what is the result? That the one can open himself more 
clearly to his friends, and can enjoy more of what makes 
life truly valuable — intimacy v/ith those he loves. An orator 
makes a false step; he employs some trivial, some absurd, 
some vulgar phrase; in the turn of a sentence he insults 
by a side wind, those whom he is labouring to charm; in 
speaking to one sentiment he unconsciously ruffles another 
in parenthesis; and you are not surprised, for you know his 
task to be delicate and filled with perils. " O frivolous 
mind of man, light ignorance ! " As if yourself, when you 
seek to explain some misunderstanding or excuse some ap- 
parent fault, speaking swiftly and addressing a mind still 
recently incensed, were not harnessing for a more perilous 
adventure; as if yourself required less tact and eloquence; as 
if an angry friend or a suspicious lover were not more easy 
to offend than a meeting of indifferent politicians ! Nay, 
and the orator treads in a beaten round ; the matters he dis- 
cusses have been discussed a thousand times before; lan- 
guage is ready-shaped to his purpose; he speaks out of a 
cut and dry vocabulary. But you — may it not be that your 
defence reposes on some subtlety of feeling, not so much as 
touched upon in Shakespeare, to express which, like a 
pioneer, you must venture forth into zones of thought still 
unsurveyed, and become yourself a literary innovator? For 
even in love there are unlovely humours; ambiguous acts, 
unpardonable words, may yet have sprung from a kind sen- 
timent. If the injured one could read your heart, you may 
be sure that he would understand and pardon ; but, alas ! 
the heart cannot be shown — it has to be demonstrated in 
words. Do you think it is a hard thing to write poetry? 
Why, that is to write poetry, and of a high, if not the high- 
est, order. 

I should even more admire "the lifelong and heroic lit* 
erary labours " of my fellow-men, patiently clearing up fir 
words their loves and their contentions, and speaking their 
autobiography daily to their wives, were it not for a cir- 
cumstance which lessens their difficulty and my admiration 

Vol. 28— J He 



■..-■>;. 



290 STEVENSON 

by equal parts. For life, though largely, is not entirely car- 
ried on by literature. We are subject to physical passions 
and contortions; the voice breaks and changes, and speaks 
by unconscious and winning inflections; we have legible 
countenances, like an open book; things that cannot be said 
look eloquently through the eye; and the soul, not locked 
into the body as a dunge.oia, dwells ever on the threshold 
with appealing signals. Groans and tears, looks and ges- 
tures, a flush or a paleness, are often the most clear report- 
ers of the heart, and speak more directly to the hearts of 
others. The message flies by these interpreters in the least 
space of time, and the misunderstanding is averted in the 
moment of its birth. To explain in words takes time and a 
just and patient hearing; and in the critical epochs of a close 
relation, patience and justice are not qualities on which we 
can rely. But the look or the gesture explains things in a 
breath; they tell their message without ambiguity; unlike 
speech, they cannot stumble, by the way, on a reproach or 
an allusion that should steel your friend against the truth; 
and then they have a higher authority, for they are the 
direct expression of the heart, not yet transmitted through 
the unfaithful and sophisticating brain. Not long ago I 
wrote a letter to a friend which came near involving us in 
quarrel; but we met, and in personal talk I repeated the 
worst of what I had written, and added worse to that; and 
with the commentary of the body it seemed not unfriendly 
either to hear or say. Indeed, letters are in vain for the 
purposes of intimacy ; an absence is a dead break in the 
relation; yet two who know each other fully and are 
bent on perpetuity in love, may so preserve the attitude of 
their affections that they may meet on the same terms as 
they had parted. 

Pitiful is the case of the blind, who cannot read the face ; 
pitiful that of the deaf, who cannot follow the changes of 
the voice. And there are others also to be pitied; for there 
are some of an inert, uneloquent nature, who have been 
denied all the symbols of communication, who have neither 
a lively play of facial expression, nor speaking gestures, 
nor a responsive voice, nor yet the gift of frank, explana- 
tory speech: people truly made of clay, people tied for life 



TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 291 

into a bag which no one can undo. They are poorer than 
the gipsy, for their heart can speak no language under 
heaven. Such people we must learn slowly by the tenor of 
their acts, or through yea and nay communications; or we 
take them on trust on the strength of a general air, and now 
and again, when we see the spirit breaking through in a 
flash, correct or change our estimate. But these will be 
uphill intimacies, without charm or freedom, to the end; 
and freedom is the chief ingredient in confidence. Some 
minds, romantically dull, despise physical endowments. 
That is a doctrine for a misanthrope; to those who like their 
fellow-creatures it must always be meaningless; and, for 
my part, I can see few things more desirable, after the pos- 
session of such radical qualities as honour and humour and 
pathos, than to have a lively and not a stolid countenance; 
to have looks to correspond with every feeling; to be ele- 
gant and delightful in person, so that we shall please even 
in the intervals of- active pleasing, and may never discredit 
speech with uncouth manners or become unconsciously our 
own burlesques. But of all unfortunates there is one crea- 
ture (for I will not call him man) conspicuous in misfor- 
tune. This is he who has forfeited his birthright of expres- 
sion, who has cultivated artful intonations, who has taught 
his face tricks, like a pet monkey, and on every side per- 
verted or cut off his means of communication with his fel- 
low-men. [ The body is a house of many windows : there we 
all sit, showing ourselves and crying on the passers-by 
to come and love us. But this fellow has filled his windows 
with opaque glass, elegantly coloured. His house may be 
admired for its design, the crowd may pause before the 
stained windows, but meanwhile the poor proprietor must 
lie languishing within, uncomforted, unchangeably alone. 

Truth of intercourse is something more difficult than to 
refrain from open lies. It is possible to avoid falsehood 
and yet not tell the truth. It is not enough to answer for- 
mal questions. To reach the truth by yea and nay com- 
munications implies a questioner with a share of inspiration 
such as is often found in mutual love. Yea and nay mean 
nothing; the meaning must have been related in the ques- 
tion. Many words are often necessary to convey a very 



292 STEVENSON 

simple statement; for in this sort of exercise we never hit 
the gold; the most that we can hope is by many arrows, 
more or less far off on different sides, to indicate, in the 
course of time, for what target we are aiming, and after an 
hour's talk, back and forward, to convey the purport of a 
single principle or a single thought. And yet while the curt, 
pithy speaker misses the point entirely, a wordy, prolegom- 
enous babbler will often add three new offences in the 
process of excusing one. It is really a most delicate affair. 
The world was made before the English language, and 
seemingly upon a different design. Suppose we held our 
converse, not in words, but in music; those who have a bad 
ear would find themselves cut off from all near commerce, 
and no better than foreigners in this big world. But we 
do not consider how many have " a bad ear " for words, nor 
how often the most eloquent find nothing to reply. I hate 
questioners and questions; there are so few that can be 
spoken to without a lie. " Do you forgive me?" Madam 
and sweetheart, so far as I have gone in life I have never 
yet been able to discover what forgiveness means. "Is it 
still the same between us?" Why, how can it be? It is 
eternally different; and yet you are still the friend of my 
heart. "Do you understand me ? " God knows ; I should 
think it highly improbable. 

The crudest lies are often told in silence. A man may 
have sat in a room for hours and not opened his teeth, and 
yet come out of that room a disloyal friend or a vile calum- 
niator. And how many loves have perished because, from 
pride, or spite, or diffidence, or that unmanly shame which 
withholds a man from daring to betray emotion, a lover, at 
the critical point of the relation, has but hung his head and 
held his tongue ? And, again, a lie may be told by a truth, or 
a truth conveyed through a lie. Truth to facts is not always 
truth to sentiment; and part of the truth, as often happens 
in answer to a question, may be the foulest calumny. A 
fact may be an exception ; but the feeling is the law, and it 
is that which you must neither garble nor belie. The whole 
tenor of a conversation is a part of the meaning of each sep- 
arate statement; the beginning and the end define and 
travesty the intermediate conversation. You never speak 



TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 293 

to God; you address a fellow-man, full of his own tempers; 
and to tell truth, rightly understood, is not to state the true 
facts, but to convey a true impression; truth in spirit, not 
truth to letter, is the true veracity. To reconcile averted 
friends a Jesuitical discretion is often needful, not so much 
to gain a kind hearing as to communicate sober truth. 
Women have an ill name in this connection; yet they live 
in as true relations; the lie of a good woman is the true 
index of her heart. 

" It takes/' says Thoreau, in the noblest and most useful 
passage I remember to have read in any modern author, 1 
" two to speak truth — one to speak and another to hear." 
He must be very little experienced, or have no great zeal for 
truth, who does not recognise the fact. A grain of anger 
or a grain of suspicion produces strange acoustical effects, 
and makes the ear greedy to remark offence. Hence we find 
those who have once quarrelled carry themselves distantly, 
and are ever ready to break the truce. To speak truth 
there must be moral equality or else no respect; and hence 
between parent and child intercourse is apt to degenerate 
into a verbal fencing bout, and misapprehensions to become 
ingrained. And there is another side to this, for the parent 
begins with an imperfect notion of the child's character, 
formed in early years or during the equinoctial gales of 
youth; to this he adheres, noting only the facts which suit 
with his preconception; and wherever a person fancies 
himself unjustly judged, he at once and finally gives up the 
effort to speak truth. With our chosen friends, on the other 
hand, and still more between lovers (for mutual under- 
standing is love's essence), the truth is easily indicated by 
the one and aptly comprehended by the other. A hint taken, 
a look understood, conveys the gist of long and delicate ex- 
planations; and where the life is known even yea and nay 
become luminous. In the closest of all relations — that of a 
love well founded and equally shared — speech is half dis- 
carded, like a roundabout, infantile process or a ceremony 
of formal etiquette; and the two communicate directly by 
their presences, and with few looks and fewer words con- 
trive to share their good and evil and uphold each other's 

1 " A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers," Wednesday, p. 283. 



294 STEVENSON 

hearts in joy. For love rests upon a physical basis; it is a 
familiarity of nature's making and apart from voluntary 
choice. Understanding has in some sort outrun knowledge, 
for the affection perhaps began with the acquaintance; and 
as it was not made like other relations, so it is not, like 
them, to be perturbed or clouded. Each knows more than 
can be uttered ; each lives by faith, and believes by a natural 
compulsion; and between man and wife the language of the 
'body is largely developed and grown strangely eloquent. 
The thought that prompted and was conveyed in a caress 
would only lose to be set down in words—ay, although 
Shakespeare himself should be the scribe. 

Yet it is in these dear intimacies, beyond all others, that 
we must strive and do battle for the truth. Let but a doubt 
arise, and alas ! all the previous intimacy and confidence is 
but another charge against the person doubted. " What a 
monstrous dishonesty is this if I have been deceived so long 
and so completely!" Let but that thought gain entrance, 
and you plead before a deaf tribunal. Appeal to the past; 
why, that is your crime ! Make all clear, convince the 
reason; alas! speciousness is but a proof against you. " // 
you can abuse me now, the more likely that you have abused 
me from the first." 

For a strong affection such moments are worth support- 
ing, and they will end well; for your advocate is in your 
lover's heart and speaks her own language ; it is not you but 
she herself who can defend and clear you of the charge. 
But in slighter intimacies, and for a less stringent union? 
Indeed, is it worth while? We are all incompris, only more 
or less concerned for the mischance; all trying wrongly to 
do right; all fawning at each other's feet like dumb, neg- 
lected lap-dogs. Sometimes we catch an eye — this is our 
opportunity in the ages — and we wag our tail with a poor 
smile. "Is that all?" All? If you only knew! But how 
can they know? They do not love us; the more fools we 
to squander life on the indifferent. 

But the morality of the thing, you will be glad to hear, is ex- 
cellent; for it is only by trying to understand others that we 
can get our own hearts understood; and in matters of human 
feeling the clement judge is the most successful pleader. 



SAMUEL PEPYS 



IN two books a fresh light has recently been thrown on 
the character and position of Samuel Pepys. Mr. 
Mynors Bright has given us a new transcription of the 
Diary, increasing it in bulk by near a third, correcting many 
errors, and completing our knowledge of the man in some 
curious and important points. We can only regret that he 
has taken liberties with the author and the public. It is 
no part of the duties of the editor of an established classic 
to decide what may or may not be " tedious to the reader." 
The book is either an historical document or not, and in 
condemning Lord Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns him- 
self. As for the time-honored phrase, " unfit for publica- 
tion," without being cynical, we may regard it as the sign 
of a precaution more or less commercial; and we may think, 
without being sordid, that when we purchase six huge and 
distressingly expensive volumes, we are entitled to be 
treated rather more like scholars and rather less like chil- 
dren. But Mr. Bright may rest assured: while we com- 
plain, we are still grateful. Mr. Wheatley, to divide our 
obligation, brings together, clearly and with no lost words, 
a body of illustrative material. Sometimes we might ask a 
little more; never, I think, less. And as a matter of fact, 
a great part of Mr. Wheatley's volume might be trans- 
ferred, by a good editor of Pepys, to the margin of the text, 
for it is precisely what the reader wants. 

In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to 
read our author. Between them they contain all we can 
expect to learn for, it may be, many years. Now, if ever, 
we should be able to form some notion of that unparalleled 
figure in the annals of mankind — unparalleled for three 
good reasons: first, because he was a man known to his 

295 



296 STEVENSON 

contemporaries in a halo of almost historical pomp, and to 
his remote descendants with an indecent familiarity, like a 
tap-room comrade; second, because he has outstripped all 
competitors in the art or virtue of a conscious honesty about 
oneself; and, third, because, being in many ways a very 
ordinary person, he has yet placed himself before the public 
eye with such a fulness and such an intimacy of detail as 
might be envied by a genius like Montaigne. Not then for 
his own sake only, but as a character in a unique position, 
endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a unique light 
upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely worthy 
of prolonged and patient study. 

The Diary 

That there should be such a book as Pepys's Diary is 
incomparably strange. Pepys, in a corrupt and idle period, 
played the man in public employments, toiling hard and 
keeping his honor bright. Much of the little good that is 
set down to James the Second comes by right to Pepys; and 
if it were little for a king, it is much for a subordinate. 
To his clear, capable head was owing somewhat of the great- 
ness of England on the seas. In the exploits of Hawke, 
Rodney, or Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys of the Navy Office 
had some considerable share. He stood well by his business 
in the appalling plague of 1666. He was loved and respected 
by some of the best and wisest men in England. He was 
President of the Royal Society; and when he came to die, 
people said of his conduct in that solemn hour — thinking 
it needless to say more — that it was answerable to the great- 
ness of his life. Thus he walked in dignity, guards of 
soldiers sometimes attending him in his walks, subalterns 
bowing before his periwig ; and when he uttered his thoughts 
they were suitable to his state and services. On February 
8, 1668, we find him writing to Evelyn, his mind bitterly 
occupied with the late Dutch war, and some thoughts of the 
different story of the repulse of the great Armada : " Sir, 
you will not wonder at the backwardness of my thanks for 
the present you made me, so many days since, of the Pros- 
pect of the Medway, while the Hollander rode master in 



SAMUEL PEPYS 297 

it, when I have told you that the sight of it hath led me to 
such reflections on my particular interest, by my employ- 
ment, in the reproach due to that miscarriage, as have 
given me little less disquiet than he is fancied to have who 
found his face in Michael Angelo's hell. The same should 
serve me also in excuse for my silence in celebrating your 
mastery shown in the design and draught, did not indig- 
nation rather than courtship urge me so far to commend 
them, as to wish the furniture of our House of Lords 
changed from the story of '88 to that of '6? (of Evelyn's 
designing), till the pravity of this were reformed to the 
temper of that age, wherein God Almighty found his 
blessings more operative than, I fear, he doth in ours his 
judgments." 

This is a letter honorable to the writer, where the mean- 
ing rather than the words is eloquent. Such was the 
account he gave .of himself to his contemporaries; such 
thoughts he chose to utter, and in such language: giving 
himself out for a grave and patriotic public servant. We 
turn to the same date in the Diary by which he is known, 
after two centuries, to his descendants. The entry begins 
in the same key with the letter, blaming the "madness of 
the House of Commons " and " the base proceedings, just the 
epitome of all our public proceedings in this age, of the 
House of Lords ; " and then, without the least transition, this 
is how our diarist proceeds : " To the Strand, to my book- 
seller's, and there bought an idle, rogueish French book, 
L'escholle des Filles, which I have bought in plain binding, 
avoiding the buying of it better bound, because I resolve, 
as soon as I have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand 
in the list of books, nor among them, to disgrace them, if it 
should be found." Even in our day, when responsibility is 
so much more clearly apprehended, the man who wrote the 
letter would be notable; but what about the man, I do not 
say who bought a roguish book, but who was ashamed of 
doing so, yet did it, and recorded both the doing and the 
shame in the pages of his daily journal? 

We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape 
ourselves when we address our fellows; at a given moment 
we apprehend our character and acts by some particular 



298 STEVENSON 

side; we are merry with one, grave with another, as befits 
the nature and demands of the relation. Pepys's letter to 
Evelyn would have little in common with that other one 
to Mrs. Knipp which he signed by the pseudonym of Dapper 
Dicky; yet each would be suitable to the character of his 
correspondent There is no untruth in this, for man, being 
a Protean animal, swiftly shares and changes with his 
company and surroundings; and these changes are the 
better part of his education in the world. To strike a pos- 
ture once for all, and to march through life like a drum- 
major, is to be highly disagreeable to others and a fool for 
oneself into the bargain. To Evelyn and to Knipp we 
understand the double facing; but to whom was he posing 
in the Diary, and what, in the name of astonishment, was 
the nature of the pose? Had he suppressed all mention 
of the book, or had he bought it, gloried in the act, and cheer- 
fully recorded his glorification, in either case we should have 
made him out. But no; he is full of precautions to conceal 
the " disgrace " of the purchase, and yet speeds to chron- 
icle the whole affair in pen and ink. It is a sort of anomaly 
in human action, which we can exactly parallel from another 
part of the Diary. 

Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints 
against her husband, and written it in plain and very pungent 
English. Pepys, in an agony lest the world should come to 
see it, brutally seizes and destroys the tell-tale document; 
and then — you disbelieve your eyes — down goes the whole 
story with unsparing truth and in the cruellest detail. It 
seems he has no design but to appear respectable, and here 
he keeps a private book to prove he was not. You are at 
first faintly reminded of some of the vagaries of the morbid 
religious diarist ; but at a moment's thought the resemblance 
disappears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify; it is 
not from repentance that he chronicles his peccadilloes, for 
he tells us when he does repent, and, to be just to him, there 
often follows some improvement. Again, the sins of the 
religious diarist are of a very formal pattern, and are told 
with an elaborate whine. But in Pepys you come upon good, 
substantive misdemeanors; beams in his eye of which he 
alone remains unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the animal 



SAMUEL PEPYS 299 

nature, and laughable subterfuges to himself that always 
command belief and often engage the sympathies. 

Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to him- 
self in the world, sowed his wild oats late, took late to indus- 
try, and preserved till nearly forty the headlong gusto of 
a boy. So, to come rightly at the spirit in which the Diary 
was written, we must recall a class of sentiments which 
with most of us are over and done before the age of 
twelve. In our tender years we still preserve a freshness of 
surprise at our prolonged existence; events make an im- 
pression out of all proportion to their consequence ; we are 
unspeakably touched by our own past adventures, and look 
forward to our future personality with sentimental interest. 
It was something of this, I think, that clung to Pepys. 
Although not sentimental in the abstract, he was sweetly sen- 
timental about himself. His own past clung about his heart, 
an evergreen. He, was the slave of an association. He could 
not pass by Islington, where his father used to carry him to 
cakes and ale, but he must light at the " King's Head " and 
eat and drink " for remembrance of the old house sake." He 
counted it good fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew 
his old walks, " where Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and 
talk, with whom I had the first sentiments of love and pleas- 
ure in a woman's company, discourse and taking her by the 
hand, she being a pretty woman." He goes about weighing 
up the Assurance, which lay near Woolwich under water, and 
cries in a parenthesis, " Poor ship, that I "have been twice 
merry in, in Captain Holland's time ; " and after revisiting 
the Naseby, now changed into the Charles, he confesses " it 
was a great pleasure to myself to see the ship that I began 
my good fortune in." The stone that he was cut for he pre- 
served in a case; and to the Turners he kept alive such 
gratitude for their assistance that for years, and after he had 
begun to mount himself into higher zones, he continued to 
have that family to dinner on the anniversary of the opera- 
tion. Not Hazlitt nor Rousseau had a more romantic pas- 
sion for their past, although at times they might express it 
more romantically; and if Pepys shared with them this 
childish fondness, did not Rousseau, who left behind him the 
Confessions, or Hazlitt, who wrote the Liber Amoris, and 



300 STEVENSON 

loaded his essays with, loving personal detail, share with 
Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two things go 
hand in hand ; or, to be more exact, it is the first that makes 
the second either possible or pleasing. 

But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return 
once more to the experience of children. I can remember 
to have written, in the fly-leaf of more than one book, the 
date and the place where I then was — if, for instance, I 
was ill in bed or sitting in a certain garden; these were jot- 
tings for my future self; if I should chance on such a note 
in after years, I thought it would cause me a particular thrill 
to recognize myself across the intervening distance. Indeed, 
I might come upon them now, and not be moved one tittle — 
which shows that I have comparatively failed in life, and 
grown older than Samuel Pepys. For in the Diary we can 
find more than one such note of perfect childish egotism; as 
when he explains that his candle is going out, " which makes 
me write thus slobberingly ; " or as in this incredible par- 
ticularity, " To my study, where I only wrote thus much of 
this day's passages to this, and so out again ; " or lastly, as 
here, with more of circumstance : " I staid up till the bellman 
came by with his bell under my window, as I was writing of 
this very line, and cried, ' Past one of the clock, and a cold, 
frosty, windy morning/ " Such passages are not to be mis- 
understood. The appeal to Samuel Pepys years hence is 
unmistakable. He desires that dear, though unknown, gen- 
tleman keenly to realize his predecessor ; to remember why a 
passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, with 
a sigh) the tones of the bellman, the chill of the early, windy 
morning, and the very line his own romantic self was scri- 
bing at the moment. The man, you will perceive was making 
reminiscences — a sort of pleasure by ricochet, which comforts 
many in distress, and turns some others into sentimental 
libertines: and the whole book, if you will but look at it 
in that way, is seen to be a work of art to Pepys's own 
address. 

Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable attitude 
preserved by him throughout his Diary, to that unflinching 
- — I had almost said, that unintelligent — sincerity which makes 
it a miracle among human books. He was not unconscious 



SAMUEL PEPYS 301 

oi his errors — far from it; he was often startled into shame, 
often reformed, often made and broke his vows of change. 
But whether he did ill or well, he was still his own unequalled 
self; still that entrancing ego of whom alone he cared to 
write ; and still sure of his own affectionate indulgence, when 
the parts should be changed, and the writer come to read 
what he had written. Whatever he did, or said, or thought, 
or suffered, it was still a trait of Pepys, a character of his 
career; and as, to himself, he was more interesting than 
Moses or than Alexander, so all should be faithfully set 
down. I have called his Diary a work of art. Now when 
the artist has, found something, word or deed, exactly proper 
to a favorite character in play or novel, he will neither sup- 
press nor diminish it, though the remark be silly or the act 
mean. The hesitation of Hamlet, the credulity of Othello, 
the baseness of Emma Bovary, or the irregularities of Mr. 
Swiveller, caused neither disappointment nor disgust to their 
creators. And so with Pepys and his adored protagonist: 
adored not blindly, but with trenchant insight and enduring, 
human toleration. I have gone over and over the greater 
part of the Diary; and the points where, to the most sus- 
picious scrutiny, he has seemed not perfectly sincere, are so 
few, so doubtful, and so petty, that I am ashamed to name 
them. It may be said that we all of us write such a diary in 
airy characters upon our brain; but I fear there is a dis- 
tinction to be made; I fear that as we render to our con- 
sciousness an account of our daily fortunes and behavior, 
we too often weave a tissue of romantic compliments and 
dull excuses ; and even if Pepys were the ass and coward 
that men call him, we must take rank as sillier and more 
cowardly than he. The bald truth about oneself, what we 
are all too timid to admit when we are not too dull to see it, 
that was what he saw clearly and set down unsparingly. 

It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on 
in the same single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was 
not such an ass, but he must have perceived, as he went on, 
the extraordinary nature of the work he was producing. He 
was a great reader, and he knew what other books were 
like. It must, at least, have crossed his mind that some one 
might ultimately decipher the manuscript, and he himself, 



/ 



302 STEVENSON 

with all his pains and pleasures, be resuscitated in some later 
day; and the thought, although discouraged, must have 
warmed his heart. He was not such an ass, besides, but he 
must have been conscious of the deadly explosives, the gun- 
cotton and the giant powder, he was hoarding in his drawer. 
Let some contemporary light upon the Journal, and Pepys 
was plunged forever in social and political disgrace. We can 
trace the growth of his terrors by two facts. In 1660, while 
the Diary was still in its youth, he tells about it, as a matter 
of course, to a lieutenant in the navy; but in 1669, when it 
was already near an end, he could have bitten his tongue out, 
as the saying is, because he had let slip his secret to one so 
grave and friendly as Sir William Coventry. And from two 
other facts I think we may infer that he had entertained, 
even if he had not acquiesced in, the thought of a far-distant 
publicity. The first is of capital importance: the Diary was 
not destroyed. The second — that he took unusual precautions 
to confound the cipher in " rogueish " passages — proves, 
beyond question, that he was thinking of some other reader 
besides himself. Perhaps while his friends were admiring the 
" greatness of his behavior " at the approach of death, he 
may have had a twinkling hope of immortality. Mens cajus- 
que is est qitisque, said his chosen motto; and, as he had 
stamped his mind with every crook and foible in the pages of 
the Diary, he might feel that what he left behind him was 
indeed himself. There is perhaps no other instance so re- 
markable of the desire of man for publicity and an enduring 
name. The greatness of his life was open, yet he longed to 
communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries 
bowed before him, he must buttonhole posterity with the 
news that his periwig was once alive with nits. But this 
thought, although I cannot doubt he had it, was neither his 
first nor his deepest ; it did not color one word that he wrote ; 
the Diary, for as long as he kept it, remained what it 
was when he began, a private pleasure for himself. It was 
his bosom secret; it added a zest to all his pleasures; he 
lived in and for it, and might well write these solemn words, 
when he closed that confidant forever : " And so I betake 
myself to that course which is almost as much as to see 
myself go into the grave; for which, and all the discom- 



SAMUEL PEPYS 303 

iorts that will accompany my being blind, the good God pre- 
pare me." 

A Liberal Genius 

Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he 
had taken physic, composing " a song in praise of a liberal 
genius (such as I take my own to be) to all studies and 
pleasures." The song was unsuccessful, but the Diary is, 
in a sense, the very song that he was seeking; and his portrait 
by Hales, sc admirably reproduced in Mynors Bright's edi- 
tion, is a confirmation of the Diary. Hales it would appear, 
had known his business ; and though he put his sitter to a deal 
of trouble, almost breaking his neck " to have the portrait 
full of shadows," and draping him in an Indian gown hired 
expressly for the purpose, he was preoccupied about no 
merely picturesque effects, but to portray the essence of the 
man. Whether we read the picture by the Diary or the Diary 
by the picture, we shall at least agree that Hales was among 
the number of those who can " surprise the manners in the 
face." Here we have a mouth pouting, moist with desires; 
eyes greedy, protuberant, and yet apt for weeping too; a 
nose great alike in character and dimensions ; and altogether 
a most fleshly, melting countenance. The face is attractive 
by its promise of reciprocity. I have used the word greedy, 
but the reader must not suppose that he can change it for 
that closely kindred one of hungry; for there is here no 
aspiration, no waiting for better things, but an animal joy in 
all that comes. It could never be the face of an artist; it 
is the face of a viveur — kindly, pleased and pleasing, pro- 
tected from excess and upheld in contentment by the shifting 
versatility of his desires. For a single desire is more rightly 
to be called a lust ; but there is health in a variety, where one 
may balance and control another. 

The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden 
of Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with 
the most eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done 
with the most lively pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all 
the shows of the world and all the secrets of knowledge, 
filled him brimful of the longing to travel, and supported him 
in the toils of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he 



304 STEVENSON 

was never happier than when he read or talked of the Eter- 
nal City. When he was in Holland, he was " with child " to 
see any strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing 
with them in a palace near The Hague, his pen fails hirn to 
express his passion of delight, " the more so because in a 
heaven of pleasure and in a strange country." He must go to 
see all famous executions. He must needs visit the body of 
a murdered man, defaced " with a broad wound," he says, 
" that makes my hand now shake to write of it." He learned 
to dance, and was " like to make a dancer." He learned to 
sing, and walked about Gray's Inn Fields " humming to 
myself (which is now my constant practice) the trillo." He 
learned to play the lute, the flute, the flageolet, and the 
theorbo, and it was not the fault of his intention if he did 
not learn the harpsichord or the spinet. He learned to com- 
pose songs, and burned to give forth " a scheme and theory 
of music not yet ever made in the world." When he heard 
" a fellow whistle like a bird exceeding well," he promised 
to return another day and give an angel for a lesson in the 
art. Once, he writes, " I took the Bezan back with me, and 
with a brave gale and tide reached up that night to the Hope, 
taking great pleasure in learning the seamen's manner of 
singing when they sound the depths." If he found himself 
rusty in his Latin grammar, he must fall to it like a schoolboy. 
He was a member of Harrington's Club till its dissolution, 
and of the Royal Society before it had received the name. 
Boyle's Hydrostatics was " of infinite delight " to him, walk- 
ing in Barnes Elms. We find him comparing Bible concord- 
ances, a captious judge of sermons, deep in Descartes and 
Aristotle. We find him, in a single year, studying timber and 
the measurement of timber ; tar and oil, hemp, and the process 
of preparing cordage; mathematics and accounting; the hull 
and the rigging of ships from a model ; and " looking and 
improving himself of the (naval) stores with " — hark to the 
fellow ! — " great delight." His familiar spirit of delight was 
not the same with Shelley's; but how true it was to him 
through life ! He is only copying something, and behold, he 
" takes great pleasure to rule the lines, and have the capital 
words wrote with red ink ; " he has only had his coal-cellar 
emptied and cleaned, and behold, " it do please him exceed- 



SAMUEL PEPYS 305 

ingly." A hog's harslett is " a piece of meat he loves. " He 
cannot ride home in my Lord Sandwich's coach, but he must 
exclaim, with breathless gusto, " his noble, rich coach ! " 
When he is bound for a supper party, he anticipates a " glut 
of pleasure/' When he has a new watch, " to see my childish- 
ness," #ays he, " I could not forbear carrying it in my hand 
and seeing what o'clock it was an hundred times." To go to 
Vauxhall, he says, and " to hear the nightingales and other 
birds, hear fiddles, and there a harp and here a Jew's trump, 
and here laughing, and there fine people walking, is mighty 
divertising." And the nightingales, I take it, were particu- 
larly dear to him ; and it was again " with great pleasure " 
that he paused to hear them as he walked to Woolwich, while 
the fog was rising and the April sun broke through. 

He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by 
preference, two agreeable things at once. In his house he 
had a box of carpenter's tools, two dogs, an eagle, a canary, 
and a blackbird that whistled tunes, lest, even in that full life, 
he should chance upon an empty moment. If he had to wait 
for a dish of poached eggs, he must put in the time by playing 
on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he must read in the 
book of Tobit or divert his mind v/ith sly advances on the 
nearest women. When he walked, it must be with a book in 
his pocket to beguile the way in case the nightingales were 
silent; and even along the streets of London, with so many 
pretty faces to be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted, 
his trail was marked by little debts " for wine, pictures, etc.," 
the true headmark of a life intolerant of any joyless passage. 
He had a kind of idealism in pleasure; like the princess in 
the fairy story, he was conscious of a rose-leaf out of 
place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he could not enjoy nor 
shine in a conversation when he thought himself unsuitably 
dressed. Dearly as he loved eating, he " knew not how to 
eat alone ; " pleasure for him must heighten pleasure ; and the 
eye and ear must be flattered like the palate ere he avow him- 
self content. He had no zest in a good dinner when it fell 
to be eaten " in a bad street and in a periwig-maker's house ; " 
and a collation was spoiled for him by indifferent music. His 
body was indefatigable, doing him yeoman service in this 
breathless chase of pleasures. On April ii # 1662, he men- 



306 STEVENSON 

tions that he went to bed " weary, which I seldom am; " and 
already over thirty, he would sit up all night cheerfully to see 
a comet. But it is never pleasure that exhausts the pleasure- 
seeker;, for in that career, as in all others, it is failure that 
kills. The man who enjoys so wholly and bears so impa- 
tiently the slightest widowhood from joy, is just the man to 
lose a night's rest over some paltry question of his right to 
fiddle on the leads, or to be " vexed to the blood " by a sole- 
cism in his wife's attire; and we find in consequence that he 
was always peevish when he was hungry, and that his head 
" aked mightily " after a dispute. But nothing could divert 
him from his aim in life; his remedy in care was the same 
as his delight in prosperity; it was with pleasure, and with 
pleasure only, that he sought to drive out sorrow; and, 
whether he was jealous of his wife or skulking from a bailiff, 
he would equally take refuge in the theatre. There, if the 
house be full and the company noble, if the songs be tunable, 
the actors perfect, and the play diverting, this old hero of 
the secret Diary, this private self-adorer, will speedily be 
healed of his distresses. 

Equally pleased with' a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a 
tune upon the fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was 
pleased yet more by the beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the 
mere scenic attitude in life of his fellow-creatures. He shows 
himself throughout a sterling humanist. Indeed, he who loves 
himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plenitude of knowledge, 
is the best equipped of all to love his neighbors. And perhaps 
it is in this sense that charity may be most properly said to 
begin at home. It does not matter what quality a person 
has : Pepys can appreciate and love him for it. He " fills 
his eyes " with the beauty of Lady Castlemaine ; indeed, he 
may be said to dote upon the thought of her for years; if 
a woman be good-looking and not painted, he will walk miles 
to have another sight of her; and even when a lady by a mis- 
chance spat upon his clothes, he was immediately consoled 
when he had observed that she was pretty. But, on the 
other hand, he is delighted to see Mrs. Pett upon her knees, 
and speaks thus of his Aunt James : " a poor, religious, well- 
meaning, good soul, talking of nothing but God Almighty, and 
that with so much innocence that mightily pleased me." He 



SAMUEL PEPYS 307 

is taken with Pen's merriment and loose songs, but not less 
taken with the sterling worth of Coventry. He is jolly with 
a drunken sailor, but listens with interest and patience, as he 
rides the Essex roads, to the story of a Quaker's spiritual 
trials and convictions. He lends a critical ear to the dis- 
course of kings and royal dukes. He spends an evening at 
Vauxhall with " Killigrew and young Newport — loose com- 
pany," says he, " but worth a man's being in for once, to 
know the nature of it, and their manner of talk and lives." 
And when a rag-boy lights him home, he examines him 
about his business and other ways of livelihood for destitute 
children. This is almost half-way to the beginning of phi- 
lanthropy; had it only been the fashion, as it is at present, 
Pepys had perhaps been a man famous for good deeds. And 
it is through this quality that he rises, at times, superior to 
his surprising egotism; his interest in the love affairs of 
others is, indeed, impersonal ; he is filled with concern for my 
Lady Castlemaine, whom he only knows by sight, shares in 
her very jealousies, joys with her in her successes; and it is 
not untrue, however strange it seems in his abrupt present- 
ment, that he loved his maid Jane because she was in love 
with his man Tom. 

Let us hear him, for once, at length : " So the women and 
W. Hewer and I v/alked upon the Downes, where a flock of 
sheep was ; and the most pleasant and innocent sight that ever 
I saw in my life. We found a shepherd and his little boy 
reading, far from any houses or sight of people, the Bible to 
him ; so I make the boy to read to me, which he did with the 
forced tone that children do usually read, that was mighty 
pretty; and then I did give him something, and went to the 
father, and talked with him. He did content himself mightily 
in my liking his boy's reading, and did bless God for him, 
the most like one of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in 
my life, and it brought those thoughts of the old age of the 
world in my mind for two or three days after. We took 
notice of his woollen knit stockings of two colors mixed, 
and of his shoes shod with iron, both at the toe and heels, 
and with great nails in the soles of his feet, which was mighty 
pretty ; and taking notice of them, ' Why/ says the poor 
man, ' the downes, you see, are full of stones, and we are 



308 STEVENSON 

f aine to shoe ourselves thus ; and these/ says he, * will make 
the stones fly till they ring before me/ I did give the poor 
man something, for which he was mighty thankful, and I 
tried to cast stones with his home crooke. He values his 
dog mightily, that would turn a sheep any way which he 
would have him, when he goes to fold them; told me there 
was about eighteen score sheep in his flock, and that he hath 
four shillings a week the year round for keeping of them; 
and Mrs. Turner, in the common fields here, did gather one 
of the prettiest nosegays that ever I saw in my life." 

And so the story rambles on to the end of that day's pleas- 
uring; with cups of milk, and glow-worms, and people walk- 
ing at sundown with their wives and children, and all the 
way home Pepys still dreaming " of the old age of the world " 
and the early innocence of man. This was how he walked 
through life, his eyes and ears wide open, and his hand, 
you will observe, not shut; and thus he observed the lives, 
the speech, and the manners of his fellow-men, with prose 
fidelity of detail and yet a lingering glamour of romance. 

It was " two or three days after " that he extended this 
passage in the pages of his Journal, and the style has thus 
the benefit of some reflection. It is generally supposed that, 
as a writer, Pepys must rank at the bottom of the scale of 
merit. But a style which is indefatigably lively, telling, and 
picturesque through six large volumes of everyday experi- 
ence, which deals with the whole matter of a life, and yet 
is rarely wearisome, which condescends to the most fastidi- 
ous particulars, and yet sweeps all away in the forthright 
current of the narrative, — such a style may be ungrammatical, 
it may be inelegant, it may be one tissue of mistakes, but it 
can never be devoid of merit. The first and the true func- 
tion of the writer has been thoroughly performed through- 
out; and though the manner of his utterance may be child- 
ishly awkward, the matter has been transformed and assimi- 
lated by his unfeigned interest and delight. The gusto of the 
man speaks out fierily after all these years. For the differ- 
ence between Pepys and Shelly, to return to that half whim- 
sical approximation, is one of quality but not one of degree ; 
in his sphere, Pepys felt as keenly, and his is the true prose 
of poetry — prose because the spirit of the man was narrow 



SAMUEL PEPYS 309 

and earthly, but poetry because he was delightedly alive. 
Hence, in such a passage as this about the Epsom shepherd, 
the result upon the reader's mind is entire conviction and 
unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the thing fell out, not 
otherwise; and you would no more change it than you would 
change a sublimity of Shakespeare's, a homely touch of Bun- 
yan's, or a favored reminiscence of your own. 

There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet 
was not one. The tang was in the family; while he was 
writing the journal for our enjoyment in his comely house 
in Navy Gardens, no fewer than two of his cousins were 
tramping the fens, kit under arm, to make music to the 
country girls. But he himself, though he could play so many 
instruments and pass judgment in so many fields of art, 
remained an amateur. It is not given to any one so keenly 
to enjoy, without some greater power to understand. That 
he did not like Shakespeare as an artist for the stage may 
be a fault, but it is not without either parallel or excuse. 
He certainly admired him as a poet; he was the first beyond 
mere actors on the rolls of that innumerable army who have 
got " To be or not to be " by heart. Nor was he content with 
that ; it haunted his mind ; he quoted it to himself in the pages 
of the Diary, and, rushing in where angels fear to tread, he 
set it to music. Nothing, indeed, is more notable than the 
heroic quality of the verses that our little sensualist in a peri- 
wig chose out to marry with his own mortal strains. Some 
gust from brave Elizabethan times must have warmed his 
spirit, as he sat tuning his sublime theorbo. " To be or not 
to be. Whether 'tis nobler " — " Beauty retire, thou dost my 
pity move " — " It is decreed, nor shall thy fate, O Rome ; " — 
open and dignified in the sound, various and majestic in the 
sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly no timid, 
spirit that selected such a range of themes. Of " Gaze not on 
Swans," I know no more than these four words; yet that 
also seems to promise well. It was, however, not a probable 
suspicion, the work of his master, Mr. Berkenshaw — as the 
drawings that figure at the breaking up of a young ladies' 
seminary are the work of the professor attached to the estab- 
lishment. Mr. Berkenshaw w&s not altogether happy in his 
pupil. The amateur cannot usually rise into the artist, some 



310 STEVENSON 

leaven of the world still clogging him; and we find Pepys 
behaving like a pickthank to the man who taught him com- 
position. In relation to the stage, which he so warmly loved 
and understood, he was not only more hearty, but more gen- 
erous to others. Thus he encounters Colonel Reames, "a 
man," says he, " who understands and loves a play as well 
as I, and I love him for it." And again, when he and his 
wife had seen a most ridiculous insipid piece, " Glad we 
were," he writes, " that Betterton had no part in it." It is 
by such a zeal and loyalty to those who labor for his delight 
that the amateur grows worthy of the artist. And it should 
be kept in mind that, not only in art, but in morals, Pepys 
rejoiced to recognize his betters. There was not one speck 
of envy in the whole human-hearted egotist. 

Respectability 

When writers inveigh against respectability, in the present 
degraded meaning of the word, they are usually suspected 
of a taste for clay pipes and beer cellars ; and their perform- 
ances are thought to hail from the Owl's Nest of the comedy. 
They have something more, however, in their eye than the 
dulness of a round million dinner parties that sit down yearly 
in old England. For to do anything because others do it, and 
not because the thing is good, or kind, or honest in its own 
right, is to resign all moral control and captaincy upon your- 
self, and go post-haste to the devil with the greater number. 
We smile over the ascendency of priests; but I had rather 
follow a priest than what they call the leaders of society. No 
life can better than that of Pepys illustrate the dangers of 
this respectable theory of living. For what can be more un- 
toward than the occurrence, at a critical period and while the 
habits are still pliable, of such sweeping transformation as 
the return of Charles the Second? Round went the whole 
fleet of England on the other tack; and while a few tall 
pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely course by the 
stars and their own private compass, the cock-boat, Pepys, 
must go about with the majority among " the stupid starers 
and the loud huzzas." 

The respectable are not led so much by any desire pi 



SAMUEL PEPYS 311 

applause as by a positive need for countenance. The weaker 
and the tamer the man, the more will he require this support; 
and any positive quality relieves him, by just so much, of this 
dependence. In a dozen ways, Pepys was quite strong enough 
to please himself without regard for others ; but his positive 
qualities were not co-extensive with the field of conduct ; and 
in many parts of life he followed, with gleeful precision, in 
the footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. In morals, 
particularly, he lived by the countenance of others; felt a 
slight from another more keenly than a meanness in himself, 
and then first repented when he was found out. You could 
talk of religion or morality to such a man ; and by the artist 
side of him, by his lively sympathy and apprehension, he could 
rise, as it were dramatically, to the significance of what you 
said. All that matter in religion which has been nicknamed 
other-worldliness was strictly in his gamut; but a rule of life 
that should make a man rudely virtuous, following right in 
good report and ill report, was foolishness and a stumbling- 
block to Pepys. He was much thrown across the Friends; 
and nothing can be more instructive than his attitude toward 
these most interesting people of that age. I have mentioned 
how he conversed with one as he rode; when he saw some 
brought from a meeting under arrest, " I would to God," said 
he, " they would either conform, or be more wise and not be 
catched ; " and to a Quaker in his own office he extended a 
timid though effectual protection. Meanwhile there was 
growing up next door to him that beautiful nature, William 
Pen. It is odd that Pepys condemned him for a fop; odd, 
though natural enough when you see Pen's portrait, that 
Pepys was jealous of him with his wife. But the cream 
of the story is when Pen publishes his Sandy Foundation 
Shaken, and Pepys has it read aloud by his wife. " I find it," 
he says, " so well writ as, I think, it is too good for him ever 
to have writ it; and it is a serious sort of book, and not fit 
for everybody to read/ 9 Nothing is more galling to the merely 
respectable than to be brought in contact with religious ardor. 
Pepys had his own foundations, sandy enough, but dear to him 
from practical considerations, and he would read the book 
with true uneasiness of spirit; for conceive the blow if, by 
some plaguy accident, this Pen were to convert him ! It was 



312 STEVENSON 

a different kind of doctrine that he judged profitable for him- 
self and others. "A good sermon of Mr. Gifford's at our 
church, upon ' Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven.' A very 
excellent and persuasive, good and moral sermon. He showed, 
like a wise man, that righteousness is a surer moral way of 
being rich than sin and villainy." It is thus that respectable 
people desire to have their Greathearts address them, telling, 
in mild accents, how you may make the best of both worlds, 
and be a moral hero without courage, kindness, or trouble- 
some reflection ; and thus the Gospel, cleared of Eastern meta- 
phor, becomes a manual of worldly prudence, and a handy- 
book for Pepys and the successful merchant. 

The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has 
no idea of truth except for the Diary. He has no care 
that a thing shall be, if it but appear; gives out that he has 
inherited a good estate, when he has seemingly got nothing 
but a lawsuit; and is pleased to be thought liberal when he 
knows he has been mean. He is conscientiously ostentatious. 
I say conscientiously, with reason. He could never have been 
taken for a fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a manner 
nicely suitable to his position. For long he hesitated to 
assume the famous periwig; for a public man should travel 
gravely with his fashions, not foppishly before, nor dowdily 
behind, the central movement of his age. For long he durst 
not keep a carriage; that, in his circumstances, would have 
been improper; but a time comes, with the growth of his 
fortune, when the impropriety has shifted to the other side, 
and he is " ashamed to be seen in a hackney." Pepys talked 
about being " a Quaker or some very melancholy thing ; " for 
my part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because 
nothing half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. 
But so respectability and the duties of society haunt and 
burden their poor devotees ; and what seems at first the very 
primrose path of life, proves difficult and thorny like the rest. 
And the time comes to Pepys, as to all the merely respectable, 
when he must not only order his pleasures, but even clip his 
virtuous movements, to the public patter of the age. There 
was some juggling among officials to avoid direct taxation; 
and Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing ashamed of this 
dishonesty, designed to charge himself with £1000; but find- 



SAMUEL PEPYS 313 

ing none to set him an example, " nobody of our ablest mer- 
chants " with this moderate liking for clean hands, he judged 
it " not decent ; " he feared it would " be thought vain glory ; " 
and, rather than appear singular, cheerfully remained a thief. 
One able merchant's countenance, and Pepys had dared to do 
an honest act! Had he found one brave spirit, properly 
recognized by society, he might have gone far as a disciple. 
Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him full of sordid scandal, and 
make him believe, against the testimony of his senses, that 
Pen's venison pasty stank like the devil; but, on the other 
hand, Sir William Coventry can raise him by a word into 
another being. Pepys, when he is with Coventry, talks in the 
vein of an old Roman. What does he care for office or emolu- 
ment? "Thank God, I have enough of my own/' says he, 
" to buy me a good book and a good fiddle, and I have a good 
wife." And again, we find this pair projecting an old age 
when an ungrateful country shall have dismissed them from 
the field of public service; Coventry living retired in a fine 
house, and Pepys dropping in, " it may be, to read a chapter 
of Seneca." 

Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys 
continued zealous and, for the period, pure in his employ- 
ment. He would not be "bribed to be unjust," he says, 
though he was "not so squeamish as to refuse a present 
after," suppose the king to have received no wrong. His new 
arrangement for the victualling of Tangier, he tells us with 
honest complacency, will save the king a thousand and gain 
Pepys three hundred pounds a year, — a statement which 
exactly fixes the degree of the age's enlightenment. But for 
his industry and capacity no praise can be too high. It was 
an unending struggle for the man to stick to his business in 
such a garden of Armida as he found this life; and the story 
of his oaths, so often broken, so courageously renewed, is 
worthy rather of admiration than the contempt it has 
received. 

Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry's influence, 
we find him losing scruples and daily complying further 
with the age. When he began the Journal, he was a trifle 
prim and puritanic ; merry enough, to be sure, over his pri- 
vate cups, and still remembering Magdalene ale and his 



314 STEVENSON 

acquaintance with Mrs. Ainsworth of Cambridge. But 
youth is a hot season with all ; when a man smells April and 
May he is apt at times to stumble; and in spite of a disor- 
dered practice, Pepy's theory, the better things that he 
approved and followed after, we may even say were strict. 
Where there was "tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, 
and drinking," he felt " ashamed, and went away ;" and 
when he slept in church he prayed God forgive him. In but 
a little while we find him with some ladies keeping each 
other awake " from spite," as though not to sleep in church 
were an obvious hardship; and yet later he calmly passes 
the time of service, looking about him, with a perspective 
glass, on all the pretty women. His favorite ejaculation, 
" Lord ! " occurs but once that I have observed in 1660, 
never in ? 6i, twice in '62, and at least five times in '63; after 
which the " Lords " may be said to pullulate like herrings, 
with here and there a solitary " damned," as it were a 
whale among the shoal. He and his wife, once filled with 
dudgeon by some innocent freedoms at a marriage, are soon 
content to go pleasuring with my Lord Brouncker's mis- 
tress, who was not even, by his own account, the most dis- 
creet of mistresses. Tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, sing- 
ing, and drinking become his natural element; actors and 
actresses and drunken, roaring courtiers are to be found in 
his society; until the man grew so involved with Satur- 
nalian manners and companions that he was shot almost 
unconsciously into the grand domestic crash of 1668. 

That was the legitimate issue and punishment of years of 
staggering walk and conversation. The man who has 
smoked his pipe for half a century in a powder magazine 
finds himself at last the author and the victim of a hideous 
disaster. So with our pleasant-minded Pepys and his 
peccadilloes. All of a sudden, as he still trips dexterously 
enough among the dangers of a double-faced career, think- 
ing no great evil, humming to himself the trillo, Fate takes 
the further conduct of that matter from his hands, and 
brings him face to face with the consequences of his acts. 
For a man still, after so many years, the lover, although not 
the constant lover, of his wife, — for a man, besides, who 
was so greatly careful of appearances, — the revelation of 



SAMUEL PEPYS 315 

his infidelities was a crushing blow. The tears that he shed, 
the indignities that he endured, are not to be measured. A 
vulgar woman, and now justly incensed, Mrs. Pepys 
spared him no detail of suffering. She was violent, threat- 
ening him with the tongs; she was careless of his honor, 
driving him to insult the mistress whom she had driven him 
to betray and to discard; worst of all, she was hopelessly 
inconsequent in word and thought and deed, now lulling 
him with reconciliations, and anon flaming forth again with 
the original anger. Pepys had not used his wife well; he 
had wearied her with jealousies, even while himself unfaith- 
ful ; he had grudged her clothes and pleasures, while lavish- 
ing both upon himself; he had abused her in words; he had 
bent his fist at her in anger; he had once blacked her eye; 
and it is one of the oddest particulars in that odd Diary of 
his, that, while the injury is referred to once in passing, 
there is no hint as to the occasion or the manner of the 
blow. But now, when he is in the wrong, nothing can ex- 
ceed the long-suffering affection of this impatient husband. 
While he was still sinning and still undiscovered, he seems 
not to have known a touch of penitence stronger than what 
might lead him to take his wife to the theatre, or for an 
airing, or to give her a new dress, by way of compensation. 
Once found out, however, and he seems to himself to have 
lost all claim to decent usage. It is perhaps the strongest 
instance of his externality. His wife may do what she 
pleases, and though he may groan, it will never occur to 
him to blame her; he has no weapon left but tears and the 
most abject submission. We should perhaps have respected 
him more had he not given away so utterly, — above all, had 
he refused to write, under his wife's dictation, an insulting 
letter to his unhappy fellow-culprit, Miss Willet; but some- 
how I believe we like him better as he was. 

The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must 
have stamped the impression of this episode upon his mind. 
For the remaining years of his long life we have no Diary 
to help us, and we have seen already how little stress is to 
be laid upon the tenor of his correspondence ; but what with 
the recollection of the catastrophe of his married life, what 
with the natural influence of his advancing years and repu- 



316 STEVENSON 

tation, it seems not unlikely that the period of gallantry was 
at an end for Pepys; and it is beyond a doubt that he sat 
down at last to an honored and agreeable old age among 
his books and music, the correspondent of Sir Isaac Newton, 
and in one instance at least, the poetical counsellor of 
Dryden. Through all this period, that Diary which con- 
tained the secret memoirs of his life, with all its inconsist- 
encies and escapades, had been religiously preserved; nor 
when he came to die, does he appear to have provided for its 
destruction. So we may conceive him faithful to the end 
to all his dear and early memories; still mindful of Mrs. 
Hely in the woods at Epsom; still lighting at Islington for 
a cup of kindness to the dead; still, if he heard again that 
air that once so much disturbed him, thrilling at the recol- 
lection of the love that bound him to his wife. 



ON THE ELEVATION OF THE 
LABORING CLASSES 

BY 

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

William Ellery Channing, the chief apostle of New England 
Unitarianism, was born at Newport, Rhode Island, April 7, 1/80. 
He graduated from Harvard in 1798, and five years later became 
minister of the Federal Street Church in Boston, where he re- 
mained for thirty-seven years. He died October 2, 1842. 

Channing was still a child when, in 1785, King's Chapel in Bos- 
ton, in revising its liturgy, eliminated the doctrine of the Trinity. 
For the next fifty years the movement went on, separating the 
Congregational churches in New England into Trinitarian and 
Unitarian. A sermon preached by Channing in Baltimore in 
18 19, at the ordination of Jared Sparks, is generally regarded 
as the formulation of the Unitarian creed, and throughout his 
life Channing continued a leader in the denomination. 

To the tolerance, the culture, and the high civic and private 
virtue that characterised the typical Unitarian of that time, Chan- 
ning added an emotional and spiritual quality, and an interest in 
philosophy, that make him not merely the greatest of the Uni- 
tarian leaders, but in important respects the first of the Tran- 
scend entalists. "The Calvinists," it has been said, "believed that 
human nature is totally depraved; the Unitarians denied this, 
their denial carrying with it the positive implication that human 
nature is essentially good; the Transcendentalists believed that 
human nature is divine" (Goddard). Judged by this test, Chan- 
ning belongs to the third group, for it is in his passionate faith 
in the divinity of human nature, apparent in the following lec- 
tures "On the Elevation of the Laboring Classes," as in his 
writing and preaching in general, that one finds the characteristic 
mark of his spirit and the main secret of his power. 



313 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 

The following lectures were prepared for two meetings of 
mechanics, one of them consisting of apprentices, the other of 
adults. For want of strength they were delivered only to the 
former, though, in preparing them, I had kept the latter also 
in view. " The Mechanic Apprentices' Library Association/' at 
whose request the lectures are published, is an institution of 
much promise, not only furnishing a considerable means of in- 
tellectual improvement, but increasing the self-respect and con- 
ducing to the moral safety of the members. 

When I entered on this task, I thought of preparing only one 
lecture of the usual length. But I soon found that I could 
not do justice to my views in so narrow a compass. I therefore 
determined to write at large, and to communicate through the 
press the results of my labor, if they should be thought worthy 
of publication. With this purpose, I introduced topics which I 
did not deliver, and which I thought might be usefully presented 
to some who might not hear me. I make this statement to pre- 
vent the objection, that the lectures are not, in all things, adapted 
to those to whom they were delivered. Whilst written chiefly 
for a class, they were also intended for the community. 

As the same general subject is discussed in these lectures as 
in the " Lecture on Self-Culture," published last winter, there 
will, of course, be found in them that coincidence of thoughts 
which always takes place in the writings of a man who has the 
inculcation of certain great principles much at heart. Still, the 
point of view, the mode of discussion, and the choice of topics, 
differ much in the two productions; so that my state of mind 
would be given very imperfectly were the present lectures 
withheld. 

This is, probably, the last opportunity I shall have for com- 
municating with the laboring classes through the press. I may, 

319 



320 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 

therefore, be allowed to express my earnest wishes for their hap- 
piness, and my strong hope that they will justify the confidence 
of their friends, and will prove by their example the possibility 
of joining with labor all the improvements which do honor to 
our nature. — W. E. C, Boston, February n, 1840. 



ON THE ELEVATION OF THE 
LABORING CLASSES 



IT is with no common pleasure that I take part in the 
present course of lectures. Such a course is a sign 
of the times, and very interesting to all who are in- 
terested in the progress of their fellow-creatures. We hear 
much of the improvements of our age. The wonders achieved 
by machinery are the common talk of every circle; but I 
confess that, to me, this gathering of mechanics , apprentices, 
whose chief bond of union is a library, and who come to- 
gether weekly to refresh and improve themselves by the 
best instruction which the state of society places within 
their reach, is more encouraging than all the miracles of 
the machinist. In this meeting I see, what I desire most 
to see, that the mass of the people are beginning to com- 
prehend themselves and their true happiness, that they are 
catching glimpses of the great work and vocation of human 
beings, and are rising to their true place in the social 
state. The present meeting indicates a far more radical, 
more important change in the world than the steam-engine, 
or the navigation of the Atlantic in a fortnight. That mem- 
bers of the laboring class, at the close of a day's work, 
should assemble in such a hall as this, to hear lectures on 
science, history, ethics, and the most stirring topics of the 
day, from men whose education is thought to fit them for 
the highest offices, is a proof of a social revolution to which 
no bounds can be set, and from which too much cannot 
be hoped. I see in it a repeal of the sentence of degradation 
passed by ages on the mass of mankind. I see in it the dawn 
of a new era, in which it will be understood that the 
first object of society is to give incitements and means 
of progress to all its members. I see in it the sign of the 
Vol. 28— K 321 HC 



322 CHANNING 

approaching triumph of men's spiritual over their out- 
ward and material interests. In the hunger and thirst foi 
knowledge and for refined pleasures which this course of 
lectures indicates in those who labor, I see that the spirit 
of man is not always to be weighed down by toils for 
animal life and by the appetite for animal indulgences. I 
do attach great importance to this meeting, not for its own 
sake or its immediate benefits, but as a token and pledge 
of a new impulse given to society through all its conditions. 
On this account, I take more pleasure in speaking here than 
I should feel in being summoned to pronounce a show- 
oration before all the kings and nobles on earth. In truth, 
it is time to have done with shows. The age is too stirring, 
we are pressed on by too solemn interests, to be justified 
in making speeches for self-display or mere amusement. 
He who cannot say something in sympathy with, or in aid 
of, the great movements of humanity, might as well hold 
his peace. 

With these feelings and convictions, I am naturally, al- 
most necessarily, led to address you on a topic which must 
insure the attention of such an audience : namely, the eleva- 
tion of that portion of the community who subsist by the 
labor of the hands. This work, I have said, is going on. 
I may add, that it is advancing nowhere so rapidly as in 
this city. I do not believe that, on the face of the earth, 
the spirit of improvement has anywhere seized so strongly 
on those who live by the sweat of the brow as among 
ourselves. Here it is nothing rare to meet the union of 
intellectual culture and self-respect with hard work. Here 
the prejudice against labor as degrading has very much 
given way. This, then, is the place where the subject which 
I have proposed should be discussed. We ought to consider 
in what the true elevation of the laboring portion consists, 
how far it is practicable, and how it may be helped onward. 
The subject, I am aware, is surrounded with much preju- 
dice and error. Great principles need to be brought out, 
and their application plainly stated. There are serious ob- 
jections to be met, fears to be disarmed, and rash hopes to 
be crushed. I do not profess to have mastered the topic. But 
I can claim one merit, that of coming to the discussion with 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 323 

a feeling of its importance, and with a deep interest in the 
class of people whom it concerns. I trust that this expression 
of interest will not be set down as mere words, or as meant 
to answer any selfish purpose. A politician who professes 
attachment to the people is suspected to love them for their 
votes. But a man who neither seeks nor would accept 
any place within their gift may hope to be listened to as 
their friend. As a friend, I would speak plainly. I 
cannot flatter. I see defects in the laboring classes. I think 
that, as yet, the greater part of them have made little 
progress; that the prejudices and passions, the sensuality and 
selfishness of multitudes among them, are formidable barriers 
to improvement; that multitudes have not waked as yet to 
a dim conception of the end for which they are to struggle. 
My hopes do not blind me to what exists; and with this 
clear sense of the deficiencies of the multitude of men, I 
cannot, without guilt, minister to their vanity. Not that 
they alone are to be charged with deficiencies. Look where 
we may, we shall .discern in all classes ground for con- 
demnation; and whoever would do good ought to speak the 
truth of all, only remembering that he is to speak with 
sympathy, and with a consciousness of his own fallibleness 
and infirmity. 

In giving my views of the elevation of the laboring 
multitude, I wish that it may be understood that I shall 
often speak prospectively, or of changes and improvements 
which are not to be expected immediately, or soon; and this 
I say, that I may not be set down as a dreamer, expecting 
to regenerate the world in a day. I fear, however, that 
this explanation will not shield me from this and like 
reproaches. There are men who, in the face of all his- 
tory, of the great changes wrought in men's condition, and 
of the new principles which are now acting on society, 
maintain that the future is to be a copy of the past, and 
probably a faded rather than bright copy. From such I 
differ, and did I not differ I would not stand here. Did I 
expect nothing better from human nature than I see, I 
should have no heart for the present effort, poor as it may 
be. I see the signs of a better futurity, and especially signs 
that the large class by whose toil we all live are rising 



324 CHANNING 

from the dust; and this faith is my only motive to what I 
now offer. 

The elevation of the laboring portion of society: this 
is our subject. I shall first consider in what this consists. 
I shall then consider some objections to its practicableness, 
and to this point shall devote no small part of the discus- 
sion; and shall close the subject with giving some grounds 
of my faith and hope in regard to the most numerous class 
of our fellow-beings. 

I. What is to be understood by the elevation of the labor- 
ing class? This is our first topic. To prevent misappre- 
hension, I will begin with stating what is not meant by it, 
in what it does not consist. — I say, then, that by the elevation 
of the laborer, I do not understand that he is to be raised 
above the need of labor. I do not expect a series of improve- 
ments, by which he is to be released from his daily work. 
Still more, I have no desire to dismiss him from his work- 
shop and farm, to take the spade and axe from his hand, 
and to make his life a long holiday. I have faith in labor, 
and I see the goodness of God in placing us in a world 
where labor alone can keep us alive. I would not change, 
if I could, our subjection to physical laws, our exposure to 
hunger and cold, and the necessity of constant conflicts 
with the material world. I would not, if I could, so temper 
the elements that they should infuse into us only grateful 
sensations, that they should make vegetation so exuberant 
as to anticipate every want, and the minerals so ductile 
as to offer no resistance to our strength and skill. Such 
a world would make a contemptible race. Man owes his 
growth, his energy, chiefly to that striving of the will, 
that conflict with difficulty, which we call effort. Easy, 
pleasant work does not make robust minds, does not give men 
a consciousness of their powers, does not train them to 
endurance, to perseverance, to steady force of will, that 
force without which all other acquisitions avail nothing. 
Manual labor is a school in which men are placed to get 
energy of purpose and character, — a vastly more important 
endowment than all the learning of all other schools. They 
are placed, indeed, under hard masters, physical sufferings 
and wants, the power of fearful elements, and the vicissitudes 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 325 

of all human things; but these stern teachers do a work 
which no compassionate, indulgent friend could do for us; 
and true wisdom will bless Providence for their sharp 
ministry. I have great faith in hard work. The material 
world does much for the mind by its beauty and order; but 
it does more for our minds by the pains it inflicts; by its 
obstinate resistance, which nothing but patient toil can over- 
come; by its vast forces, which nothing but unremitting 
skill and effort can turn to our use; by its perils, which 
demand continual vigilance; and by its tendencies to decay. 
I believe that difficulties are more important to the human 
mind than what we call assistances. Work we all must, if 
we mean to bring out and perfect our nature. Even if we 
do not work with the hands, we must undergo equivalent 
toil in some other direction. No business or study which 
does not present obstacles, tasking to the full the intellect 
and the will, is worthy of a man. In science, he who does 
not grapple with hard questions, who does not concentrate 
his whole intellect 'in vigorous attention, who does not aim 
to penetrate what at first repels him, will never attain 
to mental force. The uses of toil reach beyond the present 
world. The capacity of steady, earnest labor is, I apprehend, 
one of our great preparations for another state of being. 
When I see the vast amount of toil required of men, I 
feel that it must have important connection with their future 
existence; and that he who has met this discipline manfully 
has laid one essential foundation of improvement, exertion, 
and happiness in the world to come. You will here see that 
to me labor has great dignity. It is not merely the grand 
instrument by which the earth is overspread with fruit- 
fulness and beauty, and the ocean subdued, and matter 
wrought into innumerable forms for comfort and ornament. 
It has a far higher function, which is to give force to the 
will, efficiency, courage, the capacity of endurance, and of 
persevering devotion to far-reaching plans. Alas, for the 
man who has not learned to work! He is a poor creature. 
He does not know himself. He depends on others, with 
no capacity of making returns for the support they give; 
and let him not fancy that he has a monopoly of enjoyment. 
Ease, rest, owes its deliciousness to toil; and no toil is so 



326 CHANNING 

burdensome as the rest of him who has nothing to task and 
quicken his powers. 

I do not, then, desire to release the laborer from toil. 
This is not the elevation to be sought for him. Manual 
labor is a great good ; but, in so saying, I must be understood 
to speak of labor in its just proportions. In excess it does 
great harm. It is not a good, when made the sole work 
of life. It must be joined with higher means of improve- 
ment, or it degrades instead of exalting. Man has a various 
nature, which requires a variety of occupation and discipline 
for its growth. Study, meditation, society, and relaxation 
should be mixed up with his physical toils. He has intellect, 
heart, imagination, taste, as well as bones and muscles; and 
he is grievously wronged when compelled to exclusive drudg- 
ery for bodily subsistence. Life should be an alternation of 
employments, so diversified as to call the whole man into 
action. Unhappily our present civilization is far from realiz- 
ing this idea. It tends to increase the amount of manual 
toil, at the very time that it renders this toll less favorable 
to the culture of the mind. The division of labor, which 
distinguishes civilized from savage life, and to which we 
owe chiefly the perfection of the arts, tends to dwarf the 
intellectual powers, by confining the activity of the individual 
to a narrow range, to a few details, perhaps to the head- 
ing of pins, the pointing of nails, or the tying together 
of broken strings; so that while the savage has his faculties 
sharpened by various occupations, and by exposure to various 
perils, the civilized man treads a monotonous, stupefying 
round of unthinking toil. This cannot, must not, always be. 
Variety of action, corresponding to the variety of human 
powers, and fitted to develop all, is the most important 
element of human civilization. It should be the aim of 
philanthropists. In proportion as Christianity shall spread 
the spirit of brotherhood, there will and must be a more 
equal distribution of toils and means of improvement. That 
system of labor which saps the health, and shortens life, 
and famishes intellect, needs, and must receive, great modifi- 
cation. Still, labor in due proportion is an important part 
of our present lot. It is the condition of all outward com- 
forts and improvements, whilst, at the same time, it con- 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 327 

spires with higher means and influences in ministering to 
the vigor and growth of the soul. Let us not fight against 
it. We need this admonition, because at the present mo- 
ment there is a general disposition to shun labor; and this 
ought to be regarded as a bad sign of our times. The city 
is thronged with adventurers from the country, and the 
liberal professions are overstocked, in the hope of escaping 
the primeval sentence of living by the sweat of the brow ; 
and to this crowding of men into trade we owe not only the 
neglect of agriculture, but, what is far worse, the demoraliza- 
tion of the community. It generates excessive competition, 
which of necessity generates fraud. Trade is turned to 
gambling; and a spirit of mad speculation exposes public 
and private interests to a disastrous instability. It is, then, no 
part of the philanthropy which would elevate the laboring 
body, to exempt them from manual toil. In truth, a wise 
philanthropy would, if possible, persuade all men of all 
conditions to mix up a measure of this toil with their other 
pursuits. The body as well as the mind needs vigorous ex- 
ertion, and even the studious would be happier were they 
trained to labor as well as thought. Let us learn to re- 
gard manual toil as the true discipline of a man. Not a 
few of the wisest, grandest spirits have toiled at the work- 
bench and the plough. 

I have said that, by the elevation of the laboring mass, 
I do not mean that they are to be released from labor. I 
add, in the next place, .hat this elevation is not to be gained 
by efforts to force themselves into what are called the upper 
ranks of society. I wish them to rise, but I have no desire 
to transform them into gentlemen or ladies, according to 
the common acceptation of these terms. I desire for them 
not an outward and showy, but an inward and real change; 
not to give them new titles and an artificial rank, but 
substantial improvements and real claims to respect. I 
have no wish to dress them from a Parisian tailor's shop, 
or to teach them manners from a dancing-school. I have no 
desire to see them, at the end of the day, doff their working 
dress, that they may play a part in richly attired circles. 
I have no desire that they should be admitted to luxurious 
feasts, or should get a taste for gorgeous upholstery. There 



328 CHANNING 

is nothing cruel in the necessity which sentences the multi- 
tude of men to eat, dress, and lodge plainly and simply, 
especially where the sentence is executed so mildly as in 
this country. In this country, where the demand for labor 
is seldom interrupted, and the openings for enterprise are 
numerous beyond precedent, the laboring class, with few 
exceptions, may well be satisfied with their accommodations. 
Very many of them need nothing but a higher taste for 
beauty, order, and neatness, to give an air of refinement and 
grace as well as comfort to their establishments. In this 
country, the mass of laborers have their share of out- 
ward good. Their food, abundant and healthful, seasoned 
with the appetite which labor gives, is, on the whole, sweeter 
as well as healthier than the elaborate luxuries of the pros- 
perous; and their sleep is sounder and more refreshing 
than falls to the lot of the less employed. Were it a possible 
thing, I should be sorry to see them turned into men and 
women of fashion. Fashion is a poor vocation. Its creed, 
that idleness is a privilege, and work a disgrace, is among 
the deadliest errors. Without depth of thought, or earnest- 
ness of feeling, or strength of purpose, living an unreal life, 
sacrificing substance to show, substituting the factitious for 
the natural, mistaking a crowd for society,, finding its 
chief pleasure in ridicule, and exhausting its ingenuity 
in expedients for killing time, fashion is among the 
last influences under which a human being, who respects 
himself or who comprehends the great end of life, 
would desire to be placed. I use strong language, because 
I would combat the disposition, too common in the labor- 
ing mass, to regard what is called the upper class with 
envy or admiration. This disposition manifests itself among 
them in various forms. Thus, when one of their number 
prospers he is apt to forget his old acquaintance, and to 
work his way, if possible, into a more fashionable caste. 
As far, indeed, as he extends his acquaintance among the 
intelligent, refined, generous, and truly honorable, he makes 
a substantial improvement of his condition; but if, as is too 
often the case, he is admitted by way of favor into a circle 
which has few claims beyond those of greater luxury and 
show, and which bestows on him a patronizing, condescending 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 329 

notice, in exchange for his old, honorable influence among 
his original associates, he does any thing but rise. Such is 
not the elevation I desire for the laborer. I do not desire him 
to struggle into another rank. Let him not be a servile 
copyist of other classes, but aim at something higher than 
has yet been realized in any body of men. Let him not 
associate the idea of dignity or honor with certain modes 
of living, or certain outward connections. I would have 
every man stand on his own ground, and take his place 
among men according to personal endowments and worth, 
and not according to outward appendages ; and I would have 
every member of the community furnished with such means 
of improvement, that, if faithful to himself, he may need no 
outward appendage to attract the respect of all around him. 
I have said, that the people are not to be elevated by 
escaping labor, or by pressing into a different rank. Once 
more, I do not mean by the elevation of the people, that 
they should become self-important politicians; that, as 
individuals or a class, they should seize on political power; 
that by uniting their votes they should triumph over the 
more prosperous; or that they should succeed in bending 
the administration of government to their particular in- 
terests. An individual is not elevated by figuring in public 
affairs, or even by getting into office. He needs previous 
elevation to save him from disgrace in his public relations. 
To govern one's self, not others, is true glory. To serve 
through love, not to rule, is Christian greatness. Office is 
not dignity. The lowest men, because most faithless in 
principle, most servile to opinion, are to be found in office. 
I am sorry to say it, but the truth should be spoken, that, 
at the present moment, political action in this country does 
little to lift up any who are concerned in it. It stands in 
opposition to a high morality. Politics, indeed, regarded 
as the study and pursuit of the true, enduring good of a 
community, as the application of great unchangeable prin- 
ciples to public affairs, is a noble sphere of thought and 
action; but politics, in its common sense, or considered as 
the invention of temporary shifts, as the playing of a 
subtile game, as the tactics of party for gaining power and 
the spoils of office, and for elevating one set of men above 



330 CHANNING 

another, is a paltry and debasing concern. The laboring 
class are sometimes stimulated to seek power as a class, and 
this it is thought will raise them. But no class, as such, 
should bear rule among us. All conditions of society should 
be represented in the government, and alike protected by it; 
nor can any thing be expected but disgrace to the individual 
and the country from the success of any class in grasping at 
a monopoly of political power. I would by no means dis- 
courage the attention of the people to politics. They ought 
to study in earnest the interests of the country, the principles 
of our institutions, the tendencies of public measures. But 
the unhappiness is, they do not study; and, until they do, 
they cannot rise by political action. A great amount of 
time, which, if well used, would form an enlightened popu- 
lation, is now wasted on newspapers and conversations, 
which inflame the passions, which unscrupulously distort the 
truth, which denounce moral independence as treachery to 
one's party, which agitate the country for no higher end 
than a triumph over opponents; and thus multitudes are 
degraded into men-worshippers or men-haters, into the 
dupes of the ambitious, or the slaves of a faction. To rise, 
the people must substitute reflection for passion. There is 
no other way. By these remarks, I do not mean to charge 
on the laboring class all the passionateness of the country. 
All classes partake of the madness, and all are debased by 
it. The fiery spirits are not confined to one portion of the 
community. The men, whose ravings resound through the 
halls of Congress, and are then circulated through the coun- 
try as eloquence, are not taken from among those who toil. 
Party prejudices break out as fiercely on the exchange, and 
even in the saloon, as in the workshop. The disease has 
spread everywhere. Yet it does not dishearten me, for 
I see that it admits of mitigation, if not of cure. I trust 
that these lectures, and other sources of intellectual enjoy- 
ment now opening to the public, will abate the fever of 
political excitement, by giving better occupation to the 
mind. Much, too, may be hoped from the growing self- 
respect of the people, which will make them shrink in- 
dignantly from the disgrace of being used as blinded parti- 
sans and unreflecting tools. Much also is to be hoped from 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 331 

the discovery, which must sooner or later be made, that the 
importance of government is enormously overrated, that 
it does not deserve all this stir, that there are vastly more 
effectual means of human happiness. Political institutions 
are to be less and less deified, and to shrink into a nar- 
rower space; and just in proportion as a wiser estimate of 
government prevails, the present frenzy of political ex- 
citement will be discovered and put to shame. 

I have now said what I do not mean by the elevation 
of the laboring classes. It is not an outward change of 
condition. It is not release from labor. It is not strug- 
gling for another rank. It is not political power. I 
understand something deeper. I know but one elevation 
of a human being, and that is elevation of soul. With- 
out this, it matters nothing where a man stands or what 
he possesses; and with it, he towers, he is one of God's 
nobility, no matter what place he holds in the social 
scale. There is but one elevation for a laborer, and 
for all other men. There are not different kinds of dignity 
for different orders of men, but one and the same to all. 
The only elevation of a human being consists in the exercise, 
growth, energy of the higher principles and powers of his 
soul. A bird may be shot upward to the skies by a foreign 
force; but it rises, in the true sense of the word, only when 
it spreads its own wings and soars by its own living power. 
So a man may be thrust upward into a conspicuous place 
by outward accidents; but he rises, only in so far as he 
exerts himself, and expands his best faculties, and ascends 
by a free effort to a nobler region of thought and action. 
Such is the elevation I desire for the laborer, and I desire 
no other. This elevation is indeed to be aided by an im- 
provement of his outward condition, and in turn it greatly 
improves his outward lot; and thus connected, outward 
good is real and great; but supposing it to exist in separa- 
tion from inward growth and life, it would be nothing 
worth, nor would I raise a finger to promote it. 

I know it will be said, that such elevation as I have 
spoken of is not and cannot be within the reach of the 
laboring multitude, and of consequence they ought not to be 
tantalized with dreams of its attainment. It will be said 



332 CHANNING 

that the principal part of men are plainly designed to work 
on matter for the acquisition of material and corporeal 
good, and that, in such, the spirit is of necessity too wedded 
to matter to rise above it. This objection will be consid- 
ered by and by; but I would just observe, in passing, that 
the objector must have studied very carelessly the material 
world, if he suppose that it is meant to be the grave of 
the minds of most of those who occupy it. Matter was 
made for spirit, body for mind. The mind, the spirit, is 
the end of this living organization of flesh and bones, of 
nerves and muscles; and the end of this vast system of sea 
and land, and air and skies. This unbounded creation of 
sun, and moon, and stars, and clouds, and seasons, was not or- 
dained merely to feed and clothe the body, but first and 
supremely to awaken, nourish, and expand the soul, to be 
the school of the intellect, the nurse of thought and imagina- 
tion, the field for the active powers, a revelation of the 
Creator, and a bond of social union. We were placed in 
the material creation, not to be its slaves, but to master it, 
and to make it a minister to our highest powers. It is in- 
teresting to observe how much the material world does for 
the mind. Most of the sciences, arts, professions, and oc- 
cupations of life, grow out of our connection with matter. 
The natural philosopher, the physician, the lawyer, the 
artist, and the legislator, find the objects or occasions of 
their researches in matter. The poet borrows his beautiful 
imagery from matter. The sculptor and painter express 
their noble conceptions through matter. Material wants 
rouse the world to activity. The material organs of sense, 
especially the eye, wake up infinite thoughts in the mind. 
To maintain, then, that the mass of men are and must be 
so immersed in matter, that their souls cannot rise, is to 
contradict the great end of their connection with matter. 
I maintain that the philosophy which does not see, in the laws 
and phenomena of outward nature, the means of awakening 
mind, is lamentably short-sighted; and that a state of so- 
ciety which leaves the mass of men to be crushed and 
famished in soul by excessive toils on matter is at war with 
God's designs, and turns into means of bondage what was 
meant to free and expand the soul. 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 333 

Elevation of soul, this is to be desired for the laborer 
as for every human being; and what does this mean? The 
phrase, I am aware, is vague, and often serves for mere 
declamation. Let me strive to convey some precise ideas 
of it; and in doing this, I can use no language which will 
save the hearer from the necessity of thought. The subject 
is a spiritual one. It carries us into the depths of our own 
nature, and I can say nothing about it worth saying, without 
tasking your powers of attention, without demanding some 
mental toil. I know that these lectures are meant for enter- 
tainment rather than mental labor; but, as I have told you, 
I have great faith in labor, and I feel that I cannot be more 
useful than in exciting the hearer to some vigorous action 
of mind. 

Elevation of soul, in what does this consist? Without 
aiming at philosophical exactness, I shall convey a suffi- 
ciently precise idea of it, by saying that it consists, first, 
in force of thought exerted for the acquisition of truth; 
secondly, in force of pure and generous feeling; thirdly, in 
force of moral purpose. Each of these topics needs a lec- 
ture for its development. I must confine myself to the 
first; from which, however, you may learn in a measure my 
views of the other two. — Before entering on this topic, let 
me offer one preliminary remark. To every man who would 
rise in dignity as a man, be he rich or poor, ignorant or 
instructed, there is one essential condition, one effort, one 
purpose, without which not a step can be taken. He must 
resolutely purpose and labor to free himself from whatever 
he knows to be wrong in his motives and life. He who 
habitually allows himself in any known crime or wrong- 
doing, effectually bars his progress towards a higher intel- 
lectual and moral life. On this point every man should 
deal honestly with himself. If he will not listen to his 
conscience, rebuking him for violations of plain duty, let 
him not dream of self-elevation. The foundation is wanting. 
He will build, if at all, in sand. 

I now proceed to my main subject. I have said that the 
elevation of a man is to be sought, or rather consists, first, 
in force of thought exerted for the acquisition of truth; 
and to this I ask your serious attention. Thought, thought, 



334 CHANNING 

is the fundamental distinction of mind, and the great work 
of life. All that a man does outwardly is but the expression 
and completion of his inward thought. To work effectually, 
he must think clearly. To act nobly, he must think nobly. 
Intellectual force is a principal element of the soul's life, and 
should be proposed by every man as a principal end of his be- 
ing. It is common to distinguish between the intellect and the 
conscience, between the power of thought and virtue, and to 
say that virtuous action is worth more than strong thinking. 
But we mutilate our nature by thus drawing lines between ac- 
tions or energies of the soul, which are intimately, indissolubly 
bound together. The head and the heart are not more vitally 
connected than thought and virtue. Does not conscience 
include, as a part of itself, the noblest action of the intellect 
or reason? Do we not degrade it by making it a mere 
feeling? Is it not something more? Is it not a wise dis- 
cernment of the right, the holy, the good? Take away 
thought from virtue, and what remains worthy of a man? 
Is not high virtue more than blind instinct? Is it not 
founded on, and does it not include clear, bright perceptions 
of what is lovely and grand in character and action? With- 
out power of thought, what we call conscientiousness, or a 
desire to do right, shoots out into illusion, exaggeration, per- 
nicious excess. The most cruel deeds on earth have been 
perpetrated in the name of conscience. Men have hated 
and murdered one another from a sense of duty. The worst 
frauds have taken the name of pious. Thought, intelligence, 
is the dignity of a man, and no man is rising but in propor- 
tion as he is learning to think clearly and forcibly, or direct- 
ing the energy of his mind to the acquisition of truth. Every 
man, in whatsoever condition, is to be a student. No matter 
what other vocation he may have, his chief vocation is to 
Think. 

I say every man is to be a student, a thinker. This does 
not mean that he is to shut himself within four walls, and 
bend his body and mind over books. Men thought before 
books were written, and some of the greatest thinkers never 
entered what we call a study. Nature, Scripture, society, 
and life, present perpetual subjects for thought; and the 
man who collects, concentrates, employs his faculties on any 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 335 

of these subjects for the purpose of getting the truth, is so 
far a student, a thinker, a philosopher, and is rising to the 
dignity of a man. It is time that we should cease to limit 
to professed scholars the titles of thinkers, philosophers. 
Whoever seeks truth with an earnest mind, no matter when 
or how, belongs to the school of intellectual men. 

In a loose sense of the word, all men may be said to think ; 
that is, a succession of ideas, notions, passes through their 
minds from morning to night ; but in as far as this succession 
is passive, undirected, or governed only by accident and out- 
ward impulse, it has little more claim to dignity than the 
experience of the brute, who receives, with like passiveness, 
sensations from abroad through his waking hours. Such 
thought, if thought it may be called, having no aim, is as 
useless as the vision of an eye which rests on nothing, which 
flies without pause over earth and sky, and of consequence 
receives no distinct image. Thought, in its true sense, is 
an energy of intellect. In thought, the mind not only re- 
ceives impressions or suggestions from without or within, 
but reacts upon them, collects its attention, concentrates its 
forces upon them, breaks them up and analyzes them like a 
living laboratory, and then combines them anew, traces their 
connections, and thus impresses itself on all the objects 
which engage it. 

The universe in which we live was plainly meant by God 
to stir up such thought as has now been described. It is 
full of difficulty and mystery, and can only be penetrated and 
unravelled by the concentration of the intellect. Every 
object, even the simplest in nature and society, every event 
of life, is made up of various elements subtly bound to- 
gether; so that, to understand anything, we must reduce it 
from its complexity to its parts and principles, and examine 
their relations to one another. Nor is this all. Every thing 
which enters the mind not only contains a depth of mystery 
in itself, but is connected by a thousand ties with all other 
things. The universe is not a disorderly, disconnected heap, 
but a beautiful whole, stamped throughout with unity, so as 
to be an image of the One Infinite Spirit. Nothing stands 
alone. All things are knit together, each existing for all 
and all for each. The humblest object has infinite connec- 



336 CHANNING 

tions. The vegetable, which you saw on your table to-day, 
came to you from the first plant which God made to grow- 
on the earth, and was the product of the rains and sunshine 
of six thousand years. Such a universe demands thought 
to be understood; and we are placed in it to think, to put 
forth the power within, to look beneath the surface of things, 
to look beyond particular facts and events to their causes 
and effects, to their reasons and ends, their mutual influences, 
their diversities and resemblances, their proportions and 
harmonies, and the general laws which bind them together. 
This is what I mean by thinking; and by such thought the 
mind rises to a dignity which humbly represents the great- 
ness of the Divine intellect; that is, it rises more and more 
to consistency of views, to broad general principles, to uni- 
versal truths, to glimpses of the order and harmony and 
infinity of the Divine system, and thus to a deep, enlightened 
veneration of the Infinite Father. Do not be startled, as if I 
were holding out an elevation of mind utterly to be despaired 
of; for all thinking, which aims honestly and earnestly to 
see things as they are, to see them in their connections, and 
to bring the loose, conflicting ideas of the mind into con- 
sistency and harmony, all such thinking, no matter in what 
sphere, is an approach to the dignity of which I speak. You 
are all capable of the thinking which I recommend. You 
have all practised it in a degree. The child, who casts an 
inquiring eye on a new toy, and breaks it to pieces that he 
may discover the mysterious cause of its movements, has 
begun the work of which I speak, has begun to be a philos- 
opher, has begun to penetrate the unknown, to seek con- 
sistency and harmony of thought; and let him go on as he 
has begun, and make it one great business of life to inquire 
into the elements, connections, and reasons of whatever he 
witnesses in his own breast, or in society, or in outward 
nature, and, be his condition what it may, he will rise by 
degrees to a freedom and force of thought, to a breadth and 
unity of views, which will be to him an inward revelation 
and promise of the intellectual greatness for which he was 
created. 

You will observe, that in speaking of force of thought 
as the elevation of the laborer and of every human being, 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 337 

I have continually supposed this force to be exerted for 
the purpose of acquiring truth. I beg you never to lose 
sight of this motive, for it is essential to intellectual dignity. 
Force of thought may be put forth for other purposes, — 
to amass wealth for selfish gratification, to give the individ- 
ual power over others, to blind others, to weave a web of 
sophistry, to cast a deceitful lustre on vice, to make the 
worse appear the better cause. But energy of thought so 
employed, is suicidal. The intellect, in becoming a pander 
to vice, a tool of the passions, an advocate of lies, becomes 
not only degraded, but diseased. It loses the capacity of 
distinguishing truth from falsehood, good from evil, right 
from wrong; it becomes as worthless as an eye which can- 
not distinguish between colors or forms. Woe to that mind 
which wants the love of truth ! For want of this, genius 
has become a scourge to the world, its breath a poisonous 
exhalation, its brightness a seducer into paths of pestilence 
and death. Truth is the light of the Infinite Mind, and the 
image of God in his creatures. Nothing endures but truth. 
The dreams, fictions, theories, which men would substitute 
for it, soon die. Without its guidance effort is vain, and 
hope baseless. Accordingly, the love of truth, a deep thirst 
for it, a deliberate purpose to seek it and hold it fast, 
may be considered as the very foundation of human culture 
and dignity. Precious as thought is, the love of truth is 
still more precious; for without it, thought — thought wan- 
ders and wastes itself, and precipitates men into guilt and 
misery. There is no greater defect in education and the 
pulpit than that they inculcate so little an impartial, earnest, 
reverential love of truth, a readiness to toil, to live and die 
for it. Let the laboring man be imbued in a measure with 
this spirit; let him learn to regard himself as endowed with 
the power of thought, for the very end of acquiring truth; 
let him learn to regard truth as more precious than his 
daily bread ; and the spring of true and perpetual elevation is 
touched within him. He has begun to be a man ; he becomes 
one of the elect of his race. Nor do I despair of this eleva- 
tion of the laborer. Unhappily little, almost nothing, has 
been done as yet to inspire either rich or poor with the 
love of truth for its own sake, or for the life, and in- 



338 CHANNING 

spiration, and dignity it gives to the soul. The prosperous 
have as little of this principle as the laboring mass. I think, 
indeed, that the spirit of luxurious, fashionable life, is more 
hostile to it than the hardships of the poor. Under a wise 
culture, this principle may be awakened in all classes, and 
wherever awakened, it will form philosophers, successful 
and noble thinkers. These remarks seem to me particularly 
important, as showing how intimate a union subsists between 
the moral and intellectual nature, and how both must work 
together from the beginning. All human culture rests on 
a moral foundation, on an impartial, disinterested spirit, 
on a willingness to make sacrifices to the truth. Without 
this moral power, mere force of thought avails nothing 
towards our elevation. 

I am aware that I shall be told that the work of thought 
which I have insisted on is difficult, — that to collect and 
concentrate the mind for the truth is harder than to toil 
with the hands. Be it so. But are we weak enough to hope 
to rise without toil? Does any man, laborer or not, expect 
to invigorate body or mind without strenuous effort? 
Does not the child grow and get strength by throwing a 
degree of hardship and vehemence and conflict into his very 
sports? Does not life without difficulty become insipid and 
joyless? Cannot a strong interest turn difficulty into pleas- 
ure? Let the love of truth, of which I have spoken, be 
awakened, and obstacles in the way to it will whet, not dis- 
courage, the mind, and inspire a new delight into its 
acquisition. 

I have hitherto spoken of force of thought in general. 
My views will be given more completely and distinctly, 
by considering, next, the objects on which this force 
is to be exerted. These may be reduced to two classes, 
matter and mind — the physical world which falls under 
our eyes, and the spiritual world, The working man 
is particularly called to make matter his study, because his 
business is to work on it, and he works more wisely, ef- 
fectually, cheerfully, and honorably, in proportion as he 
knows what he acts upon, knows the laws and forces 
of which he avails himself, understands the reason of what 
he does, and can explain the changes which fall under his 



/ 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 339 

eye. Labor becomes a new thing when thought is thrown 
into it, when the mind keeps pace with the hands. Every 
farmer should study chemistry, so as to understand the 
elements or ingredients which enter into soils, vegetation, 
and manures, and the laws according to which they com- 
bine with and are loosened from one another. So, the me- 
chanic should understand the mechanical powers, the laws of 
motion, and the history and composition of the various sub- 
stances which he works on. Let me add, that the farmer 
and the mechanic should cultivate the perception of beauty. 
What a charm and new value might the farmer add to his 
grounds and cottage, were he a man of taste ! The product 
of the mechanic, be it great or small, a house or a shoe, is 
worth more, sometimes much more, if he can succeed in 
giving it the grace of proportion. In France, it is not un- 
common to teach drawing to mechanics, that they may get 
a quick eye and a sure hand, and may communicate to their 
works the attraction of beauty. Every man should aim 
to impart this perfection to his labors. The more of mind 
we carry into toil, the better. Without a habit of thought, 
a man works more like a brute or machine than like a man. 
With it, his soul is kept alive amidst his toils. He learns 
to fix an observing eye on the processes of his trade, catches 
hints which abridge labor, gets glimpses of important dis- 
coveries, and is sometimes able to perfect his art. Even now, 
after all the miracles of invention which honor our age, 
we little suspect what improvements of machinery are to 
spring from spreading intelligence and natural science among 
workmen. 

But I do not stop here. Nature is to engage our force 
of thought, not simply for the aid which the knowledge of 
it gives in working, but for a higher end. Nature should 
be studied for its own sake, because so wonderful a work 
of God, because impressed with his perfection, because radi- 
ant with beauty, and grandeur, and wisdom, and beneficence. 
A laborer, like every other man, is to be liberally educated, 
that is, he is to get knowledge, not only for his bodily 
subsistence, but for the life, and growth, and elevation of 
his mind. Am I asked, whether I expect the laborer to 
traverse the whole circle of the physical sciences? Certainly 



340 CHANNING 

not; nor do I expect the merchant, or the lawyer, or 
preacher to do it. Nor is this at all necessary to elevation 
of soul. The truths of physical science, which give greatest 
dignity to the mind, are those general laws of the creation 
which it has required ages to unfold, but which an active 
mind, bent on self -enlargement, may so far study and com- 
prehend, as to interpret the changes of nature perpetually 
taking place around us, as to see in all the forces of the 
universe the workings of one Infinite Power, and in all its 
arrangements the manifestation of one unsearchable wisdom. 
And this leads me to observe the second great object on 
which force of thought is to be exerted, and that is mind, 
spirit, comprehending under this word God and all his intel- 
ligent offspring. This is the subject of what are called 
the metaphysical and moral sciences. This is the grand field 
for thought; for the outward, material world is the shadow 
of the spiritual, and made to minister to it. This study is 
of vast extent. It comprehends theology, metaphysics, moral 
philosophy, political science, history, literature. This is a 
formidable list, and it may seem to include a vast amount 
of knowledge which is necessarily placed beyond the reach 
of the laborer. But it is an interesting thought, that the 
key to these various sciences is given to every human being 
in his own nature, so that they are peculiarly accessible 
to him. How is it that I get my ideas of God, of my fel- 
low-creatures, of the deeds, suffering, motives, which make 
up universal history? I comprehend all these from the 
consciousness of what passes in my own soul. The mind 
within me is a type representative of all others, and there- 
fore I can understand all. Whence come my conceptions 
of the intelligence, and justice, and goodness, and power of 
God? It is because my own spirit contains the germs of 
these attributes. The ideas of them are first derived from 
my own nature, and therefore I comprehend them in other 
beings. Thus the foundation of all the sciences which 
treat of mind is laid in every man's breast. The good 
man is exercising in his business and family faculties and 
affections which bear a likeness to the attributes of the 
Divinity, and to the energies which have made the 
greatest men illustrious; so that in studying himself, in 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 341 

learning the highest principles and laws of his own soul, 
he is in truth studying God, studying all human history, 
studying the philosophy which has immortalized the sages 
of ancient and modern times. In every man's mind and life 
all other minds and lives are more or less represented and 
wrapped up. To study other things, I must go into the 
outward world, and perhaps go far. To study the science 
of spirit, I must come home and enter my own soul. The 
profoundest books that have ever been written do nothing 
more than bring out, place in clear light, what is passing in 
each of your minds. So near you, so within you, is the 
grandest truth. 

I have, indeed, no expectation that the laborer is to under- 
stand in detail the various sciences which relate to mind. 
Few men in any vocation do so understand them. Nor is it 
necessary; though, where time can be commanded, the 
thorough study of some particular branch, in which the 
individual has a special interest, will be found of great 
utility. What is needed to elevate the soul is, not that a 
man should know ail that has been thought and written in 
regard to the spiritual nature, not that a man should be- 
come an encyclopaedia, but that the great ideas, in which 
all discoveries terminate, which sum up all sciences, which 
the philosopher extracts from infinite details, may be com- 
prehended and felt. It is not the quantity but the quality 
of knowledge which determines the mind's dignity. A 
man of immense information may, through the want of 
large and comprehensive ideas, be far inferior in intellect 
to a laborer, who, with little knowledge, has yet seized on 
great truths. For example, I do not expect the laborer to 
study theology in the ancient languages, in the writings of 
the Fathers, in the history of sects, &c, &c. ; nor is this 
needful. All theology, scattered as it is through countless 
volumes, is summed up in the idea of God; and let this idea 
shine bright and clear in the laborer's soul and he has the 
essence of theological libraries, and a far higher light than 
has visited thousands of renowned divines. A great mind 
is formed by a few great ideas, not by an infinity of loose 
details. I have known very learned men who seemed to 
me very poor in intellect, because they had no grand 



342 CHANNING 

thoughts. What avails it that a man has studied ever so 
minutely the histories of Greece and Rome, if the great 
ideas of freedom, and beauty, and valor, and spiritual en- 
ergy, have not been kindled by these records into living 
fires in his soul? The illumination of an age does not con- 
sist in the amount of its knowledge, but in the broad and 
noble principles of which that knowledge is the foundation 
and inspirer. The truth is, that the most laborious and suc- 
cessful student is confined in his researches to a very few of 
God's works; but this limited knowledge of things may still 
suggest universal laws, broad principles, grand ideas, and 
these elevate the mind. There are certain thoughts, prin- 
ciples, ideas, which by their nature rule over all knowledge, 
which are intrinsically glorious, quickening, all-comprehend- 
ing, eternal, and with these I desire to enrich the mind of 
the laborer and of every human being. 

To illustrate my meaning, let me give a few examples 
of the great ideas which belong to the study or science 
of mind. Of course, the first of these, the grandest, the 
most comprehensive, is the idea of God, the Parent Mind, 
the Primitive and Infinite Intelligence. Every man's eleva- 
tion is to be measured first and chiefly by his conception of 
this Great Being; and to attain a just, and bright, and 
quickening knowledge of Him, is the highest aim of thought. 
In truth, the great end of the universe, of revelation, of 
life, is to develop in us the idea of God. Much earnest, 
patient, laborious thought is required to see this Infinite 
Being as He is, to rise above the low, gross notions of the 
Divinity, which rush in upon us from our passions, from 
our selfish partialities, and from the low-minded world around 
us. There is one view of God particularly suited to ele- 
vate us. I mean the view of Him as the " Father of our 
spirits ; " as having created us with great powers to grow 
up to perfection; as having ordained all outward things 
to minister to the progress of the soul; as always present 
to inspire and strengthen us, to wake us up to inward life, 
and to judge and rebuke our wrong-doing; as looking with 
parental joy on our resistance of evil; as desiring to com- 
municate himself to our minds for ever. This one idea, 
expanded in the breast of the laborer, is a germ of eleva- 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 343 

tion more fruitful than all science, no matter how extensive 
or profound, which treats only of outward finite things. It 
places him in the first rank of human beings. You hear of 
great theologians. He only deserves the name, be his con- 
dition what it may, who has, by thought and obedience, 
purified and enlarged his conception of God. 

From the idea of God, I proceed to another grand one, 
that of man, of human nature; and this should be the 
object of serious, intense thought. Few men know, as yet, 
what a man is. They know his clothes, his complexion, his 
property, his rank, his follies, and his outward life. But 
the thought of his inward being, his proper humanity, has 
hardly dawned on multitudes ; and yet, who can live a man's 
life that does not know what is the distinctive worth of a 
human being? It is interesting to observe how faithful 
men generally are to their idea of a man; how they act up 
to it. Spread the* notion that courage is true manhood, and 
how many will die rather than fall short of that standard; 
and hence, the true idea of a man, brought out in the 
laborer's mind, elevates him above every other class who 
may want it. Am I asked for my conception of the dignity 
of a human being? I should say, that it consists, first, in 
that spiritual principle, called sometimes the reason, some- 
times the conscience, which, rising above what is local and 
temporary, discerns immutable truth and everlasting right; 
which, in the midst of imperfect things, conceives of perfec- 
tion; which is universal and impartial, standing in direct 
opposition to the partial, selfish principles of human nature; 
which says to me with authority, that my neighbor is as 
precious as myself, and his rights as sacred as my own; 
which commands me to receive all truth, however it may 
war with my pride, and to do all justice, however it may 
conflict with my interest ; and which calls me to rejoice with 
love in all that is beautiful, good, holy, happy, in whatever 
being these attributes may be found. This principle is a 
ray of Divinity in man. We do not know what man is, 
still something of the celestial grandeur of this principle in 
the soul may be discerned. There is another grand view of 
man, included indeed in the former, yet deserving distinct 
notice. He is a free being; created to act from a spring in 



344 CHANNING 

his own breast, to form himself and to decide his own 
destiny; connected intimately with nature, but not enslaved 
to it; connected still more strongly with God, yet not en- 
slaved even to the Divinity, but having power to render 
or withhold the service due to his Creator; encompassed 
by a thousand warring forces, by physical elements which 
inflict pleasure and pain, by dangers seen and unseen, by 
the influences of a tempting, sinful world, yet endued by 
God with power to contend with all, to perfect himself by 
conflict with the very forces which threaten to overwhelm 
him. Such is the idea of a man. Happy he in whom it is 
unfolded by earnest thought! 

Had I time, I should be glad to speak of other great 
ideas belonging to the science of mind, and which sum up 
and give us, in one bright expression, the speculations of 
ages. The idea of human life, of its true end and greatness; 
the idea of virtue, as the absolute and ultimate good; the 
idea of liberty, which is the highest thought of political 
science, and which, by its intimate presence to the minds 
of the people, is the chief spring of our country's life and 
greatness, — all these might be enlarged on; and I might 
show how these may be awakened in the laborer, and may 
give him an elevation which many who are above labor 
want. But, leaving all these, I will only refer to another, one 
of the most important results of the science of mind, and 
which the laborer, in common with every man, may and 
should receive, and should strengthen by patient thought. 
It is the idea of his importance as an individual. He is to 
understand that he has a value, not as belonging to a com- 
munity, and contributing to a general good which is distinct 
from himself, but on his own account. He is not a mere 
part of a machine. In a machine the parts are useless, but 
as conducing to the end of the whole, for which alone they 
subsist. Not so a man. He is not simply a means, but 
an end, and exists for his own sake, for the unfolding of 
his nature, for his own virtue and happiness. True, he 
is to work for others, but not servilely, not with a broken 
spirit, not so as to degrade himself : he is to work for others 
from a wise self-regard, from principles of justice and 
benevolence, and in the exercise of a free will and intel- 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 345 

ligence, by which his own character is perfected. His 
individual dignity, not derived from birth, from success, from 
wealth, from outward show, but consisting in the inde- 
structible principles of his soul, — this ought to enter into his 
habitual consciousness. I do not speak rhetorically or use 
the cant of rhapsodists, but I utter my calm, deliberate con- 
viction, when I say that the laborer ought to regard him- 
self with a self-respect unknown to the proudest monarch 
who rests on outward rank. 

I have now illustrated what I mean by the great ideas 
which exalt the mind. Their worth and power cannot be 
exaggerated. They are the mightiest influences on earth. 
One great thought breathed into a man may regenerate him. 
The idea of freedom in ancient and modern republics, the 
idea of inspiration in various religious sects, the idea of 
immortality, how have these triumphed over worldly in- 
terests ! How many heroes and martyrs have they formed ! 
Great ideas are mightier than the passions. To awaken 
them is the highest office of education. As yet it has been 
little thought of. The education of the mass of the people 
has consisted in giving them mechanical habits, in breaking 
them to current usages and modes of thinking, in teaching 
religion and morality as traditions. It is time that a rational 
culture should take the place of mechanical ; that men should 
learn to act more from ideas and principles, and less from 
blind impulse and undiscerning imitation. 

Am I met here by the constantly recurring objection, that 
such great thoughts as have now been treated of are not to 
be expected in the multitude of men whose means of culture 
are so confined? To this difficulty I shall reply in the next 
lecture; but I wish to state a fact, or law of our nature, 
very cheering to those who, with few means, still pant 
for generous improvement. It is this, that great ideas 
come to us less from outward, direct, laborious teach- 
ing, than from indirect influences, and from the native 
working of our own minds; so that those who want 
the outward apparatus for extensive learning are not 
cut off from them. Thus, laborious teachers may in- 
struct us for years in God, and virtue, and the soul, and 
we may remain nearly as ignorant of them as at the begin- 



346 CHANNING 

ning; whilst a look, a tone, an act of a fellow-creature, who 
is kindled by a grand thought, and who is thrown in our 
path at some susceptible season of life, will do much to 
awaken and expand this thought within us. It is a matter 
of experience that the greatest ideas often come to us r 
when right-minded, we know not how. They flash on us 
as lights from heaven. A man seriously given to the culture 
of his mind in virtue and truth finds himself under better 
teaching than that of man. Revelations of his own soul, 
of God's intimate presence, of the grandeur of the creation, 
of the glory of disinterestedness, of the deformity of 
wrong-doing, of the dignity of universal justice, of the might 
of moral principle, of the immutableness of truth, of immor- 
tality, and of the inward sources of happiness; these revela- 
tions, awakening a thirst for something higher than he is 
or has, come of themselves to an humble, self-improving 
man. Sometimes a common scene in nature, one of the 
common relations of life, will open itself to us with a bright- 
ness and pregnancy of meaning unknown before. Sometimes 
a thought of this kind forms an era in life. It changes the 
whole future course. It is a new creation. And these 
great ideas are not confined to men of any class. They 
are communications of the Infinite Mind to all minds which 
are open to their reception; and labor is a far better con- 
dition for their reception than luxurious or fashionable life. 
It is even better than a studious life, when this fosters vanity, 
pride, and the spirit of jealous competition. A childlike 
simplicity attracts these revelations more than a selfish cul- 
ture of intellect, however far extended. — Perhaps a caution 
should be added to these suggestions. In speaking of great 
ideas, as sometimes springing up of themselves, as sudden 
illuminations, I have no thought of teaching that we are to 
wait for them passively, or to give up our minds unthink- 
ingly to their control. We must prepare ourselves for 
them by faithfulness to our own powers, by availing our- 
selves of all means of culture within our reach; and, what 
is more, these illuminations, if they come, are not distinct, 
complete, perfect views, but glimpses, suggestions, flashes, 
given us, like all notices and impressions from the outward 
world, to be thought upon, to be made subjects of patient 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 347 

reflection, to be brought by our own intellect and activity 
into their true connection with all our other thoughts. A 
great idea, without reflection, may dazzle and bewilder, may 
destroy the balance and proportion of the mind, and impel 
to dangerous excess. It is to awaken the free, earnest ex- 
ertion of our powers, to rouse us from passiveness to activity 
and life, that inward inspirations, and the teachings of out- 
ward nature, are accorded to the mind. 

I have thus spoken at large of that force of thought 
which the laborer is to seek as his true elevation; and 
I will close the subject with observing, that on what- 
ever objects or for whatever purposes this force may 
be exerted, one purpose should be habitually predomi- 
nant, and that is, to gain a larger, clearer compre- 
hension of all the duties of life. Thought cannot take too 
wide a range; but its chief aim should be to acquire juster 
and brighter perceptions of the right and the good, in every 
relation and condition in which we may be placed. Do not 
imagine that I am here talking professionally, or sliding 
unconsciously, by the force of habit, into the tone of the 
pulpit. The subject of duty belongs equally to all pro- 
fessions and all conditions. It were as wise to think of 
living without breath, or of seeing without light, as to 
exclude moral and religious principle from the work of self- 
elevation. And I say this, because you are in danger of 
mistaking mere knowledge for improvement. Knowledge 
fails of its best end when it does not minister to a high 
virtue. I do not say that we are never to think, read, 
or study, but for the express purpose of learning our duties. 
The mind must not be tied down by rigid rules. Curiosity, 
amusement, natural tastes, may innocently direct reading 
and study to a certain extent. Even in these cases, however, 
we are bound to improve ourselves morally as well as 
intellectually, by seeking truth and rejecting falsehood, and 
by watching against the taint which inheres in almost all 
human productions. What avails intellectual without moral 
power? How little does it avail us to study the outward 
world, if its greatness inspire no reverence of its Author, 
if its beneficence awaken no kindred love towards our fellow- 
creatures! How little does it avail us to study history, if 



348 CHANNING 

the past do not help us to comprehend the dangers and duties 
of the present; if from the sufferings of those who have 
gone before us, we do not learn how to suffer, and from their 
great and good deeds how to act nobly; if the development 
of the human heart, in different ages and countries, do 
not give us a better knowledge of ourselves ! How little 
does literature benefit us, if the sketches of life and character, 
the generous sentiments, the testimonies to disinterestedness 
and rectitude, with which it abounds, do not incite and 
guide us to wiser, purer, and more graceful action ! How 
little substantial good do we derive from poetry and the fine 
arts, if the beauty, which delights the imagination, do not 
warm and refine the heart, and raise us to the love and 
admiration of what is fair, and perfect, and lofty, in char- 
acter and life ! \ Let our studies be as wide as our con- 
dition will allow; but let this be their highest aim, to in- 
struct us in our duty and happiness, in the perfection of our 
nature, in the true use of life, in the best direction of our 
powers. Then is the culture of intellect an unmixed good, 
when it is sacredly used to enlighten the conscience, to feed 
the flame of generous sentiment, to perfect us in our com- 
mon employments, to throw a grace over our common actions, 
to make us sources of innocent cheerfulness and centres of 
holy influence, and to give us courage, strength, stability, 
amidst the sudden changes and sore temptations and trials 
of life. 



LECTURE II 

IN my last lecture I invited your attention to a subject of 
great interest, — the elevation of the laboring portion of 
the community. I proposed to consider, first, in what this 
elevation consists; secondly the objections which may be made 
to its practicableness ; thirdly, the circumstances which now 
favor it, and gives us hope that it will be more and more 
accomplished. In considering the first head, I began with 
stating in what the elevation of the laboring class does not 
consist, and then proceeded to show positively what it is, 
what it does consist in. I want time to retrace the ground 
over which we then travelled. I must trust to your memo- 
ries. I was obliged by my narrow limits to confine myself 
chiefly to the consideration of the intellectual elevation which 
the laborer is to propose; though, in treating this topic, I 
showed the moral, religious, social improvements which 
enter into his true dignity. I observed that the laborer 
was to be a student, a thinker, an intellectual man, as well 
as a laborer; and suggested the qualifications of this truth 
which are required by this peculiar employment, by his daily 
engagement in manual toil. I now come to consider the 
objections which spring up in many minds, when such views 
of the laborer's destiny are given. This is our second head. 
First, it will be objected, that the laboring multitude can- 
not command a variety of books, or spend much time in read- 
ing ; and how, then, can they gain the force of thought, and 
the great ideas, which were treated of in the former lec- 
ture? This objection grows out of the prevalent disposition 
to confound intellectual improvement with book-learning. 
Some seem to think that there is a kind of magic in a printed 
page, that types give a higher knowledge than can be gained 
from other sources. Reading is considered as the royal 
road to intellectual eminence. This prejudice I have vir- 

349 



350 CHANNING 

tually set aside in my previous remarks; but it has taken 
so strong a hold of many as to need some consideration. I 
shall not attempt to repel the objection by decrying books. 
Truly good books are more than mines to those who can 
understand them. They are the breathings of the great souls 
of past times. Genius is not embalmed in them, as is 
sometimes said, but lives in them perpetually. But we need 
not many books to answer the great ends of reading. A 
few are better than many, and a little time given to a faith- 
ful study of the few will be enough to quicken thought and 
enrich the mind. The greatest men have not been book- 
men. Washington, it has often been said, was no great 
reader. The learning commonly gathered from books is of 
less worth than the truths we gain from experience and re- 
flection. Indeed, most of the knowledge from reading, in 
these days, being acquired with little mental action, and 
seldom or never reflected on and turned to use, is very much 
a vain show. Events stirring the mind to earnest thought 
and vigorous application of its resources, do vastly more 
to elevate the mind than most of our studies at the present 
time. Few of the books read among us deserve to be read. 
Most of them have no principle of life, as is proved by the 
fact that they die the year of their birth. They do not come 
from thinkers, and how can they awaken thought? A great 
proportion of the reading of this city is useless, I had almost 
said pernicious. I should be sorry to see our laborers ex- 
changing their toils for the reading of many of our young 
ladies and young gentlemen, who look on the intellect as 
given them for amusement; who read, as they visit, for 
amusement, who discuss no great truths and put forth no 
energy of thought on the topics which fly through their 
minds. With this insensibility to the dignity of the intellect, 
and this frittering away of the mind on superficial reading, 
I see not with what face they can claim superiority to the 
laboring mass, who certainly understand one thing thor- 
oughly, that is, their own business, and who are doing some- 
thing useful for themselves and their fellow-creatures. The 
great use of books is to rouse us to thought; to turn us to 
questions which great men have been working on for ages; 
to furnish us with materials for the exercise of judgment, 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 351 

imagination, and moral feeling; to breathe into us a moral 
life from higher spirits than our own; and this benefit of 
books may be enjoyed by those who have not much time for 
retired study. 

It must not be forgotten, by those who despair of the 
laboring classes because they cannot live in libraries, that 
the highest sources of truth, light, and elevation of mind, 
are not libraries, but our inward and outward experience. 
Human life, with its joys and sorrows, its burdens and al- 
leviations, its crimes and virtues, its deep wants, its solemn 
changes, and its retributions, always pressing on us ; what a 
library is this! and who may not study it? Every human 
being is a volume worthy to be studied. The books which 
circulate most freely through the community are those which 
give us pictures of human life. How much more improving 
is the original, did we know how to read it? The laborer 
has this page always open before him; and, still more, the 
laborer is every day writing a volume more full of in- 
struction than all human productions, — I mean his own life. 
No work of the most exalted genius can teach us so much 
as the revelation of human nature in the secrets of our own 
souls, in the workings of our own passions, in the operations 
of our own intelligence, in the retributions which follow our 
own good and evil deeds, in the dissatisfaction with the 
present, in the spontaneous thoughts and aspirations which 
form part of every man's biography. The study of our own 
history from childhood, of all the stages of our development, 
of the good and bad influences which have beset us, of our 
mutations of feeling and purpose, and of the great current 
which is setting us towards future happiness or woe, — this 
is a study to make us nobly wise; and who of us has not 
access to this fountain of eternal truth ? May not the laborer 
study and understand the pages which he is writing in his 
own breast? 

In these remarks, I have aimed to remove the false notion 
into which the laborers themselves fall, that they can do 
little towards acquiring force and fulness of thought, be- 
cause in want of books. I shall next turn to prejudices more 
confined to other classes. A very common one is, that the 
many are not to be called to think, study, improve their 



352 CHANNING 

minds, because a privileged few are intended by God to do 
their thinking for them. " Providence," it is said, " raises 
up superior minds, whose office it is to discover truth for the 
rest of the race. Thinking and manual toil are not meant 
to go together. The division of labor is a great law of 
nature. One man is to serve society by his head, another by 
his hands. Let each class keep to its proper work." These 
doctrines I protest against. I deny to any individual or class 
this monopoly of thought. Who among men can show God's 
commission .to think for his brethren, to shape passively 
the intellect of the mass, to stamp his own image on them 
as if they were wax? As well might a few claim a monopoly 
of light and air, of seeing and breathing, as of thought. Is 
not the intellect as universal a gift as the organs of sight 
and respiration? Is not truth as freely spread abroad as 
the atmosphere or the sun's rays? Can we imagine that 
God's highest gifts of intelligence, imagination, and moral 
power were bestowed to provide only for animal wants? 
to be denied the natural means of growth, which is action? 
to be starved by drudgery ? Were the mass of men made to 
be monsters ? to grow only in a few organs and faculties, and 
to pine away and shrivel in others? or were they made to 
put forth all the powers of men, especially the best and 
most distinguishing? No man, not the lowest, is all hands, 
all bones and muscles. The mind is more essential to human 
nature, and more enduring, than the limbs; and was this 
made to lie dead? Is not thought the right and duty of all? 
Is not truth alike precious to all? Is not truth the natural 
ailment of the mind, as plainly as the wholesome grain is 
of the body? Is not the mind adapted to thought, as plainly 
as the eye to light, the ear to sound? Who dares to withhold 
it from its natural action, its natural element and joy? 
Undoubtedly some men are more gifted than others, and 
are marked out for more studious lives. But the work of 
such men is not to do others' thinking for them, but to help 
them to think more vigorously and effectually. Great minds 
are to make others great. Their superiority is to be used, not 
to break the multitude to intellectual vassalage, not to estab- 
lish over them a spiritual tyranny, but to rouse them from 
lethargy, and to aid them to judge for themselves. The light 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 353 

and life which spring up in one soul are to be spread far 
and wide. Of all treasons against humanity, there is no 
one worse than his who employs great intellectual force to 
keep down the intellect of his less favored brother. 

It is sometimes surged by those who consider the multitude 
as not intended to think, that at best they can learn but little, 
and that this is likely to harm rather than to do them good. 
" A little learning/' we are told, " is a dangerous thing." 
" Shallow draughts " of knowledge are worse than ignorance. 
The mass of the people, it is said, can go to the bottom of 
nothing; and the result of stimulating them to thought will 
be the formation of a dangerous set of half-thinkers. To 
this argument I reply, first, that it has the inconvenience of 
proving too much; for, if valid, it shows that none of any 
class ought to think. For who, I would ask, can go to the 
bottom o»f anything? Whose " learning " is not "little"? 
Whose " draughts " of knowledge are not " shallow " ? Who 
of us has fathomed the depths of a single product of nature 
or a single event in history? Who of us is not baffled by 
the mysteries in a grain of sand? How contracted the range 
of the widest intellect! But is our knowledge, because so 
little, of no worth? Are we to despise the lessons which are 
taught us in this nook of creation, in this narrow round of 
human experience, because an infinite universe stretches 
around us, which we have no means of exploring, and in 
which the earth, and sun, and planets dwindle to a point? 
We should remember that the known, however little it may 
be, is in harmony with the boundless unknown, and a step 
towards it. We should remember, too, that the gravest 
truths may be gathered from a very narrow compass of 
information. God is revealed in his smallest work as truly 
as in his greatest. The principles of human nature may be 
studied better in a family than in the history of the world. 
The finite is a manifestation of the infinite. The great 
ideas, of which I have formerly spoken, are within the reach 
of every man who thirsts for truth, and seeks it with single- 
ness of mind. I will only add, that the laboring class are not 
now condemned to draughts of knowledge so shallow as to 
merit scorn. Many of them know more of the outward 
world than all the philosophers of antiquity; and Christian- 

Vol. 28— L HC 



354 CHANNING 

ity has opened to them mysteries of the spiritual world which 
kings and prophets were not privileged to understand. And 
are they, then, to be doomed to spiritual inaction, as inca- 
pable of useful thought? 

It is sometimes said, that the multitude may think on 
the common business of life, but not on higher subjects, and 
especially on religion. This, it is said, must be received on 
authority; on this, men in general can form no judgment of 
their own. But this is the last subject on which the indi- 
vidual should be willing to surrender himself to others' dic- 
tation. In nothing has he so strong an interest. In nothing 
is it so important that his mind and heart should be alive 
and engaged. In nothing has he readier means of judging 
for himself. In nothing, as history shows, is he more likely 
to be led astray by such as assume the office of thinking 
ioi him. Religion is a subject open to all minds. Its great 
truths have their foundation in the soul itself, and their 
proofs surround us on all sides. God has not shut up the 
evidence of his being in a few books, written in a foreign 
language, and locked up in the libraries of colleges and 
philosophers; but has written his name on the heavens and 
on the earth, and even on the minutest animal and plant ; and 
his word, taught by Jesus Christ, was not given to scribes 
and lawyers, but taught to the poor, to the mass of men, 
on mountains, in streets, and on the sea-shore. Let me not 
be told that the multitude do actually receive religion on 
authority, or on the word of others. I reply, that a faith 
so received seems to me of little worth. The precious, the 
living, the effectual part of a poor man's faith, is that of 
which he sees the reasonableness and excellence; that which 
approves itself to his intelligence, his conscience, his heart; 
that which answers to deep wants in his own soul, and of 
which he has the witness in his own inward and outward 
experience. All other parts of his belief, those which he 
takes on blind trust and in which he sees no marks of truth 
and divinity, do him little or no good. Too often they do 
him harm, by perplexing his simple reason, by substituting 
the fictions and artificial systems of theologians for the 
plain precepts of love, and justice, and humility, and filial 
trust in God As long as it was supposed that religion is to 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 355 

benefit the world by laying restraints, awakening fears, and 
acting as a part of the system of police, so long it was natu- 
ral to rely on authority and tradition as the means of its 
propagation; so long it was desirable to stifle thought and 
inquiry on the subject. But now that we have learned that 
the true office of religion is to awaken pure and lofty senti- 
ments, and to unite man to God by rational homage and en- 
lightened love, there is something monstrous in placing re- 
ligion beyond the thought and the study of the mass of the 
human race. 

I proceed to another prejudice. It is objected, that the 
distinction of ranks is essential to social order, and that this 
will be swept away by calling forth energy of thought in all 
men. This objection, indeed, though exceedingly insisted 
on in Europe, has nearly died out here; but still enough of it 
lingers among us. to deserve consideration. I reply, then, 
that it is a libel on social order to suppose that it requires 
for its support the reduction of the multitude of human 
beings to ignorance and servility; and that it is a libel on 
the Creator to suppose that he requires, as the foundation 
of communities, the systematic depression of the majority 
of his intelligent offspring. The supposition is too grossly 
unreasonable, too monstrous, to require labored refutation. 
I see no need of ranks, either for social order or for any 
other purpose. A great variety of pursuits and conditions 
is indeed to be desired. Men ought to follow their genius, 
and to put forth their powers in every useful and lawful way. 
I do not ask for a monotonous world. We are far too 
monotonous now. The vassalage of fashion, which is a part 
of rank, prevents continually the free expansion of men's 
powers. Let us have the greatest diversity of occupations. 
But this does not imply that there is a need of splitting 
society into castes or ranks, or that a certain number should 
arrogate superiority, and stand apart from the rest of men 
as a separate race. Men may work in different departments 
of life, and yet recognize their brotherly relation, and honor 
one another, and hold friendly communion with one another. 
Undoubtedly, men will prefer as friends and common asso- 
ciates those with whom they sympathise most. But this is 
not to form a rank or caste. For example, the intelligent 



356 CHANNING 

seek out the intelligent; the pious, those who reverence God. 
But suppose the intellectual and the religious to cut them- 
selves off by some broad, visible distinction from the rest 
of society, to form a clan of their own, to refuse admission 
into their houses to people of inferior knowledge and virtue, 
and to diminish as far as possible the occasions of inter- 
course with them; would not society rise up, as one man, 
against this arrogant exclusiveness? And if intelligence and 
piety may not be the foundations of a caste, on what ground 
shall they, who have no distinction but wealth, superior cos- 
tume, richer equipages, finer houses, draw lines around them- 
selves and constitute themselves a higher class? That some 
should be richer than others is natural and is necessary, and 
could only be prevented by gross violations of right. Leave 
men to the free use of their powers, and some will accumu- 
late more than their neighbors. But to be prosperous is not 
to be superior; and should form no barrier between men. 
Wealth ought not to secure to the prosperous the slightest 
consideration. The only distinctions which should be recog- 
nized are those of the soul, of strong principle, of incorrupti- 
ble integrity, of usefulness, of cultivated intellect, of fidelity 
in seeking for truth. A man in proportion as he has these 
claims, should be honored and welcomed everywhere. I see 
not why such a man, however coarsely if neatly dressed, 
should not be a respected guest in the most splendid man- 
sions, and at the most brilliant meetings. A man is worth 
infinitely more than the saloons, and the costumes, and the 
show of the universe. He was made to tread all these be- 
neath his feet. What an insult to humanity is the present 
deference to dress and upholstery, as if silk-worms, and 
looms, and scissors, and needles could produce something 
nobler than a man ! Every good man should protest against 
a caste founded on outward prosperity, because it exalts the 
outward above the inward, the material above the spiritual; 
because it springs from and cherishes a contemptible pride 
in superficial and transitory distinctions ; because it alienates 
man from his brother, breaks the tie of common humanity, 
and breeds jealousy, scorn, and mutual ill-will. Can this 
be needed to social order ? 

It is true, that in countries where the mass of the people 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 357 

are ignorant and servile, the existence of a higher and a 
worshipped rank tends to keep them from outrage. It in- 
fuses a sentiment of awe, which prevents more or less the 
need of force and punishment. But it is worthy of remark 
that the means of keeping order in one state of society may 
become the chief excitement of discontent and disorder in 
another, and this is peculiarly true of aristocracy or high 
rank. In rude ages, this keeps the people down; but when 
the people by degrees have risen to some consciousness of 
their rights and essential equality with the rest of the race, 
the awe of rank naturally subsides, and passes into suspicion, 
jealousy, and sense of injury, and a disposition to resist. 
The very institution which once restrained, now provokes. 
Through this process the Old World is now passing. The 
strange illusion, that a man, because he wears a garter or a 
riband, or was bofn to a title, belongs to another race, is 
fading away; and society must pass through a series of 
revolutions, silent or bloody, until a more natural order takes 
place of distinctions which grew originally out of force. 
Thus aristocracy, instead of giving order to society, 
now convulses it. So impossible is it for arbitrary human 
ordinations permanently to degrade human nature or subvert 
the principles of justice and freedom. 

I am aware that it will be said, " that the want of refine- 
ment of manners and taste in the lower classes will neces- 
sarily keep them an inferior caste, even though all political 
inequalities be removed." I acknowledge this defect of 
manners in the multitude, and grant that it is an obstacle 
to intercourse with the more improved, though often exag- 
gerated. But this is a barrier which must and will yield 
to the means of culture spread through our community. The 
evil is not necessarily associated with any condition of 
human life. An intelligent traveller tells us, that in Nor- 
way, a country wanting many of our advantages, good 
manners and politeness are spread through all conditions; 
and that the " rough way of talking to and living with each 
other, characteristic of the lower classes of society in Eng- 
land, is not found there." Not many centuries ago, the inter- 
course of the highest orders in Europe was sullied by in- 
delicacy and fierceness; but time has worn out these stains, 



358 CHANNING 

and the same cause is now removing what is repulsive 
among those who toil with their hands. I cannot believe 
that coarse manners, boisterous conversation, slovenly neg- 
ligence, filthy customs, surliness, indecency, are to descend 
by necessity from generation to generation in any portion 
of the community. I do not see why neatness, courtesy, 
delicacy, ease, and deference to otners' feelings, may not be 
made the habits of the laboring multitude. A change is 
certainly going on among them in respect to manners. Let 
us hope that it will be a change for the better; that they 
will not adopt false notions of refinement; that they will 
escape the servile imitation of what is hollow and insincere, 
and the substitution of outward shows for genuine natural 
courtesy. Unhappily they have but imperfect models on 
which to form themselves. It is not one class alone which 
needs reform in manners. We all need a new social inter- 
course, which shall breathe genuine refinement; which shall 
unite the two great elements of politeness, self-respect, and 
a delicate regard to the rights and feelings of others ; which 
shall be free without rudeness, and earnest without positive- 
ness; which shall be graceful, yet warm-hearted; and in 
which communication shall be frank, unlabored, overflowing, 
through the absence of all assumption and pretence, and 
through the consciousness of being safe from heartless ridi- 
cule. This grand reform, which I trust is to come, will 
bring with it a happiness little known in social life; and 
whence shall it come? The wise and disinterested of all 
conditions must contribute to it ; and I see not why the labor- 
ing classes may not take part in the work. Indeed, when I 
consider the greater simplicity of their lives and their 
greater openness to the spirit of Christianity, I am not sure 
but that the u golden age " of manners is to begin among 
those who are now despaired of for their want of refine- 
ment. 

In these remarks, I have given the name of " prejudices " 
to the old opinions respecting rank, and respecting the need 
of keeping the people from much thought. But allow these 
opinions to have a foundation in truth; suppose high fences 
of rank to be necessary to refinement of manners; suppose 
that the happiest of all ages were the feudal, when aristoc- 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 359 

racy was in its flower and glory, when the noble, superior 
to the laws, committed more murders in one year than the 
multitude in twenty. Suppose it best for the laborer to live 
and die in thoughtless ignorance. Allow all this, and that we 
have reason to look with envy on the past ; one thing is plain, 
the past is gone, the feudal castle is dismantled, the distance 
between classes greatly reduced. Unfortunate as it may be, 
the people have begun to think, to ask reasons for what they 
do and suffer and believe, and to call the past to account. 
Old spells are broken, old reliances gone. Men can no longer 
be kept down by pageantry, state-robes, forms, and shows. 
Allowing it to be best that society should rest on the depres- 
sion of the multitude, the multitude will no longer be quiet 
when they are trodden under foot, but ask impatiently for 
a reason why they too may not have a share in social bless- 
ings. Such is the state of things, and we must make the best 
of what we cannot prevent. Right ©r wrong, the people will 
think; and is it not important that they should think justly? 
that they should be inspired with the love of truth, and in- 
structed how to seek it? that they should be established by 
wise culture in the great principles on which religion and 
society rest, and be protected from scepticism and wild 
speculation by intercourse with enlightened and virtuous 
men? It is plain that in the actual state of the world, noth- 
ing can avail us but a real improvement of the mass of the 
people. No stable foundation can be laid for us but in men's 
minds. Alarming as the truth is, it should be told, that out- 
ward institutions cannot now secure us. Mightier powers 
than institutions have come into play among us, — the judg- 
ment, the opinions, the feelings of the many; and all hopes 
of stability which do not rest on the progress of the many 
must perish. 

But a more serious objection than any yet considered, to 
the intellectual elevation of the laboring class, remains to be 
stated. It is said, " that the laborer can gain subsistence 
for himself and his family only by a degree of labor which 
forbids the use of means of improvement. His necessary 
toils leave no time or strength for thought. Political econ- 
omy, by showing that population outstrips the means of im- 
provement, passes an irrepealable sentence of ignorance and 



360 CHANNING 

degradation on the laborer. He can live but for one end, 
which is to keep himself alive. He cannot give time and 
strength to intellectual, social, and moral culture, without 
starving his family, and impoverishing the community. 
Nature has laid this heavy law on the mass of the people, 
and it is idle to set up our theories and dreams of improve- 
ment against nature." 

This objection applies with great force to Europe, and is 
not without weight here. But it does not discourage me. I 
reply, first, to this objection, that it generally comes from a 
suspicious source. It comes generally from men who abound, 
and are at ease; who think more of property than of any 
other human interest; who have little concern for the mass 
of their fellow-creatures ; who are ^willing that others should 
bear all the burdens of life, and that any social order should 
continue which secures to themselves personal comfort or 
gratification. The selfish epicure and the thriving man of 
business easily discover a natural necessity for that state 
of things which accumulates on themselves all the blessings, 
and on their neighbor all the evils, of life. But no man 
can judge what is good or necessary for the multitude but 
he who feels for them, and whose equity and benevolence 
are shocked by the thought that all advantages are to be 
monopolized by one set of men, and all disadvantages by 
another. I wait for the judgment of profound thinkers and 
earnest philanthropists on this point, — a judgment formed 
after patient study of political economy, and human nature 
and human history; nor even on such authority shall I 
readily despair of the multitude of my race. 

In the next place, the objection under consideration is 
very much a repetition of the old doctrine, that what has 
been must be; that the future is always to repeat the past, 
and society to tread for ever the beaten path. But can any 
thing be plainer than that the present condition of the world 
is peculiar, unprecedented? that new powers and new prin- 
ciples are at work? that the application of science to art 
is accomplishing a stupendous revolution? that the con- 
dition of the laborer is in many places greatly improved, and 
his intellectual aids increased? that abuses, once thought es- 
sential to society, and which seemed entwined with all its 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 361 

fibres, have been removed? Do the mass of men stand where 
they did a few centuries ago? And do not new circum- 
stances, if they make us fearful, at the same time keep us 
from despair? The future, be it what it may, will not re- 
semble the past. The present has new elements, which 
must work out new weal or woe. We have no right, then, 
on the ground of the immutableness of human affairs, 
to quench, as far as we have power, the hope of social 
progress. 

Another consideration, in reply to the objection that the 
necessary toils of life exclude improvement, may be drawn 
not only from general history, but from the experience of 
this country in particular. The working classes here have 
risen and are still rising intellectually, and yet there are no 
signs of starvation, nor are we becoming the poorest people 
on earth. By far the most interesting view of this country 
is the condition of the working multitude. Nothing among 
us deserves the attention of the traveller so much as the 
force of thought and character, and the self-respect awak- 
ened by our history and institutions in the mass of the 
people. Our prosperous classes are much like the same 
classes abroad, though, as we hope, of purer morals; but 
the great working multitude leave far behind them the la- 
borers of other countries. No man of observation and be- 
nevolence can converse with them without being struck and 
delighted with the signs they give of strong and sound in- 
tellect and manly principle. And who is authorized to set 
bounds to this progress? In improvement the first steps are 
the hardest. The difficulty is to wake up men's souls, not 
to continue their action. Every accession of light and 
strength is a help to new acquisitions. 

Another consideration, in reply to the objection, is, that 
as yet no community has seriously set itself to the work of 
improving all its members, so that what -is possible remains 
to be ascertained. No experiment has 'been made to deter- 
mine how far liberal provision can be made at once for the 
body and mind of the laborer. The highest social art is 
yet in its infancy. Great minds have nowhere solemnly, 
earnestly undertaken to resolve the problem, how the multi- 
tude of men may be elevated. The trial is to come. Still 



362 CHANNING 

more, the multitude have nowhere comprehended distinctly 
the true idea of "progress, and resolved deliberately and 
solemnly to reduce it to reality. This great thought, how- 
ever, is gradually opening on them, and it is destined to 
work wonders. From themselves their salvation must chiefly 
come. Little can be done for them by others, till a spring 
is touched in their own breasts; and this being done, they 
cannot fail. The people, as history shows us, can accomplish 
miracles under the power of a great idea. How much have 
they often done and suffered in critical moments for country, 
for religion ! The great idea of their own elevation is only 
beginning to unfold itself within them, and its energy is 
not to be foretold. A lofty conception of this kind, were it 
once distinctly seized, would be a new life breathed into 
them. Under this impulse they would create time and 
strength for their high calling, and would not only regen- 
erate themselves, but the community. 

Again, I am not discouraged by the objection, that the 
laborer, if encouraged to give time and strength to the eleva- 
tion of his mind, will starve himself and impoverish the 
country, when I consider the energy and efficiency of mind. 
The highest force in the universe is mind. This created the 
heavens and earth. This has changed the wilderness into 
fruitfulness, and linked distant countries in a beneficent 
ministry to one another's wants. It is not to brute force, 
to physical strength, so much as to art, to skill, to intel- 
lectual and moral energy, that men owe their mastery over 
the world. It is mind which has conquered matter. To fear, 
then, that by calling forth a people's mind, we shall im- 
poverish and starve them, is to be frightened at a shadow. 
I believe, that with the growth of intellectual and moral 
power in the community, its productive power will increase, 
that industry will become more efficient, that a wiser econ- 
omy will accumulate wealth, that unimagined resources of 
art and nature will be discovered. I believe that the means 
of living will grow easier, in proportion as a people shall 
become enlightened, self-respecting, resolute, and just. Bod- 
ily or material forces can be measured, but not the forces 
of the soul; nor can the results of increased mental energy 
be foretold. Such a community will tread down obstacles 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 363 

now deemed invincible, and turn them into helps. The in- 
ward moulds the outward. The power of a people lies in 
its mind; and this mind, if fortified and enlarged, will 
bring external things into harmony with itself. It will 
create a new world around it, corresponding to itself. If, 
however, I err in this belief; if, by securing time and means 
for improvement to the multitude, industry and capital 
should become less productive, I still say, Sacrifice the 
wealth, and not the mind of a people. Nor do I believe that 
the physical good of a community would in this way be 
impaired. The diminution of a country's wealth, occasioned 
by general attention to intellectual and moral culture, would 
be followed by very different effects from those which would 
attend an equal diminution brought about by sloth, intemper- 
ance, and ignorance. There would indeed be less production 
in such a country, but the character and spirit of the people 
would effect a much more equal distribution of what would 
be produced; and the happiness of a community depends 
vastly more on the distribution than on the amount of its 
wealth. In thus speaking of the future, I do not claim 
any special prophetical gift. As a general rule, no m^n is 
able to foretell distinctly the ultimate, permanent results 
of any great social change. But as to the case before us, 
we ought not to doubt. It is a part of religion to believe 
that by nothing can a country so effectually gain happiness 
and lasting prosperity as by the elevation of all classes of 
its citizens. To question this seems an approach to crime. 

« If this fail, 
The pillar'd firmament is rottenness, 
And earth's base built on stubble." 

I am aware that, in reply to all that has been said in 
favor of the possibility of uniting self-improvement with 
labor, discouraging facts may be brought forward from our 
daily experience. It may be said that in this country, under 
advantages unknown in other lands, there is a considerable 
number on whom the burden of toil presses very heavily, 
who can scarcely live with all their efforts, and who are cut 
off by their hard condition from the means of intellectual 
culture; and if this take place now, what are we to expect 
hereafter in a more crowded population? I acknowledge 



364 CHANNING 

that we have a number of depressed laborers, whose state 
is exceedingly unpropitious to the education of the mind; 
but this argument will lose much of its power when we 
inquire into the causes of this evil. We shall then see that 
it comes, not from outward necessity, not from the irresistible 
obstacles abroad, but chiefly from the fault or ignorance of 
the sufferers themselves; so that the elevation of the mind 
and character of the laborer tends directly to reduce, if not 
remove, the evil. Of consequence, this elevation finds sup- 
port in what is urged against it. In confirmation of these 
views, allow me just to hint at the causes of that depression 
of many laborers which is said to show that labor and self- 
improvement cannot go on together. 

First, how much of this depression is to be traced to 
intemperance? What a great amount of time, and strength, 
and money, might multitudes gain for self-improvement, by 
a strict sobriety ! That cheap remedy, pure water, would 
cure the chief evils in very many families of the ignorant 
and poor. Were the sums which are still lavished on ardent 
spirits appropriated wisely to the elevation of the people, 
what a new world we should live in ! Intemperance not 
only wastes the earnings, but the health and the minds of 
men. How many, were they to exchange what they call 
moderate drinking for water, would be surprised to learn 
that they had been living under a cloud, in half -stupefaction, 
and would become conscious of an intellectual energy of 
which they had not before dreamed! Their labors would 
exhaust them less ; and less labor would be needed for their 
support; and thus their inability to cultivate their high 
nature would in a great measure be removed. The working 
class, above all men, have an interest in the cause of tem- 
perance, and they ought to look on the individual who lives 
by scattering the means and excitements of drunkenness 
not only as the general enemy of his race, but as their own 
worst foe. 

In the next place, how much of the depression of laborers 
may be traced to the want of a strict economy ! The 
prosperity of this country has produced a wastefulness that 
has extended to the laboring multitude. A man, here, turns 
with scorn from fare that in many countries would be 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 365 

termed luxurious. It is, indeed, important that the stand- 
ard of living' in all classes should be high; that is, it 
should include the comforts of life, the means of neatness 
and order in our dwellings, and such supplies of our wants 
as are fitted to secure vigorous health. But how many waste 
their earnings on indulgences which may be spared, and 
thus have no resource for a dark day, and are always trem- 
bling on the brink of pauperism ! Needless expenses keep 
many too poor for self-improvement. And here let me say, 
that expensive habits among the more prosperous laborers 
often interfere with the mental culture of themselves and 
their families. How many among them sacrifice improve- 
ment to appetite ! How many sacrifice it to the love of show, 
to the desire of outstripping others, and to habits of expense 
which grow out' of this insatiable passion ! In a country so 
thriving and luxurious as ours, the laborer is in danger of 
contracting artificial wants and diseased tastes ; and to 
gratify these he gives himself wholly to accumulation, and 
sells his mind for gain. Our unparalleled prosperity has 
not been an unmixed good. It has inflamed cupidity, has 
diseased the imagination with dreams of boundless success, 
and plunged a vast multitude into excessive toils, feverish 
competitions, and exhausting cares. A laborer, having se- 
cured a neat home and a wholesome table, should ask nothing 
more for the senses; but should consecrate his leisure, and 
what may be spared of his earnings, to the culture of him- 
self and his family, to the best books, to the best teaching, 
to pleasant and profitable intercourse, to sympathy and the 
offices of humanity, and to the enjoyment of the beautiful 
in nature and art. Unhappily, the laborer, if prosperous, is 
anxious to ape the rich man, instead of trying to rise above 
him, as he often may, by noble acquisitions. The young in 
particular, the apprentice and the female domestic, catch a 
taste for fashion, and on this altar sacrifice too often their 
uprightness, and almost always the spirit of improvement, 
dooming themselves to ignorance, if not to vice, for a vain 
show. Is this evil without remedy? Is human nature al- 
ways to be sacrificed to outward decoration? Is the outward 
always to triumph over the inward man? Is nobleness of 
sentiment never to spring up among us? May not a reform 



366 CHANNING 

in this particular begin in the laboring class, since it seems 
so desperate among the more prosperous? Cannot the 
laborer, whose condition calls him so loudly to simplicity of 
taste and habits, take his stand against that love of dress 
which dissipates and corrupts so many minds among the 
opulent? Cannot the laboring class refuse to measure men 
by outward success, and pour utter scorn on all pretensions 
founded on outward show or condition? Sure I am that, 
were they to study plainness of dress and simplicity of 
living, for the purpose of their own true elevation, they 
would surpass in intellect, in taste, in honorable qualities, 
and in present enjoyment, that great proportion of the pros- 
perous who are softened into indulgence or enslaved to 
empty show. By such self-denial, how might the burden of 
labor be lightened, and time and strength redeemed for im- 
provement ! 

Another cause of the depressed condition of not a few 
laborers, as I believe, is their ignorance on the subject of 
health. Health is the working man's fortune, and he ought 
to watch over it more than the capitalist over his largest 
investments. Health lightens the efforts of body and mind. 
It enables a man to crowd much work into a narrow com- 
pass. Without it, little can be earned, and that little by 
slow, exhausting toil. For these reasons I cannot but look 
on it as a good omen that the press is circulating among us 
cheap works, in which much useful knowledge is given of 
the structure, and functions, and laws of the human body. 
It is in no small measure through our own imprudence 
that disease and debility are incurred, and one remedy is to 
be found in knowledge. Once let the mass of the people be 
instructed in their own frames; let them understand clearly 
that disease is not an accident, but has fixed causes, many 
of which they can avert, and a great amount of suffering, 
want, and consequent intellectual depression will be re- 
moved. — I hope I shall not be thought to digress too far, 
when I add, that were the mass of the community more en- 
lightened on these points, they would apply their knowl- 
edge, not only to their private habits, but to the government 
of the city, and would insist on municipal regulations favor- 
ing general health. This they owe to themselves. They 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 367 

ought to require a system of measures for effectually cleans- 
ing the city ; for supplying it with pure water, either at public 
expense or by a private corporation ; and for prohibiting the 
erection or the letting of such buildings as must generate 
disease. What a sad thought is it, that in this metropolis, 
the blessings which God pours forth profusely on bird 
and beast, the blessings of air, and light, and water, 
should, in the case of many families, be so stinted or 
so mixed with impurities, as to injure instead of invigorating 
the frame ! With what face can the great cities of Europe 
and America boast of their civilization, when within their 
limits thousands and ten thousands perish for want of God's 
freest, most lavish gifts ! Can we expect improvement 
among people who are cut off from nature's common boun- 
ties, and want those cheering influences of the elements 
which even savages enjoy? In this city, how much health, 
how many lives are sacrificed to the practice of letting cel- 
lars and rooms which cannot be ventilated, which want the 
benefits of light, free air, and pure water, and the means 
of removing filth ! We forbid by law the selling of putrid 
meat in the market. Why do we not forbid the renting of 
rooms in which putrid, damp and noisome vapors are work- 
ing as sure destruction as the worst food? Did people under- 
stand that they are as truly poisoned in such dens as by 
tainted meat and decaying vegetables, would they not ap- 
point commissioners for houses as truly as commissioners 
for markets ? Ought not the renting of untenantable rooms, 
and the crowding of such numbers into a single room as 
must breed disease, and may infect a neighborhood, be 
as much forbidden as the importation of a pestilence? I 
have enlarged on this point, because I am persuaded that the 
morals, manners, decencies, self-respect, and intellectual im- 
provement, as well as the health and physical comforts of 
a people, depend on no outward circumstances more than on 
the quality of the houses in which they live. The remedy 
of the grievance now stated lies with the people themselves. 
The laboring people must require that the health of the city 
shall be a leading object of the municipal administration, 
and in so doing they will protect at once the body and the 
mind. 



368 CHANNING 

I will mention one more cause of the depressed condition 
of many laborers, and that is, sloth, " the sin which doth 
most easily beset us." How many are there who, working 
languidly and reluctantly, bring little to pass, spread the 
work of one hour over many, shrink from difficulties which 
ought to excite them, keep themselves poor, and thus doom 
their families to ignorance as well as to want ! 

In these remarks I have endeavored to show that the 
great obstacles to the improvement of the laboring classes 
are in themselves, and may therefore be overcome. They 
want nothing but the will. Outward difficulty will shrink 
and vanish before them, just as far as they are bent 
on progress, just as far as the great idea of their own 
elevation shall take possession of their minds. I know that 
many will smile at the suggestion, that the laborer may be 
brought to practise thrift and self-denial, for the purpose 
of becoming a nobler being. But such sceptics, having never 
experienced the power of a grand thought or generous 
purpose, are no judges of others. They may be assured, 
however, that enthusiasm is not wholly a dream, and that it 
is not wholly unnatural for individuals or bodies to get the 
idea of something higher and more inspiring than their 
past attainments. 

III. Having now treated of the elevation of the laborer, 
and examined the objections to it, I proceed, in the last place, 
to consider some of the circumstances of the times which 
encourage hopes of the progress of the mass of the people. 
My limits oblige me to confine myself to very few. — And, 
first, it is an encouraging circumstance, that the respect 
for labor is increasing, or rather that the old prejudices 
against manual toil, as degrading a man or putting him in 
a lower sphere, are wearing away; and the cause of this 
change is full of promise; for it is to be found in the 
progress of intelligence, Christianity, and freedom, all of 
which cry aloud against the old barriers created between 
the different classes, and challenge especial sympathy and 
regard for those who bear the heaviest burdens, and create 
most of the comforts of social life. The contempt of labor 
of which I have spoken is a relic of the old aristocratic prej- 
udices which formerly proscribed trade as unworthy of a 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 369 

gentleman, and must die out with other prejudices of the 
same low origin. And the results must be happy. It is 
hard for a class of men to respect themselves who are denied 
respect by all around them. A vocation looked on as degrad- 
ing will have a tendency to degrade those who follow it. 
Away, then, with the idea of something low in manual 
labor. There is something shocking to a religious man in 
the thought that the employment which God has ordained 
for the vast majority of the human race should be unworthy 
of any man, even to the highest. If, indeed, there were an 
employment which could not be dispensed with, and which 
yet tended to degrade such as might be devoted to it, I 
should say that it ought to be shared by the whole race, and 
thus neutralized by extreme division, instead of being laid, 
as the sole vocation, on one man or a few. Let no human 
being be broken in spirit or trodden under foot for the out- 
ward prosperity of the State. So far is manual labor from 
meriting contempt or slight, that it will probably be found, 
when united with true means of spiritual culture, to foster 
a sounder judgment, a keener observation, a more creative 
imagination, and a purer taste, than any other vocation. 
Man thinks of the few, God of the many; and the many will 
be found at length to have within their reach the most effec- 
tual means of progress. 

Another encouraging circumstance of the times is the 
creation of a popular literature, which puts within the 
reach of the laboring class the means of knowledge in 
whatever branch they wish to cultivate. Amidst the worth- 
less volumes which are every day sent from the press for 
mere amusement, there are books of great value in all de- 
partments, published for the benefit of the mass of readers. 
Mines of inestimable truth are thus open to all who are 
resolved to think and learn. Literature is now adapting 
itself to all wants; and I have little doubt that a new form 
of it will soon appear for the special benefit of the laboring 
classes. This will have for its object to show the progress 
of the various useful arts, and to preserve the memory of 
their founders, and of men who have laid the world under 
obligation by great inventions. Every trade has distin- 
guished names in its history. Some trades can number, 



370 CHANNING 

among those who have followed them, philosophers, poets, 
men of true genius. I would suggest to the members of this 
Association whether a course of lectures, intended to illus- 
trate the history of the more important trades, and of the 
great blessings they have conferred on society, and of the 
eminent individuals who have practised them, might not do 
much to instruct, and, at the same time, to elevate them. 
Such a course would carry them far into the past, would 
open to them much interesting information, and at the same 
time introduce them to men whom they may well make their 
models. I would go farther. I should be pleased to see the 
members of an important trade setting apart an anniversary 
for the commemoration of those who have shed lustre on 
it by their virtues, their discoveries, their genius. It is 
time that honor should be awarded on higher principles 
than have governed the judgment of past ages. Surely the 
inventor of the press, the discoverer of the compass, the men 
who have applied the power of steam to machinery, have 
brought the human race more largely into their debt than 
the bloody race of conquerors, and even than many beneficent 
princes. Antiquity exalted into divinities the first culti- 
vators of wheat and the useful plants, and the first forgers 
of metals ; and we, in these maturer ages of the world, have 
still greater names to boast in the records of useful art. Let 
their memory be preserved to kindle a generous emulation 
in those who have entered into their labors. 

Another circumstance, encouraging the hope of progress 
in the laboring class, is to be found in the juster views they 
are beginning to adopt in regard to the education of their 
children. On this foundation, indeed, our hope for all 
classes must chiefly rest. All are to rise chiefly by the care 
bestowed on the young. Not that I would say, as is some- 
times rashly said, that none but the young can improve. I 
give up no age as desperate. Men who have lived thirty, or 
fifty years, are not to feel as if the door was shut upon them. 
Every man who thirsts to become something better has in 
that desire a pledge that his labor will not be in vain. None 
are too old to learn. The world, from our first to our last 
hour, is our school, and the whole of life has but one great 
purpose, — education. Still, the child, uncorrupted, unhard- 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 371 

ened, is the most hopeful subject; and vastly more, I believe, 
is hereafter to be done for children, than ever before, by 
the gradual spread of a simple truth, almost too simple, one 
would think, to need exposition, yet up to this day wilfully 
neglected: namely, that education is a sham, a cheat, unless 
carried on by able, accomplished teachers. The dignity 
of the vocation of a teacher is beginning to be understood; 
the idea is dawning on us that no office can compare in 
solemnity and importance with that of training the child; 
that skill to form the young to energy, truth, and virtue, is 
worth more than the knowledge of all other arts and 
sciences; and that, of consequence, the encouragement of 
excellent teachers is the first duty which a community owes 
to itself. I say the truth is dawning, and it must make its 
way. The instruction f the children of all classes, espe- 
cially of the laboring class, has as yet been too generally 
committed to unprepared, unskilful hands, and of course the 
school is in general little more than a name. The whole 
worth of a school lies in the teacher. You may accumulate 
the most expensive apparatus for instruction ; but without an 
intellectual, gifted teacher, it is little better than rubbish; 
and such a teacher, without apparatus, may effect the 
happiest results. Our university boasts, and with justice, 
of its library, cabinets, and philosophical instruments; but 
these are lifeless, profitless, except as made effectual by the 
men who use them. A few eminent men, skilled to under- 
stand, reach, and quicken the minds of the pupils, are worth 
all these helps. And I say this, because it is commonly 
thought that the children of the laboring class cannot be 
advanced, in consequence of the inability of parents to fur- 
nish a variety of books and other apparatus. But in educa- 
tion, various books and implements are not the great req- 
uisites, but a high order of teachers. In truth, a few books 
do better than many. The object of education is not so 
much to give a certain amount of knowledge, as to awaken 
the faculties, and give the pupil the use of his r own mind; 
and one book, taught by a man who knows how to accomplish 
these ends, is worth more than libraries as usually read. 
It is not necessary that much should be taught in youth, but 
that a little should be taught philosophically, profoundly, 



372 CHANNING 

livingly. For example, it is not necessary that the pupil be 
carried over the history of the world from the deluge to 
the present day. Let him be helped to read a single history 
wisely, to apply the principles of historical evidence to its 
statements, to trace the causes and effects of events, to pene- 
trate into the motives of actions, to observe the workings 
of human nature in what is done and suffered, to judge im- 
partially of action and, character, to sympathize with what 
is noble, to detect the spirit of an age in different forms 
from our own, to seize the great truths which are wrapped 
up in details, and to discern a moral Providence, a retribu- 
tion, amidst all corruptions and changes; let him learn to 
read a single history thus, and he has learned to read all 
histories; he is prepared to study, as he may have time 
in future life, the whole course of human events; he is 
better educated by this one book than he would be by all 
the histories in all languages as commonly taught. The 
education of the laborer's children need never stop for want 
of books and apparatus. More of them would do good, 
but enough may be easily obtained. What we want is, 
a race of teachers acquainted with the philosophy of the 
mind, gifted men and women, who shall respect human 
nature in the child, and strive to touch and gently bring 
out his best powers and sympathies; and who shall devote 
themselves to this as the great end of life. This good, I 
trust, is to come, but it comes slowly. The establishment of 
normal schools shows that the want of it begins to be felt. 
This good requires that education shall be recognized by the 
community as its highest interest and duty. It requires that 
the instructors of youth shall take precedence of the money- 
getting classes, and that the woman of fashion shall fall be- 
hind the female teacher. It requires that parents shall 
sacrifice show and pleasure to the acquisition of the best 
possible helps and guides for their children. Not that a 
great pecuniary compensation is to create good teachers ; 
these must be formed by individual impulse, by a genuine in- 
terest in education; but good impulse must be seconded by 
outward circumstances; and the means of education will 
always bear a proportion to the respect in which the office 
of teacher is held in the community. 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 373 

Happily, in this country, the true idea of education, of 
its nature and supreme importance, is silently working 
and gains ground. Those of us who look back on half a 
century, see a real, great improvement in schools and in the 
standard of instruction. What should encourage this move- 
ment in this country is, that nothing is wanting here to the 
intellectual elevation of the laboring class but that a spring 
should be given to the child, and that the art of thinking 
justly and strongly should be formed in early life; for, this 
preparation being made, the circumstances of future life 
will almost of themselves carry on the work of improvement. 
It is one of the inestimable benefits of free institutions, that 
they are constant stimulants to the intellect; that they fur- 
nish, in rapid succession, quickening subjects of thought 
and discussion. A whole people at the same moment are 
moved to reflect, reason, judge, and act on matters of deep 
and universal concern; and where the capacity of thought 
has received wise culture, the intellect, unconsciously, by 
an almost irresistible sympathy, is kept perpetually alive. The 
mind, like the body, depends on the climate it lives in, 
on the air it breathes ; and the air of freedom is bracing, ex- 
hilarating, expanding, to a degree not dreamed of under 
a despotism. This stimulus of liberty, however, avails little, 
except where the mind has learned to think for the acquisi- 
tion of truth. The unthinking and passionate are hurried 
by it into ruinous excess. 

The last ground of hope for the elevation of the laborer, 
and the chief and the most sustaining, is the clearer de- 
velopment of the principles of Christianity. The future 
influences of this religion are not to be judged from the past. 
Up to this time it has been made a political engine, and in 
other ways perverted. But its true spirit, the spirit of 
brotherhood and freedom, is beginning to be understood, and 
this will undo the work which opposite principles have been 
carrying on for ages. Christianity is the only effectual 
remedy for the fearful evils of modern civilization, — a 
system which teaches its members to grasp at everything, 
and to rise above everybody, as the great aims of life. 
Of such a civilization the natural fruits are, contempt of 
others' rights, fraud, oppression, a gambling spirit in trade, 



374 CHANNING 

reckless adventure, and commercial convulsions, all tending 
to impoverish the laborer and to render every condition in- 
secure. Relief is to come, and can only come, from the new 
application of Christian principles, of universal justice and 
universal love, to social institutions, to commerce, to busi- 
ness, to active life. This application has begun, and the 
laborer, above all men, is to feel its happy and exalting 
influences. 

Such are some of the circumstances which inspire hopes 
of the elevation of the laboring classes. To these might be 
added other strong grounds of encouragement, to be found 
in the principles of human nature, in the perfections and 
providence of God, and in the prophetic intimations of his 
word. But these I pass over. From all I derive strong 
hopes for the mass of men. I do not, cannot see, why manual 
toil and self-improvement may not go on in friendly union. 
I do not see why the laborer may not attain to refined habits 
and manners as truly as other men. I do not see why con- 
versation under his humble roof may not be cheered by wit 
and exalted by intelligence. I do not see why, amidst his 
toils, he may not cast his eye around him on God's glorious 
creation, and be strengthened and refreshed by the sight. 
I do not see why the great ideas which exalt humanity — 
those of the Infinite Father, of perfection, of our nearness 
to God, and of the purpose of our being — may not grow 
bright and strong in the laborer's mind. Society, T trust, 
is tending towards a condition in which it will look back 
with astonishment at the present neglect or perversion of 
human powers. In the development of a more enlarged 
philanthropy, in the diffusion of the Christian spirit of 
brotherhood, in the recognition of the equal rights of every 
human being, we have the dawn and promise of a better 
age, when no man will be deprived of the means of elevation 
but by his own fault; when the evil doctrine, worthy of the 
arch-fiend, that social order demands the depression of the 
mass of men, will be rejected with horror and scorn; when 
the great object of the community will be to accumulate 
means and influences for awakening and expanding the 
best powers of all classes ; when far less will be expended on 
the body and far more on the mind; when men of uncommon 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 375 

gifts for the instruction of their race will be sent forth to 
carry light and strength into every sphere of human life; 
when spacious libraries, collections of the fine arts, cabinets 
of natural history, and all the institutions by which the 
people may be refined and ennobled, will be formed and 
thrown open to all; and when the toils of life, by a wise 
intermixture of these higher influences, will be made the 
instruments of human elevation. 

Such are my hopes of the intellectual, moral, religious, 
social elevation of the laboring class. I should not, however, 
be true to myself, did I not add that I have fears as well as 
hopes. Time is not left me to enlarge on this point; but 
without a reference to it I should not give you the whole 
truth. I would not disguise from myself or others the true 
character of the world we live in. Human imperfection 
throws an uncertainty over the future. Society, like the 
natural world, holds in its bosom fearful elements. Who can 
hope that the storms which have howled over past ages 
have spent all their force? It is possible that the laboring 
classes, by their recklessness, their passionateness, their jeal- 
ousies of the more prosperous, and their subserviency to 
parties and political leaders, may turn all their bright pros- 
pects into darkness, may blight the hopes which philanthropy 
now cherishes of a happier and holier social state. It is 
also possible, in this mysterious state of things, that evil 
may come to them from causes which are thought to promise 
them nothing but good. The present anxiety and universal 
desire is to make the country rich, and it is taken for granted 
that its growing wealth is necessarily to benefit all conditions. 
But is this consequence sure? May not a country be rich, 
and yet great numbers of the people be wofully depressed? 
In England, the richest nation under heaven, how sad, how 
degraded the state of the agricultural and manufacturing 
classes ! It is thought that the institutions* of this country 
give an assurance that growing wealth will here equally 
benefit and carry forward all portions of the community. I 
hope so ; but I am not sure. At the present time a momentous 
change is taking place in our condition. The improvement 
in steam navigation has half annihilated the space between 
Europe and America, and by the progress of invention the 



376 CHANNING 

two continents are to be more and more placed side by side. 
We hail this triumph of the arts with exultation. We look 
forward to the approaching spring, when this metropolis is 
to be linked with England by a line of steamboats, as a proud 
era in our history. That a great temporary excitement will 
be given to industry, and that our wealth and numbers will 
increase, admits no dispute; but this is a small matter. The 
great question is, Will the mass of the people be permanently 
advanced in the comforts of life, and, still more, in intelli- 
gence and character, in the culture of their highest powers 
and affections? It is not enough to grow, if our growth is 
to resemble that of other populous places. Better continue 
as we are, better even decline, than tread in the steps 
of any great city, whether of past or present times. I 
doubt not that, under God's providence, the approximation of 
Europe and America is ultimately to be a blessing to both ; 
but without our vigilance, the nearer effects may be more 
or less disastrous. It cannot be doubted that for a time 
many among us, especially in the prosperous classes, will 
be more and more infected from abroad, will sympathize 
more with the institutions, and catch more the spirit and 
manners, of the Old World. As a people we want moral 
independence. We bow to " the great n of other countries, 
and we shall become for a time more and more servile 
in our imitation. But this, though bad, may not be the 
worst result. I would ask, What is to be the effect of bring- 
ing the laboring classes of Europe twice as near us as they 
now are? Is there no danger of a competition that is to 
depress the laboring classes here? Can the workman here 
stand his ground against the half-famished, ignorant work- 
men of Europe, who will toil for any wages, and who never 
think of redeeming an hour for personal improvement? Is 
there no danger that, with increasing intercourse with 
Europe, we shall import the striking, fearful contrasts which 
there divide one people into separate nations? Sooner than 
that our laboring class should become a European populace, 
a good man would almost wish that perpetual hurricanes, 
driving every ship from the ocean, should sever wholly the 
two hemispheres from each other. Heaven preserve us 
from the anticipated benefits of nearer connection with 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 377 

Europe, if with these must come the degradation which we 
see or read of among the squalid poor of her great cities, 
among the overworked operatives of her manufactories, 
among her ignorant and half-brutalized peasants ! Any 
thing, every thing should be done to save us from the 
social evils which deform the Old World, and to build up 
here an intelligent, right-minded, self-respecting popula- 
tion. If this end should require us to change our present 
modes of life, to narrow our foreign connections, to desist 
from the race of commercial and manufacturing compe- 
tition with Europe; if it should require that our great 
cities should cease to grow, and that a large portion 
of our trading population should return to labor, these 
requisitions ought to be obeyed. One thing is plain, that 
our present civilization contains strong tendencies to the 
intellectual and moral depression of a large portion of 
the community; and this influence ought to be thought 
of, studied, watched, withstood, with a stern solemn 
purpose of withholding no sacrifice by which it may be 
counteracted. 

Perhaps the fears now expressed may be groundless. 
I do not ask you to adopt them. My end will be gained 
if I can lead you to study, habitually and zealously, the 
influence of changes and measures on the character and 
condition of the laboring class. There is no subject on 
which your thoughts should turn more frequently than on 
this. Many of you busy yourselves with other questions, 
such as the probable result of the next election of President, 
or the prospects of this or that party. But these are in- 
significant, compared with the great question, Whether the 
laboring classes here are destined to the ignorance and depres- 
sion of the lower ranks of Europe, or whether they can se- 
cure to themselves the means of intellectual and moral prog- 
ress. You are cheated, you are false to yourselves, when you 
suffer politicians to absorb you in their selfish purposes, and 
to draw you away from this great question. Give the first 
place in your thoughts to this. Carry it away with you 
from the present lecture; discuss it together; study it when 
alone; let your best heads work on it; resolve that nothing 
shall be wanting on your part to secure the means of intel- 



378 CHANNING 

lectual and moral well-being to yourselves, and to those wh& 
may come after you. 

In these lectures, I have expressed a strong interest in the 
laboring portion of the community; but I have no partiality 
to them considered merely as laborers. My mind is attracted 
to them because they constitute the majority of the human 
race. My great interest is in human nature, and in the 
working classes as its most numerous representatives. To 
those who look on this nature with contempt or utter distrust, 
such language may seem a mere form, or may be construed 
as a sign of the predominance of imagination and feeling 
over the judgment. No matter. The pity of these sceptics 
I can return. Their wonder at my credulity cannot surpass 
the sorrowful astonishment with which I look on their in- 
difference to the fortunes of their race. In spite of all their 
doubts and scoffs, human nature is still most dear to me. 
When I behold it manifested in its perfect proportions in 
Jesus Christ, I cannot but revere it as the true temple of the 
Divinity. When I see it as revealed in the great and good 
of all times, I bless God for those multiplied and growing 
proofs of its high destiny. When I see it bruised, beaten 
down, stifled by ignorance and vice, by oppression, injustice, 
and grinding toil, I weep for it, and feel that every man 
should be ready to suffer for its redemption. I do and I 
must hope for its progress. But in saying this, I am not 
blind to its immediate dangers. I am not sure that dark 
clouds and desolating storms are not even now gathering 
over the world. When we look back on the mysterious 
history of the human race, we see that Providence has made 
use of fearful revolutions as the means of sweeping away 
the abuses of ages, and of bringing forward mankind to 
their present improvement. Whether such revolutions may 
not be in store for our own times, I know not. The present 
civilization of the Christian world presents much to awaken 
doubt and apprehension. It stands in direct hostility to the 
great ideas of Christianity. It is selfish, mercenary, sensual. 
Such a civilization cannot, must not, endure for ever. How 
it is to be supplanted, I know not. I hope, however, that it 
is not doomed, like the old Roman civilization, to be quenched 
in blood. I trust that the works of ages are not to be laid 



ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 379 

low by violence, rapine, and the all-devouring sword. I 
trust that the existing social state contains in its bosom some- 
thing better than it has yet unfolded. I trust that a brighter 
future is to come, not from the desolation, but from gradual, 
meliorating changes of the present. Among the changes to 
which I look for the salvation of the modern world, one of 
the chief is the intellectual and moral elevation of the labor- 
ing class. The impulses which are to reform and quicken 
society are probably to come, not from its more conspicuous, 
but from its obscurer divisions ; and among these I see with 
joy new wants, principles, and aspirations beginning to un- 
fold themselves. Let what is already won give us courage. 
Let faith in a parental Providence give us courage ; and if we 
are to be disappointed in the present, let us never doubt that 
the great interests of human nature are still secure under 
the eye and care of an Almighty Friend. 

Note for the third head. — Under the third head of the 
lectures, in which some of the encouraging circumstances of 
the times are stated, I might have spoken of the singular 
advantages and means of progress enjoyed by the laborer 
in this metropolis. It is believed that there cannot be 
found another city in the world in which the laboring 
classes are as much improved, possess as many helps, enjoy 
as much consideration, exert as much influence, as in this 
place. Had I pursued this subject, I should have done what 
I often wished to do; I should have spoken of the obliga- 
tions of our city to my excellent friend, James Savage, 
Esq., to whose unwearied efforts we are chiefly indebted 
for two inestimable institutions, — the Provident Institution 
for Savings and the Primary Schools; the former giving to 
the laborer the means of sustaining himself in times of pres- 
sure, and the latter placing almost at his door the means 
of instruction for his children from the earliest age.' The 
union of the Primary Schools with the Grammar Schools 
and the High Schools in this place constitutes a system of 
public education unparalleled, it is believed, in any country. 
It would not be easy to name an individual to whom our 
city is under greater obligations than to Mr. Savage. In the 
enterprises which I have named, he was joined and greatly 
assisted by the late Elisha Ticknor, Esq., whose name ought 



380 ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 

also to be associated with the Provident Institution and the 
Primary Schools. The subject of these lectures brings to 
my mind the plan of an institution which was laid before me 
by Mr. Ticknor, for teaching at once agriculture and the 
mechanic arts. He believed that a boy might be made a 
thorough farmer, both in theory and practice, and might at 
the same time learn a trade, and that by being skilled in 
both vocations he would be more useful, and would multiply 
his chances of comfortable subsistence. I was interested 
by the plan, and Mr. Ticknor's practical wisdom led me 
to believe that it might be accomplished. 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 



BY 

EDGAR ALLAN POE 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49) was born in Boston, the child of 
actors who died while he was very young. He was adopted by 
a Virginian gentleman, Mr. John Allan, who put him to school 
in England for five years, then in Richmond, and finally sent 
him to the University of Virginia. He remained there only a 
short time, and after finding that he disliked business, and pub- 
lishing a volume of poems, he enlisted in the army. Mr. Allan 
had him discharged and placed him in West Point, from which 
he got himself dismissed. After that he supported himself in 
a hand-to-mouth fashion by writing for and editing newspapers 
and periodicals, living successively in Baltimore, Richmond, 
Philadelphia, and New York. The publication of his remark- 
able poem, "The Raven," in 1845, brought him fame, and for a 
short time he was a literary lion. But in 1847 his wife died, 
and his two remaining years were a gradual descent. 

Poe's work falls into three divisions: poems, tales, and criti- 
cism. The poems are chiefly remarkable for the amazing tech- 
nical skill with which haunting rhythms and studied successions 
of vowel and consonant sounds are made to suggest atmospheres 
and emotional moods, with a minimum of thought. In the writing 
of fiction, Poe is the great master of the weird tale, no writer 
having surpassed him in the power of shaking the reader's 
nerves with suggestions of the supernatural and the horrible. 
In these stories, as in the poems, he shows an extraordinary 
sense of form, and his effects are produced not merely by the 
violently sensational, but by carefully calculated attacks upon the 
reader's imaginative sensibilities. 

In criticism Poe was, if not a scholarly, at least a stimulating 
and suggestive, writer, with a fine ear and, within his range, keen 
insight. His essay on (i The Poetic Principle" is his poetic con- 
fession of faith. He makes clear and defends his conception 
of poetry; a conception which excludes many great kinds .of 
verse, but which, illuminated as it is by abundant examples of 
his favorite poems, throws light in turn upon some of the funda- 
mental elements of poetry. 

It is worth noting that no American author seems to have 
enjoyed so great a European vogue as Poe. 

382 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 



IN speaking of the Poetic Principle, I have no design to 
be either thorough or profound. While discussing, very 
much at random, the essentiality of what we call 
Poetry, my principal purpose will be to cite for consider- 
ation some few of those minor English or American poems 
which best suit my own taste, or which upon my own 
fancy have left the most definite impression. By "mi£QX-~. 
jjoems " I _mean, of cou rse, p oems of little leng th. And 
here in the beginning permit me to say a few words in 
regard to a somewhat peculiar principle, which, whether 
rightfully or wrongfully, has always had its influence in 
my own critical estimate of the poem, j hold that a long 
poem doe s, not, exist. I maintain that the phrase, "a long 
poem." is simply a flat contradiction in terms. 

I need scarcely observe that g poem deserves its title 
only inasmuch as ii_j^cjitej^J^_eie^ The 

value of the poem is in the ratio of this elevating excite- 
ment. But all excitements are, through a psychal neces- 
sity, transient. That degree of excitement which would 
entitle a poem to be so called at all cannot be sustained 
throughout a composition of any great length. After the 
lapse of half an hour, at the very utmost, it flags — fails 
— a revulsion ensues — and then the poem is, in effect, and 
in fact, no longer such. 

There are, no doubt, many who have found difficulty in 
reconciling the critical dictum that the " Paradise Lost " 
is to be devoutly admired throughout, with the absolute 
impossibility of maintaining for it, during perusal, the 
amount of enthusiasm which that critical dictum would 
demand. The great work, in fact, is to be regarded as 
poetical, only when, losing sight of that vital requisite in 
all works of Art, Unity, we view it merely as a series of 

383 



384 POE 

minor poems. If, to preserve its Unity — its totality of 
effect or impression — we read it (as would be necessary) 
at a single sitting, the result is but a constant alternation of 
excitement and depression. After a passage of what we 
feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage 
of platitude which no critical prejudgment can force us 
to admire; but if, upon completing the work, we read it 
again, omitting the first book (that is to say, commencing 
with the second), we shall be surprised at now finding that 
admirable which we before condemned — that damnable 
which we had previously so much admired. It follows from 
all this that the ultimate, aggregate, or absolute effect of 
even the best epic under the sun is a nullity; — and this is 
precisely the fact. 

In regard to the " Iliad," we have, if not positive proof, at 
least very good reason for believing it intended as a series 
of lyrics; but, granting the epic intention, I can say only 
that the work is based in an imperfect sense of art. The 
modern, epic is, of the supposititious ancient model, but an 
inconsiderate and blindfold imitation. But the day of these 
artistic anomalies is over. If, at any time, any very long 
poems were popular in reality — which I doubt — it is at least 
clear that no very long poem will ever be popular again. 

That the extent of a poetical work is, ceteris paribus, the 
measure of its merit, seems undoubtedly, when we thus state 
it, a proposition sufficiently absurd — yet we are indebted 
for it to the Quarterly Reviews. Surely there can be nothing 
in mere size, abstractly considered — there can be nothing in 
mere bulk, so far as a volume is concerned which has so 
continuously elicited admiration from these saturnine pam- 
phlets ! A mountain, to be sure, by the mere sentiment of 
physical magnitude which it conveys, does impress us with 
a sense of the sublime — but no man is impressed after this 
-fashion by the material grandeur of even " The Columbiad." 
Even the Quarterlies have not instructed us to be so im- 
pressed by it. As yet, they have not insisted on our estimat- 
ing Lamartine by the cubic foot, or Pollok by the pound — 
but what else are we to infer from their continual pratingr 
about "sustained effort"? If, by "sustained effort," any 
little gentleman has accomplished an epic, let us frankly 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 385 

commend him for the effort, — if this indeed be a thing com- 
mendable, — but let us forbear praising the epic on the 
effort's account. I j: is to be _ _hogeri that common sense, in 
the time to come, will prefer deciding upon a work of Art, 
rather by the impression it makes — by the effect it produces — 
than -by the~4ime it took to impress the effect, or by the 
amount of " sustained effort " which had been found neces- 
-sary~in--effecting the impression. The fact is, that per sever.-. 
jince is o r^e thin g and genius quite another; nor can all the 
Quarterlies in Christendom confound them. By and by, 
this proposition, with many which I have been just urging, 
will be received as self-evident. In the mean time, by being 
generally condemned as falsities they will not be essentially 
damaged as truths. 

On the other hand, it is clear that a poem may be im- 
properly brief. Undue brevity degenerates into mere epi- 
grammatism. A very short pogm^. while ,. now and then pro-. 
ducing_a— bril liant or vivid never produces a p jX)found or 
gaduringy-effect. There must be the steady pressing dowrToi 
the stamp upon the wax. Beranger has wrought in- 
numerable things, pungent and spirit-stirring; but, in 
general, they have been too imponderous to stamp themselves 
deeply into the public opinion, and thus, as so many 
feathers of fancy, have been blown aloft only to be whistled 
down the wind. 

A remarkable instance of the effect of undue brevity in 
depressing a poem — in keeping it out of the popular view — is 
afforded by the following exquisite little serenade: — 

I arise from dreams of thee 

In the first sweet sleep of night, 
When the winds are breathing low, 

And the stars are shining bright; 
I arise from dreams of thee, 

And a spirit in my feet 
Hath led me — who knows how? — 

To thy chamber-window, sweet! 

The wandering airs, they faint 

On the dark, the silent stream; 
And the champak odors fail 

Like sweet thoughts in a dream; 

Vol. 28— M HC 



386 POE 

The nightingale's complaint, 

It dies upon her heart, 
As I must on thine, 

Oh, beloved as thou art ! 

Oh, lift me from the grass ! 

I die ! I faint ! I fail ! 
Let thy love in kisses rain 

On my lips and eyelids pale. 
My cheek is cold and white, alas ! 

My heart beats loud and fast : 
Oh ! press it to thine own again, 

Where it will break at last ! 

Very few, perhaps, are familiar with these lines — yet no 
less a poet than Shelley is their author. Their warm, yet 
delicate and ethereal imagination will be appreciated by all; 
but by none so thoroughly as by him who has himself arisen 
from sweet dreams of one beloved, to bathe in the aromatic 
air of a southern midsummer night. 

One of the finest poems by Willis — the very best, in my 
opinion, which he has ever written — has, no doubt, through 
this same defect of undue brevity, been kept back from its 
proper position, not less in the critical than in the popular 
view. 

The shadows lay along Broadway, 

Twas near the twilight-tide — 
And slowly there a lady fair 

Was walking in her pride. 
Alone walked she ; but, viewlessly, 

Walked spirits at her side. 

Peace charmed the street beneath her feet, 

And Honor charmed the air ; 
And all astir looked kind on her, 

And called her good as fair; 
For all God ever gave to her 

She kept with chary care. 

She kept with care her beauties rare 

From lovers warm and true, — 
For her heart was cold to all but gold, 

And the rich came not to woo, — 
But honored well are charms to sell 

If priests the selling do. 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 387 

Now walking there was one more fair — 

A slight girl, lily -pale; 
And she had unseen company 

To make the spirit quail : 
'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn, 

And nothing could avail. 

No mercy now can clear her brow 

For this world's peace to pray ; 
For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air, 

Her woman's heart gave way ! — 
But the sin forgiven by Christ in Heaven 

By man is cursed alway ! 

In this composition we find it difficult to recognize the 
Willis who has written so many mere " Verses of so- 
ciety." The lines are not only richly ideal, but full of 
energy, while they breathe an earnestness — an evident sin- 
cerity of sentiment — for which we look in vain through- 
out all the other works of this author. 

While the epic mania — while the idea that, to merit in 
poetry, prolixity is indispensable — has, for some years past, 
been gradually dying out of the public mind by mere dint 
of its own absurdity — we find it succeeded by a heresy too 
palpably false to be long tolerated, but one which, in the 
brief period it has already endured, may be said to have ac- 
complished more in the corruption of our Poetical Liter- 
ature than all its other enemies combined. I allude to the 
heresy of The Didactic. It has been assumed, tacitly and 
avowedly, directly and indirectly, that the ultimate object 
of all Poetry is Truth. Every poem, it is said, should in- 
culcate a moral; and by this moral is the poetical merit of 
the work to be adjudged. We Americans, especially, have 
patronized this happy idea; and we Bostonians, very espe- 
cially, have developed it in full. We have taken it into our 
heads that to write a poem simply for the poem's sake, 
and to acknowledge such to have been our design, would 
be to confess ourselves radically wanting in the true Poetic 
dignity and force; but the simple fact is, that, would we 
but permit ourselves to look into our own souls, we should 
immediately there discover that under the sun there neither 
exists nor can exist any work more thoroughly dignified, 
more supremely noble, than this very poem — this poem per se 



388 POE 

— this poem which is a poem and nothing more — this poem 
written solely for the poem's sake. 

With as deep a reverence for the True as ever inspired 
the bosom of man, I would, nevertheless, limit in some 
measure its modes of inculcation. I would limit to enforce 
them. I would not enfeeble them by dissipation. The 
demands of Truth are severe; she has no sympathy with 
the myrtles. All that which is so indispensable in Song, is 
precisely all that with which she has nothing whatever to 
do. It is but making her a flaunting paradox to wreathe her 
in gems and flowers. In ^en forcing a truth we n egdLaeiyerity 
rather than efflore scence of l anguage. .We musti^e^imple. 
precise, terse. We must be cool, calm, unimpassioncd. In 
a word, we must be in that mood, which, as nearly as possible, 
is the exact converse of the poetical. He must be blind, 
indeed, who does not perceive the radical and chasmal dif- 
ferences between the truthful and the poetical modes of in- 
culcation. He must be theory-mad beyond redemption who, 
in spite of these differences, shall still persist in attempting 
to reconcile the obstinate oils and waters of Poetry and 
Truth. 

Dividing the wo rld of mind into its three most imme- 
diately obvious distinctions, we have the Pure Tn teIIeffi7' 
T aste, and the Moral 5 en£e7 I place Taste in the middle, 
because it is just this position which in the mind it oc- 
cupies. It holds intimate relations with either extreme, 
but from the Moral Sense is separated by so faint a dif- 
ference that Aristotle has not hesitated to place some of 
its operations among the virtues themselves. Nevertheless, 
we find the offices of the trio marked with a sufficient dis- 
tinction. Just as the intellect concerns itself with Truth, 
so Taste informs us of the Beautiful, while the Moral 
Sense is regardful of Duty. Of this latter, while Conscience 
teaches the obligation, and Reason the expediency, Taste 
contents herself with displaying the charms: — waging war 
upon Vice solely on the ground of her deformity — her dis- 
proportion — her animosity to the fitting, to the appropriate, 
to the harmonious — in a word, to Beauty. 

An immortal instinct, deep within the spirit of man, is 
thus, plainly, a sense of the Beautiful. This it is which 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 389 

administers to his delight in the manifold forms, and sounds, 
and odors, and sentiments, amid which he exists. And just 
as the lily is repeated in the lake, or the eyes of Amaryllis 
in the mirror, so is the mere oral or written repetition of 
these forms, and sounds, and colors, and odors, and senti- 
ments, a duplicate source of delight. But this mere repetition 
is not poetry. He who shall simply sing, with however glowing 
enthusiasm, or with however vivid a truth of description, 
of the sights, and sounds, and odors, and colors, and senti- 
ments, which greet him in common with all mankind — he, 
I say, has yet failed to prove his divine title. There is still 
a something in the distance which he has been unable to 
attain. We have still a thirst unquen cjmble^Jo allay which 
hg jias not shown us the crystal springs. This thirst belongs 
t p the immortality of Man. It is at once a consequence 
and an indication of his perennial existenc e. It is the de- 
sire of th^ mntVi fnr th e star. It is no mere appreciation 
of the Beauty before us, but a wild effort to reach the 
Beauty above. Inspired by an ecstatic prescience of the 
glories beyond the grave, we struggle, by multiform com- 
binations among the things and thoughts of Time, to at- 
tain a portion of that Loveliness whose very elements, per- 
haps, appertain to eternity alone. And thus when by Poetry 
— or when by Music, the most entrancing of the Poetic 
moods — we find ourselves melted into tears not as the Abbate 
Gravia supposes through excess of pleasure, but through a 
certain petulant, impatient sorrow at our inability to grasp 
now, wholly, here on earth, at once and forever, those divine 
and rapturous joys, of which through the poem, or through 
the music, we attain to but brief and indeterminate glimpses. 

The struggle to apprehend the supernal Loveliness — 
this struggle, on the part of souls fittingly constituted — has 
given to the world all that which it (the world) has ever 
been enabled at once to understand and to feel as poetic. 

The Poetic Sentiment, of course, may develop itself in 
various modes — in Painting, in Sculpture, in Architecture, in 
the Dance — very especially in Music, — and very peculiarly 
and with a wide field, in the composition of the Landscape 
Garden. Our present theme, however, has regard only 
to its manifestation in words. And here let me speak briefly 



390 POE 

on the topic of rhythm. Contenting myself with the cer- 
tainty that Music, in its various modes of metre, rhythm, and 
rhyme, is of so vast a moment in Poetry as never to be wisely 
rejected — is so vitally important an adjunct, that he is simply 
silly who declines its assistance — I will not now pause to 
maintain its absolute essentiality. It is in Music, perhaps, that 
the soul most nearly attains the great end for which, when 
inspired by the Poetic Sentiment, it struggles — the creation 
of supernal Beauty. It may be, indeed, that here this sub- 
lime end is. now and then, attained in fact. We are o ften 
made to feel, with _,a_sjiiyxrin^-- delight^ that — fremr-an "earthly 
nauL_are stricken notes which cannaL.haY£.-been unfamili a r 
to^lhe a ng eis. And thus there can be little doubt that in 
the union of Poetry with Music in its popular sense we 
shall find the widest field for the Poetic development. The 
old Bards and Minnesingers had advantages which we do 
not possess — and Thomas Moore, singing his own songs, 
was, in the most legitimate manner, perfecting them as 
poems. 

To recapitulate, then : — I wnnld -defin-e-j- in biief, lhe '~PpeTry 
£tf _words as The Rhythmical Q t&atimi -of "Beauty. Its sole 
arbiter is Taste. With the Intellect or with the Conscience, 
it has only collateral relations. Unless incidentally, it has 
no^ concern whatever either with Duty or with Truth. 

A few words, however, in explanation. That pleasure 
which is at once the most pure, the most elevating, and the 
most intense, is derived, I maintain, from the contemplation 
of the Beautiful. In the contemplation of Beauty we alone 
find it possible to attain that pleasurable elevation, or excite- 
ment, of the soul, which we recognize as the Poetic Senti- 
ment, and which is so easily distinguished from Truth, which 
is the satisfaction of the Reason, or from Passion, which 
is the excitement of the heart. I make Beauty, therefore, — 
using the word as inclusive of the sublime, — I make Beauty 
the province of the poem, simply because it is an obvious 
rule of Art that effects should be made to spring as directly 
as possible from their causes — no one as yet having been 
weak enough to deny that the peculiar elevation in question 
is at least most readily attainable in the poem. It by no 
means follows, however, that the incitements of Passion, or 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 391 

the precepts of Duty, or even the lessons of Truth, may 
not be introduced into a poem and with advantage; for 
they may subserve, incidentally, in various ways, the general 
purposes of the work; but the true artist will always con- 
trive to tone them down in proper subjection to that Beauty 
which is the atmosphere and the real essence of the poem. 

I cannot better introduce the few poems which I shall 
present for your consideration, than by the citation of the 
" Proem " to Mr. Longfellow's " Waif " : 

The day is done, and the darkness 

Falls from the wings of Night, 
As a feather is wafted downward 

From an eagle in his flight. 

I see the lights of the village 

Gleam through the rain and the mist, 

And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me, 
That my soul cannot resist: 

A feeling of sadness and longing, 

That is not akin to pain, 
And resembles sorrow only 

As the mist resembles the rain. 

Come, read to me some poem, 

Some simple and heartfelt lay, 
That shall soothe this restless feeling, 

And banish the thoughts of day. 

Not from the grand old masters, 

Not from the bards sublime, 
Whose distant footsteps echo 

Through the corridors of Time. 

For, like strains of martial music, 

Their mighty thoughts suggest 
Life's endless toil and endeavor; 

And to-night I long for rest. 

Read from some humbler poet, 
Whose songs gushed from his heart, 

As showers from the clouds of summer, 
Or tears from the eyelids start; 

Who, through long days of labor, 
And nights devoid of ease, 



392 POE 

Still heard in his soul the music 
Of wonderful melodies. 

Such songs have power to quiet 

The restless pulse of care, 
And come like the benediction 

That follows after prayer. 

Then read from the treasured volume 

The poem of thy choice, 
And lend to the rhyme of the poet 

The beauty of thy voice. 

And the night shall be filled with music, 

And the cares, that infest the day, 
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, 

And as silently steal away. 

With no great range of imagination, these lines have been 
justly admired for their delicacy of expression. Some of 
the images are very effective. Nothing can be better than — 

the bards sublime, 
Whose distant footsteps echo 
Through the corridors of Time. 

The idea of the last quatrain is also very effective. The 
poem, on the whole, however, is chiefly to be admired for 
the graceful insouciance of its metre, so well in accordance 
with the character of the sentiments, and especially for 
the ease of the general manner. This " ease," or naturalness, 
in a literary style, it has long been the fashion to regard 
as ease in appearance alone — as a point of really difficult 
attainment. But not so; a natural manner is difficult only 
to him who should never meddle with it — to the unnatural. 
It is but the result of writing with the understanding, or 
with the instinct, that the tone, in composition, should always 
be that which the mass of mankind would adopt — and must 
perpetually vary, of course, with the occasion. The author 
who, after the fashion of the " North American Review," 
should be, upon all occasions, merely "quiet," must neces- 
sarily, upon many occasions, be simply silly, or stupid; and 
has no more right to be considered " easy," or " natural," 
than a Cockney exquisite, or than the sleeping Beauty in 
the wax-workso 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 393 

Among the minor poems of Bryant, none has so much 
impressed me as the one which he entitles "June." I quote 
only a portion of it: — 

There, through the long, long summer hours, 

The golden light should lie, 
And thick, young herbs and groups of flowers 

Stand in their beauty by. 
The oriole should build and tell 
His love-tale, close beside my cell; 

The idle butterfly 
Should rest him there, and there be heard 
The housewife-bee and humming-bird. 

And what, if cheerful shouts at noon, 

Come, from the village sent, 
Or songs of maids, beneath the moon, 

With fairy laughter blent? 
And what, if in the evening light, 
Betrothed lovers walk in sight 

Of my low monument? 
I would the lovely scene around 
Might know no sadder sight nor sound, 

I know that I no more should see 

The season's glorious show, 
Nor would its brightness shine for me, 

Nor its wild music flow; 
But if, around my place of sleep, 
The friends I love should come to weep, 

They might not haste to go. 
Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom 
Should keep them, lingering by my tomb. 

These to their softened hearts should bear 

The thought of what has been, 
And speak of one who cannot share 

The gladness of the scene; 
Whose part, in all the pomp that fills 
The circuit of the summer hills, 

Is — that his grave is green ; 
And deeply would their hearts rejoice 
To hear again his living voice. 

The rhythmical flow, here, is even voluptuous — nothing 
could be more melodious. The poem has always affected 
me in a remarkable manner. The intense melancholy, which 
seems to well up, perforce, to the surface of all the poet's 



394 POE 

cheerful sayings about his grave, we find thrilling us to 
the soul, while there is the truest poetic elevation in the 
thrill. The impression left is one of a pleasurable sadness. 

And if, in the remaining compositions which I shall in- 
troduce to you, there be more or less of a similar tone al- 
ways apparent,, let me remind you that (how or why we 
know not) cthis xertain taint of sadness is insf.p?rg.h1y con- 
nected with all the higher manifestations of true. Beauty. 
It is, nevertheless, 

A feeling of sadness and longing 

That is not akin to pain, 
And resembles sorrow only 

As the mist resembles the rain. 

The taint of which I speak is clearly perceptible even in 
a poem so full of brilliancy and spirit as the "Health" of 
Edward C. Pinkney: — 

I fill this cup to one made up 

Of loveliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentle sex 

The seeming paragon ; 
To whom the better elements 

And kindly stars have given 
A form so fair, that, like the air, 

'Tis less of earth than heaven. 

Her every tone is music's own, 

Like those of morning birds, 
And something more than melody 

Dwells ever in her words ; 
The coinage of her heart are they, 

And from her lips each flows 
As one may see the burdened bee 

Forth issue from the rose. 

Affections are as thoughts to her, 

The measures of her hours ; 
Her feelings have the fragrancy, 

The freshness of young flowers : 
And lovely passions, changing oft, 

So fill her, she appears 
The image of themselves by turns,— 

The idol of past years! 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 395 

Of her bright face one glance will trace 

A picture on the brain, 
And of her voice in echoing hearts 

A sound must long remain ; 
But memory, such as mine of her, 

So very much endears, 
When death is nigh, my latest sigh 

Will not be life's, but hers. 

I fill this cup to one made up 

Of loveliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentle sex 

The seeming paragon — 
Her health ! and would on earth there stood 

Some more of such a frame, 
That life might be all poetry, 

And weariness a name. 

It was the misfortune of Mr. Pinkney to have been born 
too far south. Had he been a New Englander, it is probable 
that he would have been ranked as the first of American 
lyrists by that magnanimous cabal which has so long con- 
trolled the destinies of American Letters, in conducting the 
thing called the " North American Review." The poem 
just cited is especially beautiful; but the poetic elevation 
which it induces we must refer chiefly to our sympathy in 
the poet's enthusiasm. We pardon his hyperboles for the 
evident earnestness with which they are uttered. 

It was by no means my design, however, to expatiate upon 
the merits of what I should read you. These will neces- 
sarily speak for themselves. Boccalini, in his "Advertise- 
ments from Parnassus/' tells us that Zoilus once presented 
Apollo a very caustic criticism upon a very admirable book; 
whereupon the god asked him for the beauties of the 
work. He replied that he only busied himself about the 
errors. On hearing this, Apollo, handing him a sack of 
unwinnowed wheat, bade him pick out all the chaff for his 
reward. 

Now this fable answers very well as a hit at the critics; 
but I am by no means sure that the god was in the right. 
I am by no means certain that the true limits of the critical 
duty are not grossly misunderstood. Excellence, in a poem 
especially, may be considered in the light of an axiom, which 



396 POE 

need only be properly put, to become self-evident. It is not 
excellence if it requires to be demonstrated as such; and 
thus, to point out too particularly the merits of a work of 
Art, is to admit that they are not merits altogether. 

Among the " Melodies " of Thomas Moore, is one whose 
distinguished character as a poem proper seems to have 
been singularly left out of view. I allude to his lines begin- 
ning: "Come, rest in this bosom." The intense energy of 
their expression is not surpassed by anything in Byron. 
There are two of the lines in which a sentiment is conveyed 
that embodies the all in all of the divine passion of love — a 
sentiment which, perhaps, has found its echo in more, and 
in more passionate, human hearts than any other single senti- 
ment ever embodied in words : — 

Come, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer, 
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home is still here; 
Here still is the smile that no cloud can o'ercast, 
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last. 

Oh ! what was love made for, if 'tis not the same 
Through joy and through torment, through glory and shame? 
I know not, I ask not, if guilt's in that heart, 
I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art. 

Thou hast called me thy angel in moments of bliss, 
And thy angel I'll be, 'mid the horrors of this, — 
Through the furnace, unshrinking, thy steps to pursue, 
And shield thee, and save thee, — or perish there too ! 

It has been the fashion, of late days, to deny Moore imagi- 
nation, while granting him fancy — a distinction originating 
with Coleridge — than whom no man more fully compre- 
hended the great powers of Moore. The fact is that the 
fancy of this poet so far predominates over all his other 
faculties, and over the fancy of all other men, as to have 
induced, very naturally, the idea that he is fanciful only. 
But never was there a greater mistake. Never was a grosser 
wrong done the fame of a true poet. In the compass of 
the English language I can call to mind no poem more 
profoundly, more weirdly imaginative, in the best sense, than 
the lines commencing : " I would I were by that dim lake/' 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 397 

which are the composition of Thomas Moore. I regret 
that I am unable to remember them. 

One of the noblest — and, speaking of fancy, one of the 
most singularly fanciful — of modern poets, was Thomas 
Hood. His " Fair Ines " had always, for me, an inexpres- 
sible charm : — 

O saw ye not fair Ines? 

She's gone into the West, 
To dazzle when the sun is down, 

And rob the world of rest; 
She took our daylight with her, 

The smiles that we love best, 
With morning blushes on her cheek, 

And pearls upon her breast. 

turn again, fair Ines, 
Before the fall of night, 

For fear the moon should shine alone, 

And stars unrivalled bright; 
And blessed will the lover be 

That walks beneath their light, 
And breathes the love against thy cheek 

I dare not even write ! 

Would I had been, fair Ines, 

That gallant cavalier, 
Who rode so gayly by thy side, 

And whispered thee so near ! 
Were there no bonny dames at home, 

Or no true lovers here, 
That he should cross the seas to win 

The dearest of the dear? 

1 saw thee, lovely Ines, 

Descend along the shore, 
With bands of noble gentlemen, 1 

And banners waved before : 
And gentle youth and maidens gay, 

And snowy plumes they wore ; 
It would have been a beauteous dream— 

If it had been no more ! 

Alas, alas, fair Ines ! 

She went away with song, 
With Music waiting on her steps, 

And shoutings of the throng; 
But some were sad and felt no mirth, 

But only Music's wrong, 



398 POE 

In sounds that sang Farewell, Farewell, 
To her you've loved so long. 

Farewell, farewell, fair Ines ! 

That vessel never bore 
So fair a lady on its deck, 

Nor danced so light before, — 
Alas, for pleasure on the sea, 

And sorrow on the shore ! 
The smile that blest one lover's heart 

Has broken many more ! 

"The Haunted House," by the same author, is one of 
the truest poems ever written; one of the truest, one of 
the most unexceptionable, one of the most thoroughly 
artistic both in its theme and in its execution. It is, more- 
over, powerfully ideal, imaginative. I regret that its length 
renders it unsuitable for the purposes of this Lecture. In 
place of it, permit me to offer the universally appreciated 
m Bridge of Sighs." 

One more Unfortunate, 
Weary of breath, 
Rashly importunate, 
Gone to her death ! 

Take her up tenderly, 
Lift her with care : 
Fashioned so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair ! 

Look at her garments 
Clinging like cerements; 
Whilst the wave constantly 
Drips from her clothing; 
Take her up instantly, 
Loving, not loathing, — 

Touch her not scornfully; 
Think of her mournfully, 
Gently and humanly; 
Not of the stains of her — 
All that remains of her 
Now, is pure womanly. 

Make no deep scrutiny 
Into her mutiny 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 399 

Rash and undutiful : 
Past all dishonor, 
Death has left on her 
Only the beautiful. 

Still, for all slips of hers, 
One of Eve's family — 
Wipe those poor lips of hers 
Oozing so clammily, 
Loop up her tresses 
Escaped from the comb, 
Her fair auburn tresses ; 
Whilst wonderment guesses 
Where was her home? 

Who was her father? 
Who was her mother? 
Had she a sister? 
Had she a brother? 
Or was there a dearer one 
Still, and a nearer one 
Yet, than all other? 

Alas ! for the rarity 
Of Christian charity 
Under the sun ! 
Oh, it was pitiful ! 
Near a whole city full, 
Home she had none. 

Sisterly, brotherly, 
Fatherly, motherly 
Feelings had changed ; 
Love, by harsh evidence, 
Thrown from its eminence; 
Even God's providence 
Seeming estranged. 

Where the lamps quiver 

So far in the river, 

With many a light 

From window and casement, 

From garret to basement, 

She stood, with amazement, 

Houseless by night. 

The bleak wind of March 
Made her tremble and shiver, 
But not the dark arch, 
Or the black flowing river : 



400 POE 

Mad from life's history, 
Glad to death's mystery, 
Swift to be hurled — 
Anywhere, anywhere 
Out of the world ! 

In she plunged boldly, 
No matter how coldly 
The rough river ran, — 
Over the brink of it, 
Picture it — think of it, 
Dissolute man ! 
Lave in it, drink of it, 
Then, if you can ! 

Take her up tenderly, 
Lift her with care ; 
Fashioned so slenderly, 
Young, and so fair ! 

Ere her limbs frigidly 
Stiffen too rigidly, 
Decently — kindly — 
Smoothe and compose them: 
And her eyes, close them, 
Staring so blindly ! 

Dreadfully staring 
Through muddy impurity, 
As when with the daring 
Last look of despairing 
Fixed on futurity. 

Perishing gloomily, 
Spurred by contumely, 
Cold inhumanity, 
Burning insanity, 
Into her rest. — 
Cross her hands humbly, 
As if praying dumbly, 
Over her breast ! 
Owning her weakness, 
Her evil behavior, 
And leaving, with meekness, 
Her sins to her Saviour ! 

The vigor of this poem is no less remarkable than its 
pathos. The versification, although carrying the fanciful 
to the very verge of the fantastic, is nevertheless admirably 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 401 

adapted to the wild insanity which is the thesis of the 
poem. 

Among the minor poems of Lord Byron, is one which has 
never received from the critics the praise which it un- 
doubtedly deserves: — 

Though the day of my destiny's over, 

And the star of my fate hath declined, 
Thy soft heart refused to discover 

The faults which so many could find; 
Though thy soul with my grief was acquainted, 

It shrunk not to share it with me, 
And the love which my spirit hath painted 

It never hath found but in thee. 



Then when nature around me is smiling, 

The last smile which answers to mine, 
I do not believe it beguiling, 

Because it reminds me of thine; 
And when winds are at war with the ocean, 

As the breasts I believed in with me, 
If their billows excite an emotion, 

It is that they bear me from thee. 

Though the rock of my last hope is shivered, 

And its fragments are sunk in the wave, 
Though I feel that my soul is delivered 

To pain — it shall not be its slave. 
There is many a pang to pursue me ; 

They may crush, but they shall not contemn; 
They may torture, but shall not subdue me; 

Tis of thee that I think — not of them. 



Though human, thou didst not deceive me; 

Though woman, thou didst not forsake; 
Though loved, thou forborest to grieve me ; 

Though slandered, thou never couldst shake; 
Though trusted, thou didst not disclaim me; 

Though parted, it was not to fly ; 
Though watchful, 'twas not to defame me; 

Nor mute, that the world might belie. 



Yet I blame not the world, nor despise it, 
Nor the war of the many with one — 

[f my soul was not fitted to prize it, 
'Twas folly not sooner to shun; 



402 POE 

And if dearly that error hath cost me, 
And more than I once could foresee, 

I have found that, whatever it lost me, 
It could not deprive me of thee. 



From the wreck of the past, which hath perished, 

Thus much I at least may recall : 
It hath taught me that what I most cherished 

Deserved to be dearest of all. 
In the desert a fountain is springing, 

In the wide waste there still is a tree, 
And a bird in the solitude singing, 

Which speaks to my spirit of thee. 



Although the rhythm here is one of the most difficult, the 
versification could scarcely be improved. No nobler theme 
ever engaged the pen of poet. It is the soul-elevating idea, 
that no man can consider himself entitled to complain of 
Fate while, in his adversity, he still retains the unwavering 
love of woman. 

From Alfred Tennyson — although in perfect sincerity I 
regard him as the noblest poet that ever lived — I have left 
myself time to cite only a very brief specimen. I call him, 
and think him, the noblest of poets, not because the impres- 
sions he produces are, at all times, the most profound, not 
because the poetical excitement which he induces is, at all 
times, the most intense, but because it is, at all times, the 
most ethereal — in other words, the most elevating and the 
most pure. No poet is so little of the earth, earthy. What 
I am about to read is from his last long poem, " The 
Princess " : — 

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, 
Tears from the depth of some divine despair 
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, 
In looking on the happy autumn fields, 
And thinking of the days that are no more. 



Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail 
That brings our friends up from the underworld; 
Sad as the last which reddens over one 
That sinks with all we love below the verge ; 
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. 



THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 403 

Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns 
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds 
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square; 
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more. 

Dear as remembered kisses after death, 
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned 
On lips that are for others ; deep as love, 
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret; 
O Death in Life, the days that are no more. 



Thus, although in a very cursory and imperfect manner, 
I have endeavored to convey to you my conception of the 
Poetic Principle. It has been my purpose to suggest that, 
while this Principle itself is, strictly and simply, the Human 
Aspiration for Supernal Beauty, the manifestation of the 
Principle is alwa ys_iaund in an-^lezLatinq excitement of the 
Soul, quite independent of that passion which is the intoxi- 
cation of the Heart, or of that Truth which is the satisfac- 
tion of the Reason. For, in regard to Passion, alas ! its 
tendency is to degrade rather than elevate the Soul. 
Love, on the contrary-jLove, the true, the divine Eros, 
the Uranian as distinguished from the Dionaean Venus — is 
unquestionahl w^he p ure st and truest of all poeti cal th emes^ 
And in regard to Truth — if, to be sure, through the attain- 
ment of a truth we are led to perceive a harmony where 
none was apparent before, we experience, at once the true 
poetical effect; but this effect is referable to the harmony 
alone, and not in the least degree to the truth which merely 
served to render the harmony manifest. 

We shall reach, however, more immediately a distinct 
conception of what the true Poetry is, by mere reference to 
a few of the simple elements which induce in the Poet him- 
self the true poetical effect. He recognizes the ambrosia, 
which nourishes his soul, in the bright orbs that shine in 
Heaven, in the volutes of the flower, in the clustering of 
low shrubberies, in the waving of the grain-fields, in the 
slanting of the tall, Eastern trees, in the blue distance of 
mountains, in the grouping of clouds, in the twinkling of 
half-hidden brooks, in the gleaming of silver rivers, in 
the repose of sequestered lakes, in the star-mirroring depths 



404 POE 

of lonely wells. He perceives it in the songs of birds, in 
the harp of Mollis, in the sighing of the night-wind, in the 
repining voice of the forest, in the surf that complains to 
the shore, in the fresh breath of the woods, in the scent 
of the violet, in the voluptuous perfume of the hyacinth, 
in the suggestive odor that comes to him at eventide from 
far-distant, undiscovered islands, over dim oceans, illimitable 
and unexplored. He owns it in all noble thoughts, in all 
unworldly motives, in all holy impulses, in all chivalrous, 
generous, and self-sacrificing deeds. He feels it in the 
beauty of woman, in the grace of her step, in the lustre of 
her eye, in the melody of her voice, in her soft laughter, in 
her sigh, in the harmony of the rustling of her robes. He 
deeply feels it in her winning endearments, in her burning 
enthusiasms, in her gentle charities, in her meek and de- 
votional endurances ; but above all — ah ! far above all — he 
kneels to it, he worships it in the faith, in the purity, in the 
strength, in the altogether divine majesty of her love. 

Let me conclude by the recitation of yet another brief 
poem — one very different in character from any that I have 
before quoted. It is by Motherwell, and is called " The 
Song of the Cavalier/' With our modern and altogether 
rational ideas of the absurdity and impiety of warfare, we 
are not precisely in that frame of mind best adapted to 
sympathize with the sentiments, and thus to appreciate the 
real excellence, of the poem. To do this fully, we must 
identify ourselves, in fancy, with the soul of the old cavalier. 

Then mounte ! then mounte, brave gallants, all, 

And don your helmes amaine : 
Deathe's couriers, Fame and Honor, call 

Us to the field againe. 
No shrewish teares shall fill our eye 

When the sword-hilt's in our hand; 
Heart-whole we'll part and no whit sighe 

For the fayrest of the land ; 
Let piping swaine, and craven wight, 

Thus weepe and puling crye, 
Our business is like men to fight, 

And hero-like to die I 



WALKING 

BY 

HENRY DAVID THOREAU 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

Henry David Thoreau was born at Concord, Massachusetts, 
July 12, 1817, and died there May 6, 1862. He was one of the 
most markedly individual of that group of philosophers and men 
of letters which has made the name of the little Massachusetts 
town so notable in the intellectual history of America. 

Thoreau came of a family of French descent, and was edu- 
cated at Harvard, "He was bred," says his friend Emerson, "to 
no profession; he never married; he lived alone; he never went 
to church; he never voted; he refused to pay a tax to the State; 
he ate no flesh, he drank no wine, he never knew the use of 
tobacco ; and, though a naturalist, he used neither trap nor gun" 
The individualism which is implied in these facts was the most 
prominent characteristic of this remarkable person. Holding that 
"a man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he 
can afford to let alone," he found that a small part of his time, 
devoted to making lead-pencils, carpentering, and surveying, gave 
him enough for his simple needs, and left him free for the rest 
of the year to observe nature, to think, and to write. 

In 1845 Thoreau built himself a hut on the edge of Walden 
Pond, and for over two years lived there in solitude, composing 
his "Week on the Concord and Merrimac Rivers." During these 
years he kept a journal, from which he later drew the volume 
called "Walden," and these are his only two books published 
during his lifetime. From articles in magazines and manuscripts, 
some eight more volumes have been compiled since his death. 

Interesting as is the philosophy which permeates the work of 
this solitary, his books have found readers rather on account 
of their minute and sympathetic observation of nature and the 
beauty of their style. The following essay on "Walking" repre- 
sents all three elements; and in its charming discursiveness, in 
the absence of any structure to hinder the writer's pen from 
Wandering at will, and in the responsiveness which it exhibits 
to the moods and suggestions of nature, it is a characteristic 
expression of its author's spirit* 



40Q 



WALKING 

[1862] 

I WISH to speak a word for Nature, for absolute freedom 
and wildness,. as contrasted with a freedom and culture 
merely civil, — to regard man as an inhabitant, or a part 
and parcel of Nature, rather than a member of society. I 
wish to make an extreme statement, if so I may make an 
emphatic one, for there are enough champions of civiliza- 
tion: the minister and the school committee and every one 
of you will take care of that. 

I have met with but one or two persons in the course of 
my life who understood the art of Walking, that is, of tak- 
ing walks, — who had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering : 
which word is beautifully derived from " idle people who 
roved about the country, in the Middle Ages, and asked 
charity, under pretence of going a la Sainte Terre," to the 
Holy Land, till the children exclaimed, " There goes a 
Sainte-Terrer," a Saunterer, a Holy-Lander. They who 
never go to the Holy Land in their walks, as they pretend, 
are indeed mere idlers and vagabonds; but they who do go 
there are saunterers in the good sense, such as I mean. 
Some, however, would derive the word from sans terre, 
without land or a home, which, therefore, in the good sense, 
will mean, having no particular home, but equally at home 
everywhere. For this is the secret of successful sauntering. 
He who sits still in a house all the time may be the greatest 
vagrant of all; but the saunterer, in the good sense, is no 
more vagrant than the meandering river, which is all the 
while sedulously seeking the shortest course to the sea. But 
I prefer the first, which, indeed, is the most probable deriva- 
tion. For every walk is a sort of crusade, preached by some 
Peter the Hermit in us, to go forth and reconquer this Holy 
Land from the hands of the Infidels. 



y 



408 THOREAU 

It is true, we are but faint-hearted crusaders, even the 
walkers, nowadays, who undertake no persevering, never- 
ending enterprizes. Our expeditions are but tours, and come 
round again at evening to the old hearth-side from which 
we set out. Half the walk is but retracing our steps. 
We should go forth on the shortest walk, perchance, in 
the spirit of undying adventure, never to return — pre- 
pared to send back our embalmed hearts only as relics 
to our desolate kingdoms. If you are ready to leave 
father and mother, and brother and sister, and wife and 
child and friends, and never see them again — if you 
have paid your debts, and made your will, and settled 
all your affairs, and are a free man, then you are ready 
for a walk. 

To come down to my own experience, my companion and 
I, for I sometimes have a companion, take pleasure in fancy- 
ing ourselves knights of a new, or rather an old, order — 
not Equestrians or Chevaliers, not Ritters or riders, but 
Walkers, a still more ancient and honourable class, I trust. 
The chivalric and heroic spirit which once belonged to the 
Rider seems now to reside in, or perchance to have subsided 
into, the Walker, — not the Knight, but Walker, Errant. He 
is a sort of fourth estate, outside of Church and State and 
People. 

We have felt that we almost alone hereabouts practised 
this noble art; though, to tell the truth, at least, if their own 
assertions are to be received, most of my townsmen would 
fain walk sometimes, as I do, but they cannot. No wealth 
can buy the requisite leisure, freedom, and independence 
which are the capital in this profession. It comes only by 
the grace of God. It requires a direct dispensation from- 
Heaven to become a walker. You must be born into the 
family of the Walkers. Ambulator nascitur, non fit. Some 
of my townsmen, it is true, can remember and have de- 
scribed to me some walks which they took ten years ago, in 
which they were so blessed as to lose themselves for half an 
hour in the woods ; but I know very well that they have con- 
fined themselves to the highway ever since, whatever pre- 
tensions they may make to belong to this select class. No 
doubt they were elevated for a moment as by the reminis- 



WALKING 409 

cence of a previous state of existence, when even they were 
foresters and outlaws. 

" When he came to grene wode, 
In a mery mornynge, 
There he herde the notes small 
Of byrdes mery syngynge. 

" It is ferre gone, sayd Robyn, 
That I was last here ; 
Me lyste a lytell for to shote 
At the donne dere." 

I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits, un- 
less I spend four hours a day at least — and it is commonly 
more than that — sauntering through the woods and over the 
hills and fields, absolutely free from all worldly engage- 
ments. You may safely say, A penny for your thoughts, or 
a thousand pounds. When sometimes I am reminded that 
the mechanics and shopkeepers stay in their shops not only 
all the forenoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting with 
crossed legs, so many of them — as if the legs were made to 
sit upon, and not to stand or walk upon — I think that they 
deserve some credit for not having all committed suicide 
long ago. 

I, who cannot stay in my chamber for a single day with- 
out acquiring some rust, and when sometimes I have stolen 
forth for a walk at the eleventh hour or four o'clock in the 
afternoon, too late to redeem the day, when the shades of 
night were already beginning to be mingled with the day- 
light, have felt as if I had committed some sin to be atoned 
for, — I confess that I am astonished at the power of en- 
durance, to say nothing of the moral insensibility, of my 
neighbours who confine themselves to shops and offices the 
whole day for weeks and months, ay, and years almost to- 
gether. I know not what manner of stuff they are of — 
sitting there now at three o'clock in the afternoon, as if it 
were three o'clock in the morning. Bonaparte may talk of 
the three-o'clock-in-the-morning courage, but it is nothing to 
the courage which can sit down cheerfully at this hour in 
the afternoon over against one's self whom you have known 
all the morning, to starve out a garrison to whom you are 



410 THOREAU 

bound by such strong ties of sympathy. I wonder that about 
this time, or say between four and five o'clock in the after- 
noon, too late for the morning papers and too early for the 
evening ones, there is not a general explosion heard up and 
down the street, scattering a legion of antiquated and house- 
bred notions and whims to the four winds for an airing — 
and so the evil cure itself. 

How womankind, who are confined to the house still more 
than men, stand it I do not know; but I have ground to 
suspect that most of them do not stand it at all. When, 
early in a summer afternoon, we have been shaking the dust 
of the village from the skirts of our garments, making haste 
past those houses with purely Doric or Gothic fronts, which 
have such an air of repose about them, my companion 
whispers that probably about these times their occupants are 
all gone to bed. Then it is that I appreciate the beauty and 
the glory of architecture, which itself never turns in, but 
forever stands out and erect, keeping watch over the 
slumberers. 

No doubt temperament, and, above all, age, have a good 
deal to do with it. As a man grows older, his ability to 
sit still and follow indoor occupations increases. He grows 
vespertinal in his habits as the evening of life approaches, 
till at last he comes forth only just before sundown, and 
gets all the walk that he requires in half an hour. 

But the walking of which I speak has nothing in it akin 
to taking exercise, as it is called, as the sick take medicine 
at stated hours — as the swinging of dumb-bells or chairs; 
but is itself the enterprise and adventure of the day. If you 
would get exercise, go in search of the springs of life. 
Think of a man's swinging dumb-bells for his health, when 
those springs are bubbling up in far-off pastures unsought 
by him ! 

Moreover, you must walk like a camel, which is said to be 
the only beast which ruminates when walking. When a 
traveller asked Wordsworth's servant to show him her mas- 
ter's study, she answered, " Here is his library, but his study 
is out of doors. " 

Living much out of doors, in the sun and wind, will no 
doubt produce a certain roughness of character — will cause 



WALKING 411 

a thicker cuticle to grow over some of the finer qualities of 
our nature, as on the face and hands, or as severe manual 
labor robs the hands of some of their delicacy of touch. So 
staying in the house, on the other hand, may produce a soft- 
ness and smoothness, not to say thinness of skin, accom- 
panied by an increased sensibility to certain impressions. 
Perhaps we should be more susceptible to some influences im- 
portant to our intellectual and moral growth, if the sun had 
shone and the wind blown on us a little less ; and no doubt 
it is a nice matter to proportion rightly the thick and thin 
skin. But methinks that is a scurf that will fall off fast 
enough — that the natural remedy is to be found in the pro- 
portion which the night bears to the day, the winter to the 
summer, thought to experience. There will be so much the 
more air and sunshine in our thoughts. The callous palms 
of the laborer are conversant with finer tissues of self- 
respect and heroism, whose touch thrills the heart, than the 
languid fingers of idleness. That is mere sentimentality that 
lies abed by day and thinks itself white, far from the tan 
and callus of experience. 

When we walk, we naturally go to the fields and woods: 
what would become of us if we walked only in a garden or 
a mall? Even some sects of philosophers have felt the ne- 
cessity of importing the woods to themselves, since they did 
not go to the woods. "They planted groves and walks of 
Platanes," where they took subdiales ambulationes in porticos 
open to the air. Of course it is of no use to direct our steps 
to the woods, if they do not carry us thither. I am alarmed 
when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods 
bodily, without getting there in spirit. In my afternoon 
walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and 
my obligations to society. But it sometimes happens that I 
cannot easily shake off the village. The thought of some 
work will run in my head and I am not where my body is — 
I am out of my senses. In my walks I would fain return 
to my senses. What business have I in the woods, if I am 
thinking of something out of the woods? I suspect myself, 
and cannot help a shudder, when I find myself so implicated 
even in what are called good works — for this may some- 
times happen. 



412 THOREAU 

My vicinity affords many good walks; and though for so 
many years I have walked almost every day, and sometimes 
for several days together, I have not yet exhausted them. 
An absolutely new prospect is a great happiness, and I can 
still get this any afternoon. Two or three hours' walking 
will carry me to as strange a country as I expect ever to 
see. A single farmhouse which I had not seen before is 
sometimes as good as the dominions of the King of Da- 
homey. There is in fact a sort of harmony discoverable 
between the capabilities of the landscape within a circle of 
ten miles' radius, or the limits of an afternoon walk, and the 
threescore years and ten of human life. It will never be- 
come quite familiar to you. 

Nowadays almost all man's improvements, so called, as 
the building of houses, and the cutting down of the forest 
and of all large trees, simply deform the landscape, and 
make it more and more tame and cheap. A people who 
would begin by burning the fences and let the forest stand! 
I saw the fences half consumed, their ends lost in the middle 
of the prairie, and some worldly miser with a surveyor 
looking after his bounds, while heaven had taken place 
around him, and he did not see the angels going to and fro, 
but was looking for an old post-hole in the midst of para- 
dise. I looked again, and saw him standing in the middle of 
a boggy stygian fen, surrounded by devils, and he had found 
his bounds without a doubt, three little stones, where a stake 
had been driven, and looking nearer, I saw that the Prince 
of Darkness was his surveyor. 

I can easily walk ten, fifteen, twenty, any number of miles, 
commencing at my own door, without going by any house, 
without crossing a road except where the fox and the mink 
do : first along by the river, and then the brook, and then the 
meadow and the wood-side. There are square miles in my 
vicinity which have no inhabitant. From many a hill I can 
see civilisation and the abodes of man afar. The farmers 
and their works are scarcely more obvious than woodchucks 
and their burrows. Man and his affairs, church and state 
and school, trade and commerce, and manufactures and agri- 
culture, even politics, the most alarming of them all, — I am 
pleased to see how little space they occupy in the landscape. 



WALKING 413 

Politics is but a narrow field, and that still narrower high- 
way yonder leads to it. I sometimes direct the traveller 
thither. If you would go to the political world, follow the 
great road — follow that market-man, keep his dust in your 
eyes, and it will lead you straight to it; for it, too, has its 
place merely, and does not occupy all space. I pass from it 
as from a bean-field into the forest, and it is forgotten. In 
one half-hour I can walk off to some portion of the earth's 
surface where a man does not stand from one year's end to 
another, and there, consequently, politics are not, for they 
are but as the cigar-smoke of a man. 

The village is the place to which the roads tend, a sort 
of expansion of the highway, as a lake of a river. It is the 
body of which roads are the arms and legs — a trivial or 
quadrivial place, the thoroughfare and ordinary of travellers. 
The word is from the Latin villa, which together with via, 
a way, or more anciently ved and vella, Varro derives from 
veho, to carry, because the villa is the place to and from 
which things are carried. They who got their living by 
teaming were said vellaturam facere. Hence, too, apparently, 
the Latin word vilis and our vile ; also villain. This suggests 
what kind of degeneracy villagers are liable to. They are 
wayworn by the travel that goes by and over them, without 
travelling themselves. 

Some do not walk at all ; others walk in the highways ; a 
few walk across lots. Roads are made for horses and men 
of business. I do not travel in them much, comparatively, 
because I am not in a hurry to get to any tavern or grocery 
or livery-stable or depot to which they lead. I am a good 
horse to travel, but not from choice a roadster. The land- 
scape-painter uses the figures of men to mark a road. He 
would not make that use of my figure. I walk out into a 
Nature such as the old prophets and poets, Menu, Moses, 
Homer, Chaucer, walked in. You may name it America, but 
it is not America: neither Americus Vespucius, nor Co- 
lumbus, nor the rest were the discoverers of it. There is a 
truer account of it in mythology than in any history of 
America, so called, that I have seen. 

However, there are a few old roads that may be trodden 
with profit, as if they led somewhere now that they are 



414 THOREAU 

nearly discontinued. There is the Old Marlborough Road, 
which does not go to Marlborough now, methinks,. unless that 
is Marlborough where it carries me. I am the bolder to 
speak of it here, because I presume that there are one or 
two such roads in every town. 

THE OLD MARLBOROUGH ROAD 

Where they once dug for money, 

Where sometimes Martial Miles 

But never found any; 

Singly files, 

And Elijah Wood, 

I fear for no good : 

No other man, 

Save Elisha Dugan, — 

man of wild habits, 
Partridges and rabbits, 
Who hast no cares 
Only to set snares, 
Who liv'st all alone, 
Close to the bone, 

And where life is sweetest 

Constantly eatest. 
When the spring stirs my blood 
With the instinct to travel 
I can get enough gravel 
On the Old Marlborough RoacL 

Nobody repairs it, 

For nobody wears it; 

It is a living way, 

As the Christians say. 
Not many there be 

Who enter therein, 
Only the guests of the 

Irishman Quin. 
What is it, what is it, 

But a direction out there, 
And the bare possibility 

Of going somewhere? 

Great guide-boards of stone, 

But travellers none ; 

Cenotaphs of the towns 

Named on their crowns. 

It is worth going to see 

Where you might be. 

What king 

Did the thing, 

1 am still wondering; 



WALKING 415 

Set up how or when, 

By what selectmen, 

Gourgas or Lee, 

Clark or Darby? 

They're a great endeavor 

To be something forever; 

Blank tablets of stone, 

Where a traveller might groan, 

And in one sentence 

Grave all that is known ; 

Which another might read, 

In his extreme need. 

I know one or two 

Lines that would do, 

Literature that might stand 

All over the land, 

Which a man could remember 

Till next December, 

And read again in the Spring, 

After the thawing. 
If with fancy unfurled 

You leave your abode, 
You may go round the world 
By the Old Marlborough Road. 

At present, in this vicinity, the best part of the land is 
not private property; the landscape is not owned, and the 
walker enjoys comparative freedom. But possibly the day 
will come when it will be partitioned off into so-called 
pleasure-grounds, in which a few will take a narrow and 
exclusive pleasure only, — when fences shall be multiplied, 
and man-traps and other engines invented to confine men 
to the public road, and walking over the surface of God's 
earth shall be construed to mean trespassing on some gentle- 
man's grounds. To enjoy a thing exclusively is commonly 
to exclude yourself from the true enjoyment of it. Let us 
improve our opportunities, then, before the evil days come. 

What is it that makes it so hard sometimes to determine 
whither we will walk? I believe that there is a subtle 
magnetism in Nature, which, if we unconsciously yield to 
it, will direct us aright. It is not indifferent to us which way 
we walk. There is a right way; but we are very liable 
from heedlessness and stupidity to take the wrong one. We 
would fain take that walk, never yet taken by us through 



416 THOREAU 

this actual world, which is perfectly symbolical of the path 
which we love to travel in the interior and ideal world; 
and sometimes, no doubt, we find it difficult to choose our 
direction, because it does not yet exist distinctly in our 
idea. 

When I go out of the house for a walk, uncertain as yet 
whither I will bend my steps, and submit myself to my in- 
stinct to decide for me, I find, strange and whimsical as it 
may seem, that I finally and inevitably settle southwest, 
toward some particular wood or meadow or deserted pasture 
or hill in that direction. My needle is slow to settle, — 
varies a few degrees, and does not always point due south- 
west, it is true, and it has good authority for this variation, 
but it always settles between west and south-southwest. The 
future lies that way to me, and the earth seems more 
unexhausted and richer on that side. The outline which 
would bound my walks would be, not a circle, but a parab- 
ola, or rather like one of those cometary orbits which have 
been thought to be non-returning curves, in this case open- 
ing westward, in which my house occupies the place of the 
sun. I turn round and round irresolute sometimes for a 
quarter of an hour, until I decide, for a thousandth time, 
that I will walk into the southwest or west. Eastward I go 
only by force; but westward I go free. Thither no business 
leads me. It is hard for me to believe that I shall find fair 
landscapes or sufficient wildness and freedom behind the 
eastern horizon. I am not excited by the prospect of a walk 
thither; but I believe that the forest which I see in the 
western horizon stretches uninterruptedly toward the setting 
sun, and there are no towns nor cities in it of enough con- 
sequence to disturb me. Let me live where I will, on this 
side is the city, on that the wilderness, and ever I am leav- 
ing the city more and more, and withdrawing into the wilder- 
ness. I should not lay so much stress on this fact, if I 
did not believe that something like this is the prevailing tend- 
ency of my countrymen. I must walk toward Oregon, and 
not toward Europe. And that way the nation is moving, and 
I may say that mankind progress from east to west. With- 
in a few years we have witnessed the phenomenon of a south- 
eastward migration, in the settlement of Australia; but this 



WALKING 417 

affects us as a retrograde movement, and, judging from the 
moral and physical character of the first generation of 
Australians, has not yet proved a successful experiment. 
The eastern Tartars think that there is nothing west beyond 
Thibet. "The world ends there," say they; "beyond there 
is nothing but a shoreless sea." It is unmitigated East 
where they live. 

We go eastward to realise history and study the works of 
art and literature, retracing the steps of the race; we go 
westward as into the future, with a spirit of enterprise 
and adventure. The Atlantic is a Lethean stream, in our 
passage over which we have had an opportunity to forget 
the Old World and its institutions. If we do not succeed 
this time, there is perhaps one more chance for the race left 
before it arrives on the banks of the Styx; and that is in 
the Lethe of the Pacific, which is three times as wide. 

I know not how significant it is, or how far it is an evi- 
dence of singularity, that an individual should thus consent 
in his pettiest walk with the general movement of the race; 
but I know that something akin to the migratory instinct 
in birds and quadrupeds, — which, in some instances, is 
known to have affected the squirrel tribe, impelling them to a 
general and mysterious movement, in which they were seen, 
say some, crossing the broadest rivers, each on its particular 
chip, with its tail raised for a sail, and bridging narrower 
streams with their dead, — that something like the furor 
which affects the domestic cattle in the spring, and which is 
referred to a worm in their tails, — affects both nations and 
individuals, either perennially or from time to time. Not 
a flock of wild geese cackles over our town, but it to some 
extent unsettles the value of real estate here, and if I were 
a broker I should probably take that disturbance into 
account. 

" Than longen folk to gon on pilgrimages, 
And palmeres for to seken strange strondes." 

Every sunset which I witness inspires me with the desire 
to go to a West as distant and as fair as that into 
which the sun goes down. He appears to migrate westward 
daily, and tempts us to follow him. He is the Great West- 
ern Pioneer whom the nations follow. We dream all 

Vol. 28— n hc 



418 THOREAU 

night of those mountain-ridges in the horizon, though they 
may be of vapor only, which were last gilded by his rays. 
The island of Atlantis, and the islands and gardens of the 
Hesperides, a sort of terrestrial paradise, appear to have 
been the Great West of the ancients, enveloped in mystery 
and poetry. Who has not seen in imagination, when looking 
into the sunset sky, the gardens of the Hesperides, and the 
foundation of all those fables? 

Columbus felt the westward tendency more strongly than 
any before. He obeyed it, and found a New World for 
Castile and Leon. The herd of men in those days scented 
fresh pastures from afar. 

" And now the sun had stretched out all the hills, 
And now was dropped into the western bay; 
At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue; 
To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new." 

Where on the globe can there be found an area of equal 
extent with that occupied by the bulk of our States, so 
fertile and so rich and varied in its productions, and at 
the same time so habitable by the European, as this is? 
Michaux, who knew but part of them, says that " the species- 
of large trees are much more numerous in North America 
than in Europe; in the United States there are more than 
one hundred and forty species that exceed thirty feet in 
height; in France there are but thirty that attain this size." 
Later botanists more than confirm his observations. Hum- 
boldt came to America to realize his youthful dreams of a 
tropical vegetation, and he beheld it in its greatest per- 
fection in the primitive forests of the Amazon, the most 
gigantic wilderness on the earth, which he has so eloquently 
described. The geographer Guyot, himself a European, 
goes farther — farther than I am ready to follow him; yet 
not when he says : " As the plant is made for the animal, as 
the vegetable world is made for the animal world, America 
is made for the man of the Old World. . . . The man 
of the Old World sets out upon his way. Leaving the 
highlands of Asia, he descends from station to station 
towards Europe. Each of his steps is marked by a new 
civilization superior to the preceding, by a greater power of 



WALKING 419 

development. Arrived at the Atlantic,, he pauses on the shore 
of this unknown ocean, the bounds of which he knows not, 
and turns upon his footprints for an instant." When he has 
exhausted the rich soil of Europe, and reinvigorated himself, 
" then recommences his adventurous career westward as in 
the earliest ages." So far Guyot. 

From this western impulse coming in contact with the 
barrier of the Atlantic sprang the commerce and enterprise 
of modern times. The younger Michaux, in his " Travels 
West of the Alleghanies in 1802," says that the common 
inquiry in the newly settled West was, " ' From what part of 
the world have you come ? ' As if these vast and fertile 
regions would naturally be the place of meeting and com- 
mon country of all the inhabitants of the globe." 

To use an obsolete Latin word, I might say, Ex Oriente 
lux; ex Occidente frux. From the East light; from the 
West fruit. 

Sir Francis Head, an English traveller and a Governor- 
General of Canada, tells us that " in both the northern 
and southern hemispheres of the New World, Nature has not 
only outlined her works on a larger scale, but has painted 
the whole picture with brighter and more costly colors than 
she used in delineating and in beautifying the Old World. 
. . . The heavens of America appear infinitely higher, the 
sky is bluer, the air is fresher, the cold is intenser, the 
moon looks larger, the stars are brighter, the thunder is 
louder, the lightning is vivider, the wind is stronger, the 
rain is heavier, the mountains are higher, the rivers longer, 
the forests bigger, the plains broader." This statement will 
do at least to set against Buffon's account of this part 
of the world and its productions. 

Linnaeus said long ago, " Nescio quae facies lata, glabra 
plantis Americanis: I know not what there is of joyous and 
smooth in the aspect of American plants;" and I think that 
in this country there are no, or at most very few, Africans 
bestiz, African beasts, as the Romans called them, and that 
in this respect also it is peculiarly fitted for the habitation 
of man. We are told that within three miles of the centre 
of the East Indian city of Singapore, some of the inhabitants 
are annually carried off by tigers; but the traveller can 



420 THOREAU 

lie down in the woods at night almost anywhere in North 
America without fear of wild beasts. 

These are encouraging testimonies. If the moon looks 
larger here than in Europe, probably the sun looks larger 
also. If the heavens of America appear infinitely higher, 
and the stars brighter, I trust that these facts are symbolical 
of the height to which the philosophy and poetry and re- 
ligion of her inhabitants may one day soar. At length, per- 
chance, the immaterial heaven will appear as much higher 
to the American mind, and the intimations that star it as 
much brighter. For I believe that climate does thus react 
on man — as there is something in the mountain air that 
feeds the spirit and inspires. Will not man grow to greater 
perfection intellectually as well as physically under these 
influences ? Or is it unimportant how many foggy days there 
are in his life? I trust that we shall be more imaginative, 
that our thoughts will be clearer, fresher, and more ethereal, 
as our sky — our understanding more comprehensive and 
broader, like our plains — our intellect generally on a 
grander scale, like our thunder and lightning, our 
rivers and mountains and forests — and our hearts shall 
even correspond in breadth and depth and grandeur to our 
inland seas. Perchance there will appear to the traveller 
something, he knows not what, of lata and glabra, of joyous 
and serene, in our very faces. Else to what end does the 
world go on, and why was America discovered? 

To Americans I hardly need to say — 

" Westward the star of empire takes its way." 

As a true patriot, I should be ashamed to think that Adam 
in paradise was more favourably situated on the whole than 
the backwoodsman in this country. 

Our sympathies in Massachusetts are not confined to 
New England; though we may be estranged from the South, 
we sympathize with the West. There is the home of the 
younger sons, as among the Scandinavians they took to the 
sea for their inheritance. It is too late to be studying He- 
brew; it is more important to understand even the slang 
of to-day. 

Some months ago I went to see a panorama of the Rhine. 



WALKING 421 

It was like a dream of the Middle Ages. I floated down its 
historic stream in something more than imagination, under 
bridges built by the Romans, and repaired by later heroes, 
past cities and castles whose very names were music to my 
ears, and each of which was the subject of a legend. There 
were Ehrenbreitstein and Rolandseck and Coblentz, which 
I knew only in history. They were ruins that interested 
me chiefly. There seemed to come up from its waters and 
its vine-clad hills and valleys a hushed music as of Crusaders 
departing for the Holy Land. I floated along under the 
spell of enchantment, as if I had been transported to an 
heroic age, and breathed an atmosphere of chivalry. 

Soon after, I went to see a panorama of the Mississippi, 
and as I worked my way up the river in the light of to-day 
and saw the steam-boats wooding up, counted the rising 
cities, gazed on the fresh ruins of Nauvoo, beheld the In- 
dians moving west across the stream, and, as before I had 
looked up the Moselle, now looked up the Ohio and the Mis- 
souri and heard the legends of Dubuque and of Wenona's 
Cliff, — still thinking more of the future than of the past or 
present, — I saw that this was a Rhine stream of a different 
kind; that the foundations of castles were yet to be laid, and 
the famous bridges were yet to be thrown over the river ; and 
I felt that this was the heroic age itself, though we know it not, 
for the hero is commonly the simplest and obscurest of men. 

The West of which I speak is but another name for the 
Wild; and what I have been preparing to say is, that in 
Wildness is the preservation of the World. Every tree 
sends its fibres forth in search of the Wild. The cities im- 
port it at any price. Men plough and sail for it. From 
the forest and wilderness come the tonics and barks which 
brace mankind. Our ancestors were savages. The story of 
Romulus and Remus being suckled by a wolf is not a meaning- 
less fable. The founders of every state which has risen to 
eminence have drawn their nourishment and vigor from a 
similar wild source. It was because the children of the 
Empire were not suckled by the wolf that they were con- 
quered and displaced by the children of the northern forests 
who were. 



422 THOREAU 

I believe in the forest, and in the meadow, and in the 
night in which the corn grows. We require an infusion of 
hemlock-spruce or arbor-vitse in our tea. There is a dif- 
ference between eating and drinking for strength and from 
mere gluttony. The Hottentots eagerly devour the marrow 
of the koodoo and other antelopes raw, as a matter of course. 
Some of our Northern Indians eat raw the marrow of the Arc- 
tic reindeer, as well as various other parts, including the sum- 
mits of the antlers, as long as they are soft. And herein, 
perchance, they have stolen a march on the cooks of Paris. 
They get what usually goes to feed the fire. This is probably 
better than stall-fed beef and slaughter-house pork to make 
a man of. Give me a wildness whose glance no civiliza- 
tion can endure — as if we lived on the marrow of koodoos 
devoured raw. 

There are some intervals which border the strain of the 
wood-thrush, to which I would migrate, — wild lands where 
no settler has squatted; to which, methinks, I am already 
acclimated. 

The African hunter Cumming tells us that the skin of 
the eland, as well as that of most other antelopes just 
killed, emits the most delicious perfume of trees and grass. 
I would have every man so much like a wild antelope, so 
much a part and parcel of Nature, that his very person 
should thus sweetly advertise our senses of his presence, 
and remind us of those parts of Nature which he most haunts. 
I feel no disposition to be satirical, when the trapper's coat 
emits the odour of musquash even ; it is a sweeter scent to me 
than that which commonly exhales from the merchant's or 
the scholar's garments. When I go into their wardrobes 
and handle their vestments, I am reminded of no grassy 
plains and flowery meads which they have frequented, but 
of dusty merchants' exchanges and libraries rather. 

A tanned skin is something more than respectable, and 
perhaps olive is a fitter color than white for a man — a 
denizen of the woods. " The pale white man I " I do not 
wonder that the African pitied him. Darwin the naturalist 
says, " A white man bathing by the side of a Tahitian was 
like a plant bleached by the gardener's art, compared with a 
fine, dark green one, growing vigorously in the open fields." 



WALKING 423 

Ben Jonson exclaims, — 

" How near to good is what is fair ! M 

So I would say — 

How near to good is what is wild ! 

Life consists with wildness. The most alive is the wildest. 
Not yet subdued to man, its presence refreshes him. One 
who pressed forward incessantly and never rested from his 
labors, who grew fast and made infinite demands on life, 
would always find himself in a new country or wilderness, 
and surrounded by the raw material of life. He would be 
climbing over the prostrate stems of primitive forest trees. 

fltope and the future for me are not in lawns and culti- 
vated fields, not in towns and cities, but in the impervious 
and quaking swamps. When, formerly, I have analyzed 
my partiality for some farm which I had contemplated pur- 
chasing, I have frequently found that I was attracted solely 
by a few square rods of impermeable and unfathomable bog 
— a natural sink in one corner of it. That was the jewel 
which dazzled me. I derive more of my subsistence from 
the swamps which surround my native town than from the 
cultivated gardens in the village. There are no richer 
parterres to my eyes than the dense beds of dwarf andro- 
meda {Cassandra calyculata) which cover these tender 
places on the earth's surface. Botany cannot go farther 
than tell me the names of the shrubs which grow there — 
the high-blueberry, panicled andromeda, lamb-kill, azalea, 
and rhodora — all standing in the quaking sphagnum. I 
often think that I should like to have my house front on 
this mass of dull red bushes, omitting other flower plots and 
borders, transplanted spruce and trim box, even graveled 
walks — to have this fertile spot under my windows, not 
a few imported barrow-fulls of soil only to cover the sand 
which was thrown out in digging the cellar. Why not put 
my house, my parlour, behind this plot, instead of behind 
that meagre assemblage of curiosities, that poor apology for 
a Nature and Art, which I call my front-yard? It is an 
effort to clear up and make a decent appearance when the 
carpenter and mason have departed, though done as much 
for the passer-by as the dweller within. The most taste- 



424 THOREAU 

ful front-yard fence was never an agreeable object of study 
to me; the most elaborate ornaments, acorn-tops, or what 
not, soon wearied and disgusted me. Bring your sills up 
to the very edge of the swamp, then (though it may not be 
the best place for a dry cellar), so that there be no access 
on that side to citizens. Front-yards are not made to walk 
in, but, at most, through, and you could go in the back way. 

Yes, though you may think me perverse, if it were pro- 
posed to me to dwell in the neighborhood of the most beauti- 
ful garden that ever human art contrived, or else of a Dis- 
mal Swamp, I should certainly decide for the swamp. How 
vain, then, have been all your labors, citizens, for me ! 

My spirits infallibly rise in proportion to the outward 
dreariness. Give me the ocean, the desert, or the wilderness ! 
In the desert, pure air and solitude compensate for want of 
moisture and fertility. The traveller Burton says of it — 
" Your morale improves ; you become frank and cordial, 
hospitable and single-minded. ... In the desert, spirituous 
liquors excite only disgust. There is a keen enjoyment in a 
mere animal existence." They who have been travelling long 
on the steppes of Tartary say : " On reentering cultivated 
lands, the agitation, perplexity, and turmoil of civilization 
oppressed and suffocated us; the air seemed to fail us, 
and we felt every moment as if about to die of asphyxia." 
When I would recreate myself, I seek the darkest wood, 
the thickest and most interminable and, to the citizen, 
most dismal swamp. I enter a swamp as a sacred place, — 
a sanctum sanctorum. There is the strength, the marrow of 
Nature. The wild-wood covers the virgin mould, — and the 
same soil is good for men and for trees. A man's health 
requires as many acres of meadow to his prospect as his 
farm does loads of muck. There are the strong meats on 
which he feeds. A town is saved, not more by the right- 
eous men in it than by the woods and swamps that surround 
it. A township where one primitive forest waves above 
while another primitive forest rots below, — such a town is 
fitted to raise not only corn and potatoes, but poets and philos- 
ophers for the coming ages. In such a soil grew Homer and 
Confucius and the rest, and out of such a wilderness comes 
the Reformer eating locusts and wild honey. 



WALKING 425 

To preserve wild animals implies generally the creation 
of a forest for them to dwell in or resort to. So it is with 
man. A hundred years ago they sold bark in our streets 
peeled from our own woods. In the very aspect of those 
primitive and rugged trees there was, methinks, a tanning 
principle which hardened and consolidated the fibres of men's 
thoughts. Ah ! already I shudder for these comparatively 
degenerate days of my native village, when you cannot col- 
lect a load of bark of good thickness; and we no longer 
produce tar and turpentine. 

The civilised nations — Greece, Rome, England — have been 
sustained by the primitive forests which anciently rotted 
where they stand. They survive as long as the soil is not 
exhausted. Alas for human culture ! little is to be expected 
of a nation, when the vegetable mould is exhausted, and it is 
compelled to make manure of the bones of its fathers. 
There the poet sustains himself merely by his own super- 
fluous fat, and the philosopher comes down on his marrow- 
bones. 

It is said to be the task of the American " to work the 
virgin soil," and that " agriculture here already assumes pro- 
portions unknown everywhere else." I think that the farmer 
displaces the Indian even because he redeems the meadow, 
and so makes himself stronger and in some respects more 
natural. I was surveying for a man the other day a single 
straight line one hundred and thirty-two rods long, through 
a swamp, at whose entrance might have been written the 
words which Dante read over the entrance to the infernal 
regions, — " Leave all hope, ye that enter," — that is, of ever 
getting out again; where at one time I saw my employer 
actually up to his neck and swimming for his life in his 
property, though it was still winter. He had another similar 
swamp which I could not survey at all, because it was com- 
pletely under water, and nevertheless, with regard to a third 
swamp, which I did survey from a distance, he remarked to 
me, true to his instincts, that he would not part with it for 
any consideration, on account of the mud which it contained. 
And that man intends to put a girdling ditch round the whole 
in the course of forty months, and so redeem it by the magic 
of his spade. I refer to him only as the type of a class. 



426 THOREAU 

The weapons with which we have gained our most im- 
portant victories, which should be handed down as heir- 
looms from father to son, are not the sword and the lance, 
but the bush-whack, the turf-cutter, the spade, and the bog- 
hoe, rusted with the blood of many a meadow, and be- 
grimed with the dust of many a hard-fought field. The very 
winds blew the' Indian's corn-field into the meadow, and 
pointed out the way which he had not the skill to follow. 
He had no better implement with which to intrench himself 
in the land than a clam-shell. But the farmer is armed with 
plough and spade. 

In Literature it is only the wild that attracts us. Dulness 
is but another name for tameness. It is the uncivilized free 
and wild thinking in " Hamlet " and the " Iliad/' in all the 
Scriptures and Mythologies, not learned in the schools, that 
delights us. As the wild duck is more swift and beautiful 
than the tame, so is the wild — the mallard — thought, which 
'mid falling dews wings its way above the fens. A truly 
good book is something as natural, and as unexpectedly and 
unaccountably fair and perfect, as a wild flower discovered 
on the prairies of the West or in the jungles of the East. 
Genius is a light which makes the darkness visible, like the 
lightning's flash, which perchance shatters the temple of 
knowledge itself, — and not a taper lighted at the hearth- 
stone of the race, which pales before the light of common day. 

English literature, from the days of the minstrels to the 
Lake Poets, — Chaucer and Spenser and Milton, and even 
Shakespeare, included — breathes no quite fresh and, in this 
sense, wild strain. It is an essentially tame and civilized 
literature, reflecting Greece and Rome. Her wilderness is 
a green wood, her wild man a Robin Hood. There is plenty 
of genial love of Nature, but not so much of Nature herself. 
Her chronicles inform us when her wild animals, but not 
when the wild man in her, became extinct. 

The science of Humboldt is one thing, poetry is another 
thing. The poet to-day, notwithstanding all the discoveries 
of science, and the accumulated learning of mankind, enjoys 
no advantage over Homer. 

Where is the literature which gives expression to Nature ? 
He would be a poet who could impress the winds and streams 



WALKING 427 

into his service, to speak for him ; who nailed words to their 
primitive senses, as farmers drive down stakes in the spring, 
which the frost has heaved; who derived his words as often 
as he used them — transplanted them to his page with earth 
adhering to their roots ; whose words were so true and fresh 
and natural that they would appear to expand like the buds 
at the approach of spring, though they lay half-smothered 
between two musty leaves in a library, — aye, to bloom and 
bear fruit there, after their kind, annually, for the faithful 
reader, in sympathy with surrounding Nature. 

I do not know of any poetry to quote which adequately 
expresses this yearning for the Wild. Approached from 
this side, the best poetry is tame. I do not know where to 
find in any literature, ancient or modern, any account which 
contents me of that Nature with which even I am ac- 
quainted. You will perceive that I demand something which 
no Augustan nor Elizabethan age, which no culture, in short, 
can give. Mythology comes nearer to it than anything. 
How much more fertile a Nature, at least, has Grecian 
mythology its root in than English literature ! Mythology is 
the crop which the Old World bore before its soil was ex- 
hausted, before the fancy and imagination were affected with 
blight; and which it still bears, wherever its pristine vigof 
is unabated. All other literatures endure only as the elm9 
which overshadow our houses; but this is like the great 
dragon-tree of the Western Isles, as old as mankind, and, 
whether that does or not, will endure as long ; for the decay 
of other literatures makes the soil in which it thrives. 

The West is preparing to add its fables to those of the 
East. The valleys of the Ganges, the Nile, and the Rhine 
having yielded their crop, it remains to be seen what the 
valleys of the Amazon, the Platte, the Orinoco, the St. 
Lawrence, and the Mississippi will produce. Perchance, 
when, in the course of ages, American liberty has become a 
fiction of the past — as it is to some extent a fiction of the 
present — the poets of the world will be inspired by Ameri- 
can mythology. 

The wildest dreams of wild men, even, are not the less 
true, though they may not recommend themselves to the 
sense which is most common among Englishmen and Amer- 



428 THOREAU 

icans to-day. It is not every truth that recommends itself 
to the common sense. Nature has a place for the wild 
clematis as well as for the cabbage. Some expressions of 
truth are reminiscent — others merely sensible, as the phrase 
j Sj — others prophetic. Some forms of disease, even, may 
prophesy forms of health. The geologist has discovered that 
the figures of serpents, griffins, flying dragons, and other 
fanciful embellishments of heraldry, have their prototypes in 
the forms of fossil species which were extinct before man 
was created, and hence " indicate a faint and shadowy knowl- 
edge of a previous state of organic existence. ,, The Hindoos 
dreamed that the earth rested on an elephant, and the ele- 
phant on a tortoise, and the tortoise on a serpent; and 
though it may be an unimportant coincidence, it will not 
be out of place here to state, that a fossil tortoise has lately 
been discovered in Asia large enough to support an ele- 
phant. I confess that I am partial to these wild fancies, 
which transcend the order of time and development. They 
are the sublimest recreation of the intellect. The partridge 
loves peas, but not those that go with her into the pot. 

In short, all good things are wild and free. There is 
something in a strain of music, whether produced by an in- 
strument or by the human voice, — take the sound of a bugle 
in a summer night, for instance, — which by its wildness, to 
speak without satire, reminds me of the cries emitted by 
wild beasts in their native forests. It is so much of their 
wildness as I can understand. Give me for my friends and 
neighbors wild men, not tame ones. The wildness of the 
savage is but a faint symbol of the awful ferity with which 
good men and lovers meet. 

I love even to see the domestic animals reassert their 
native rights, — any evidence that they have not wholly lost 
their original wild habits and vigor ; as when my neighbor's 
cow breaks out of her pasture early in the spring and boldly 
swims the river, a cold, grey tide, twenty-five or thirty rods 
wide, swollen by the melted snow. It is the buffalo crossing 
the Mississippi. This exploit confers some dignity on the 
herd in my eyes — already dignified. The seeds of instinct 
are preserved under the thick hides of cattle and horses, like 
seeds in the bowels of the earth, an indefinite period. 



WALKING 429 

Any sportiveness in cattle is unexpected. I saw one day 
a herd of a dozen bullocks and cows running about and 
frisking in unwieldy sport, like huge rats, even like kittens. 
They shook their heads, raised their tails, and rushed up and 
down a hill, and I perceived by their horns, as well as by their 
activity, their relation to the deer tribe. But, alas ! a sudden 
loud Whoa! would have damped their ardor at once, reduced 
them from venison to beef, and stiffened their sides and sin- 
ews like the locomotive. Who but the Evil One has cried, 
" Whoa !" to mankind? Indeed, the life of cattle, like that of 
many men, is but a sort of locomotiveness ; they move a side 
at a time, and man, by his machinery, is meeting the horse 
and the ox half-way. Whatever part the whip has touched is 
thenceforth palsied. Who would ever think of a side of any 
of the supple cat tribe, as we speak of a side of beef? 

I rejoice that horses and steers have to be broken before 
they can be made the slaves of men, and that men them- 
selves have some wild oats still left to sow before they be- 
come submissive members of society. Undoubtedly, all men 
are not equally fit subjects for civilization; and because the 
majority, like dogs and sheep, are tame by inherited disposi- 
tion, this is no reason why the others should have their 
natures broken that they may be reduced to the same level. 
Men are in the main alike, but they were made several in 
order that they might be various. If a low use is to be 
served, one man will do nearly or quite as well as another; 
if a high one, individual excellence is to be regarded. Any 
man can stop a hole to keep the wind away, but no other 
man could serve so rare a use as the author of this illustra- 
tion did. Confucius says — " The skins of the tiger and the 
leopard, when they are tanned, are as the skins of the dog 
and the sheep tanned." But it is not the part of a true cul- 
ture to tame tigers, any more than it is to make sheep 
ferocious; and tanning their skins for shoes is not the best 
use to which they can be put. 

When looking over a list of men's names in a foreign 
language, as cf military officers, or of authors who have 
written on a particular subject, I am reminded once more 
that there is nothing in a name. The name Mens- 



430 THOREAU 

chikoff, for instance, has nothing in it to my ears more 
human than a whisker, and it may belong to a rat. As the 
names of the Poles and Russians are to us, so are ours to 
them. It is as if they had been named by the child's rig- 
marole — Iery wiery ichery van, tittle -tol-t an. I see in my 
mind a herd of wild creatures swarming over the earth, 
and to each the herdsman has affixed some barbarous sound 
in his own dialect. The names of men are of course as 
cheap and meaningless as Bose and Tray, the names of dogs. 

Methinks it would be some advantage to philosophy, if 
men were named merely in the gross, as they are known. 
It would be necessary only to know the genus and perhaps 
the race or variety, to know the individual. We are not 
prepared to believe that every private soldier in a Roman 
army had a name of his own, — because we have not sup- 
posed that he had a character of his own. 

At present our only true names are nicknames. I knew 
a boy who, from his peculiar energy, was called " Buster " 
by his playmates, and this rightly supplanted his Christian 
name. Some travellers tell us that an Indian had no name 
given him at first, but earned it, and his name was his fame : 
and among some tribes he acquired a new name with every 
new exploit. It is pitiful when a man bears a name for 
convenience merely, who has earned neither name nor 
fame. 

I will not allow mere names to make distinctions for me, 
but still see men in herds for all them. A familiar name 
cannot make a man less strange to me. It may be given 
to a savage who retains in secret his own wild title earned 
in the woods. We have a wild savage in us, and a savage 
name is perchance somewhere recorded as ours. I see that 
my neighbor, who bears the familiar epithet William, or 
Edwin, takes it off with his jacket. It does not adhere to 
him when asleep or in anger, or aroused by any passion 
or inspiration. I seem to hear pronounced By some of his 
kin at such a time his original wild name in some jaw- 
breaking or else melodious tongue. 

Here is this vast, savage, howling mother of ours, Nature, 
lying all around, with such beauty, and such affection for her 



WALKING 431 

children, as the leopard; and yet we are so early weaned 
from her breast to society, to that culture which is exclu- 
sively an interaction of man on man — a sort of breeding in 
and in, which produces at most a merely English nobility, 
a civilization destined to have a speedy limit. 

In society, in the best institutions of men, it is easy 
to detect a certain precocity. When we should still be 
growing children, we are already little men. Give me a 
culture which imports much muck from the meadows, and 
deepens the soil — not that which trusts to heating manures, 
and improved implements and modes of culture only ! 

Many a poor sore-eyed student that I have heard of 
would grow faster, both intellectually and physically, if, in- 
stead of sitting up so very late, he honestly slumbered a 
fool's allowance. 

There may be an excess even of informing light. Niepce, 
a Frenchman, discovered " actinism," that power in the 
sun's rays which produces a chemical effect; that granite 
rocks, and stone structures, and statues of metal, " are 
all alike destructively acted upon during the hours of sun- 
shine, and, but for provisions of Nature no less wonderful, 
would soon perish under the delicate touch of the most 
subtile of the agencies of the universe/' But he observed 
that " those bodies which underwent this change during 
the daylight possessed the power of restoring themselves 
to their original conditions during the hours of night, when 
this excitement w r as no longer influencing them." Hence 
it has been inferred that " the hours of darkness are as 
necessary to the inorganic creation as we know night and 
sleep are to the organic kingdom." Not even does the moon 
shine every night, but gives place to darkness. 

I would not have every man nor every part of a man 
cultivated, any more than I would have every acre of earth 
cultivated: part will be tillage, but the greater part will be 
meadow and forest, not only serving an immediate use, 
but preparing a mould against a distant future, by the 
annual decay of the vegetation which it supports. 

There are other letters for the child to learn than those 
which Cadmus invented. The Spaniards have a good term 
to express this wild and dusky knowledge — Gramdtica parda, 



432 THOREAU 

tawny grammar — a kind of mother-wit derived from that 
same leopard to which I have referred. 

We have heard of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful 
Knowledge. It is said that knowledge is power; and the 
like. Methinks there is equal need of a Society for the 
Diffusion of Useful Ignorance, what we will call Beautiful 
Knowledge, a knowledge useful in a higher sense: for 
what is most of our boasted so-called knowledge but a con- 
ceit that we know something, which robs us of the advantage 
of our actual ignorance? What we call knowledge is often 
our positive ignorance; ignorance our negative knowledge. 
By long years of patient industry and reading of the 
newspapers, — for what are the libraries of science but 
files of newspapers? — a man accumulates a myriad facts, 
lays them up in his memory, and then when in some spring 
of his life he saunters abroad into the Great Fields of 
thought, he, as it were, goes to grass like a horse and leaves 
all his harness behind in the stable. I would say to the 
Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, sometimes, — 
Go to grass. You have eaten hay long enough. The spring 
has come with its green crop. The very cows are driven 
to their country pastures before the end of May; though 
I have heard of one unnatural farmer who kept his cow in 
the barn and fed her on hay all the year round. So, fre- 
quently, the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowl- 
edge treats its cattle. 

A man's ignorance some times is not only useful, but beauti- 
ful, — while his knowledge, so called, is oftentimes worse than 
useless, besides being ugly. Which is the best man to deal 
with, — he who knows nothing about a subject, and, what is ex- 
tremely rare, knows that he knows nothing, or he who really 
knows something about it, but thinks that he knows all? 

My desire for knowledge is intermittent ; but my desire to 
bathe my head in atmospheres unknown to my feet is peren- 
nial and constant. The highest that we can attain to is not 
Knowledge, but Sympathy with Intelligence. I do not know 
that this higher knowledge amounts to anything more definite 
than a novel and grand surprise on a sudden revelation of 
the insufficiency of all that we called Knowledge before, — 
a discovery that there are more things in heaven and earth 



WALKING 433 

than are dreamed of in our philosophy. It is the lighting 
up of the mist by the sun. Man cannot know in any higher 
sense than this, any more than he can look serenely and 
with impunity in the face of the sun : e £s r\ vo5v, ob xeivov 
vorjaets, — " You will not perceive that, as perceiving a par- 
ticular thing," say the Chaldean Oracles. 

There is something servile in the habit of seeking after 
a law which we may obey. We may study the laws of matter 
at and for our convenience, but a successful life knows no 
law. It is an unfortunate discovery certainly, that of a law 
which binds us where we did not know before that we were 
bound. Live free, child of the mist, — and with respect 
to knowledge we are all children of the mist. The man 
who takes the liberty to live is superior to all the laws, 
by virtue of his relation to the law-maker. " That is active 
duty," says the Vishnu Purana, " which is not for our 
bondage; that is knowledge which is for our liberation: all 
other duty is good only unto weariness; all other knowledge 
is only the cleverness of an artist." 

It is remarkable how few events or crises there are in 
our histories; how little exercised we have been in our 
minds; how few experiences we have had. I would fain 
be assured that I am growing apace and rankly, though 
my very growth disturb this dull equanimity, — though it be 
with struggle through long, dark, muggy nights or seasons 
of gloom. It would be well, if all our lives were a divine 
tragedy even, instead of this trivial comedy or farce. Dante, 
Bunyan, and others appear to have been exercised in their 
minds more than we: they were subjected to a kind of 
culture such as our district schools and colleges do not 
contemplate. Even Mahomet, though many may scream at 
his name, had a good deal more to live for, aye, and to die 
for, than they have commonly. 

When, at rare intervals, some thought visits one, as 
perchance he is walking on a railroad, then indeed the cars 
go by without his hearing them. But soon, by some inexo- 
rable law, our life goes by and the cars return. 

" Gentle breeze, that wanderest unseen, 
And bendest the thistles round Loira of storms, 



434 THOREAU 

Traveller of the windy glens, 

Why hast thou left my ear so soon ? " 

While almost all men feel an attraction drawing them to 
society, few are attracted strongly to Nature. In their re- 
lation to Nature men appear to me for the most part, not- 
withstanding their arts, lower than the animals. It is not 
often a beautiful relation, as in the case of the animals. How 
little appreciation of the beauty of the landscape there is 
among us ! We have to be told that the Greeks called the 
world I(6(tfio? y Beauty, or Order, but we do not see clearly 
why they did so, and we esteem it at best only a curious 
philological fact. 

For my part, I feel that with regard to Nature I live a 
sort of border life, on the confines of a world into which 
I make occasional and transient forays only, and my patriot- 
ism and allegiance to the State into whose territories I 
seem to retreat are those of a moss-trooper. Unto a life 
which I call natural I would gladly follow even a will-o'-the- 
wisp through bogs and sloughs unimaginable, but no moon 
nor firefly has shown me the causeway to it. Nature is a 
personality so vast and universal that we have never seen 
one of her features. The walker in the familiar fields 
which stretch around my native town sometimes finds him- 
self in another land than is described in their owners' 
deeds, as it were in some far-away field on the confines of 
the actual Concord, where her jurisdiction ceases, and the 
idea which the word Concord suggests ceases to be sug- 
gested. These farms which I have myself surveyed, these 
bounds which I have set up, appear dimly still as through a 
mist; but they have no chemistry to fix them; they fade 
from the surface of the glass; and the picture which the 
painter painted stands out dimly from beneath. The world 
with which we are commonly acquainted leaves no trace, 
and it will have no anniversary. 

I took a walk on Spaulding's Farm the other afternoon. 
I saw the setting sun lighting up the opposite side of a 
stately pine wood. Its golden rays straggled into the aisles 
of the wood as into some noble hall. I was impressed as if 
some ancient and altogether admirable and shining family 
had settled there in that part of the land called Concord, 



WALKING 435 

unknown to me, — to whom the sun was servant, — who had 
not gone into society in the village, — who had not been 
called on. I saw their park, their pleasure-ground, beyond 
through the wood, in Spaulding's cranberry-meadow. The 
pines furnished them with gables as they grew. Their house 
was not obvious to vision; the trees grew through it. I do 
not know whether I heard the sounds of a suppressed hi- 
larity or not. They seemed to recline on the sunbeams. 
They have sons and daughters. They are quite well. The 
farmer's cart-path, which leads directly through their hall, 
does not in the least put them out, as the muddy bottom of 
a pool is sometimes seen through the reflected skies. They 
never heard of Spaulding, and do not know that he is their 
neighbor, — notwithstanding I heard him whistle as he drove 
his team through the house. Nothing can equal the serenity 
of their lives. Their coat of arms is simply a lichen. I saw 
it painted on the pines and oaks. Their attics were in the 
tops of the trees. They are of no politics. There was no 
noise of labor. I did not perceive that they were weaving 
or spinning. Yet I did detect, when the wind lulled and 
hearing was done away, the finest imaginable sweet musical 
hum, — as of a distant hive in May, which perchance was the 
sound of their thinking. They had no idle thoughts, and no 
one without could see their work, for their industry was not 
as in knots and excrescences embayed. 

But I find it difficult to remember them. They fade ir- 
revocably out of my mind even now while I speak and en- 
deavor to recall them and recollect myself. It is only after 
a long and serious effort to recollect my best thoughts that 
I become again aware of their cohabitancy. If it were not 
for such families as this, I think I should move out of 
Concord. 

We are accustomed to say in New England that few and 
fewer pigeons visit us every year. Our forests furnish no 
mast for them. So, it would seem, few and fewer thoughts 
visit each growing man from year to year, for the grove in 
our minds is laid waste, — sold to feed unnecessary fires of 
ambition, or sent to mill, and there is scarcely a twig left for 
them to perch on. They no longer build nor breed with us. 



436 THOREAU 

In some more genial season, perchance, a faint shadow flits 
across the landscape of the mind, cast by the wings of some 
thought in its vernal or autumnal migration, but, looking up, 
we are unable to detect the substance of the thought itself. 
Our winged thoughts are turned to poultry. They no longer 
soar, and they attain only to a Shanghai and Cochin-China 
grandeur. Those gra-a-ate thoughts, those gra-a-ate men 
you hear of! 

We hug the earth, — how rarely we mount ! Methinks we 
might elevate ourselves a little more. We might climb a 
tree, at least. I found my account in climbing a tree once. 
It was a tall white pine, on the top of a hill; and though I 
got well pitched, I was well paid for it, for I discovered 
new mountains in the horizon which I had never seen be- 
fore, — so much more of the earth and the heavens. I might 
have walked about the foot of the tree for three-score 
years and ten, and yet I certainly should never have seen 
them. But, above all, I discovered around me, — it was near 
the end of June, — on the ends of the topmost branches only, 
a few minute and delicate red cone-like blossoms, the fertile 
flower of the white pine looking heavenward. I carried 
straightway to the village the topmost spire, and showed it 
to stranger jurymen who walked the streets, — for it was 
court-week, — and to farmers and lumber-dealers and wood- 
choppers and hunters, and not one had ever seen the like 
before, but wondered as at a star dropped down. Tell of 
ancient architects finishing their works on the tops of 
columns as perfectly as on the lower and more visible parts ! 
Nature has from the first expanded the minute blossoms of 
the forest only toward the heavens, above men's heads and 
unobserved by them. We see only the flowers that are under 
our feet in the meadows. The pines have developed their 
delicate blossoms on the highest twigs of the wood every 
summer for ages, as well over the heads of Nature's red 
children as of her white ones; yet scarcely a farmer or 
hunter in the land has ever seen them. 

Above all, we cannot afford not to live in the present. 
He is blessed over all mortals who loses no moment of the 



WALKING 437 

passing life in remembering the past. Unless our philosophy 
hears the cock crow in every barn-yard within our horizon, 
it is belated. That sound commonly reminds us that we are 
growing rusty and antique in our employments and habits of 
thought. His philosophy comes down to a more recent time 
than ours. There is something suggested by it that is a 
newer testament, — the gospel according to this moment. He 
has not fallen astern ; he has got up early and kept up early, 
and to be where he is is to be in season, in the foremost 
rank of time. It is an expression of the health and sound- 
ness of Nature, a brag for all the world, — healthiness as of 
a spring burst forth, a new fountain of the Muses, to cele- 
brate this last instant of time. Where he lives no fugitive 
slave laws are passed. Who has not betrayed his master 
many times since last he heard that note? 

The merit of this bird's strain is in its freedom from all 
plaintiveness. The singer can easily move us to tears or 
to laughter, but where is he who can excite in us a pure 
morning joy? When, in doleful dumps, breaking the awful 
stillness of our wooden sidewalk on a Sunday, or, perchance, 
a watcher in the house of mourning, I hear a cockerel crow 
far or near, I think to myself, " There is one of us well, at 
any rate," — and with a sudden gush return to my senses. 

We had a remarkable sunset one day last November. I 
was walking in a meadow, the source of a small brook, when 
the sun at last, just before setting, after a cold gray day, 
reached a clear stratum in the horizon, and the softest, 
brightest morning sunlight fell on the dry grass and on the 
stems of the trees in the opposite horizon and on the leaves 
of the shrub-oaks on the hillside, while our shadows stretched 
long over the meadow eastward, as if we were the only motes 
in its beams. It was such a light as we could not have 
imagined a moment before, and the air also was so warm 
and serene that nothing was wanting to make a paradise of 
that meadow. When we reflected that this was not a solitary 
phenomenon, never to happen again, but that it would hap- 
pen forever and ever an infinite number of evenings, and 
cheer and reassure the latest child that walked there, it was 
more glorious still. 



438 WALKING 

The sun sets on some retired meadow, where no house is 
visible, with all the glory and splendor that it lavishes on 
cities, and perchance as it has never set before, — where 
there is but a solitary marsh-hawk to have his wings gilded 
by it, or only a musquash looks out from his cabin, and 
there is some little black-veined brook in the midst of the 
marsh, just beginning to meander, winding slowly round a 
decaying stump. We walked in so pure and bright a light,' 
gilding the withered grass and leaves, so softly and serenely 
bright, I thought I had never bathed in such golden flood, 
without a ripple or a murmur to it. The west side of every 
wood and rising ground gleamed like the boundary of Ely- 
sium, and the sun on our backs seemed like a gentle herds- 
man driving us home at evening. 

So we saunter toward the Holy Land, till one day the 
sun shall shine more brightly than ever he has done, shall 
perchance shine into our minds and hearts, and light up our 
whole lives with a great awakening light, as warm and 
serene and golden as on a bankside in autumn. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
DEMOCRACY 

BY 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE 

James Russell Lowell, poet, essayist, diplomatist, and scholar, 
was born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, on February 22, 1819, the 
son of a Unitarian minister. Educated at Harvard College, he 
tried the law, but soon gave it up for literature. His poem on 
"The Present Crisis" written in 1844, was his first really notable 
production, and one that made a deep impression on the public 
mind. In the twenty years of troubled politics that followed, 
one finds it constantly quoted. The year 1848 saw four volumes 
from Lowell's pen — a book of "Poems," the "Fable for Critics/' 
"The Biglow Papers," and the "Vision of Sir Launfal." The 
second of these exhibited the author as wit and critic, the third 
as political reformer, the fourth as poet and mystic; and these 
various sides of his personality continue to appear with varying 
prominence throughout his career. 

On the retirement of Longfellow from the chair of belles- 
lettres at Harvard in 1854, Lowell was elected to succeed him, 
and by way of preparation spent the next two years in Europe 
studying modern languages and literatures. In 1857 he became 
the first editor of the "Atlantic Monthly" and after 1864 he 
collaborated with Charles Eliot Norton in the editorship of the 
"North American Review" Throughout the period of the war 
Lowell wrote much both in prose and verse on behalf of the 
Union; his work on the "North American" was largely literary 
criticism. 

In 1877 Lowell went to Spain as American Minister, and in 
1880 to London, where for five years he represented the United 
States with great distinction, and did much to improve the rela- 
tions of the two countries. Six years after his return, on August 
12, 1891, he died in Elmwood, the house in Cambridge where 
he was born. 

Lowell's literary gifts were so various that it is difficult to 
say on which of them his final reputation will rest. But it is 
certain that he will long be esteemed for the grace, vivacity, and 
eloquence of the prose in which he placed before the world his 
views of such great American principles and personalities as are 
dealt with in the two following essays on "Democracy*' and on 
"Abraham Lincoln" 

440 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 

1864-1865 



THERE have been many painful crises since the im- 
patient vanity of South Carolina hurried ten pros- 
perous Commonwealths into a crime whose assured 
retribution was to leave them either at the mercy of the 
nation they had wronged, or of the anarchy they had sum- 
moned but could not control, when no thoughtful American 
opened his morning paper without dreading to find that 
he had no longer a country to love and honor. Whatever 
the result of the convulsion whose first shocks were be- 
ginning to be felt; there would still be enough square miles 
of earth for elbow-room; but that ineffable sentiment made 
up of memory and hope, of instinct and tradition, which 
swells every man's heart and shapes his thought, though 
perhaps never present to his consciousness, would be gone 
from it, leaving it common earth and nothing more. Men 
might gather rich crops from it, but that ideal harvest of 
priceless associations would be reaped no longer; that fine 
virtue which sent up messages of courage and security from 
every sod of it would have evaporated beyond recall. We 
should be irrevocably cut off from our past, and be forced 
to splice the ragged ends of our lives upon whatever new 
conditions chance might leave dangling for us. 

We confess that we had our doubts at first whether the 
patriotism of our people were not too narrowly provincial 
to embrace the proportions of national peril. We felt an 
only too natural distrust of immense public meetings and 
enthusiastic cheers. 

That a reaction should follow the holiday enthusiasm 
with which the war was entered on, that it should follow 

By arrangement with Houghton Mifflin Company. 
441 



442 LOWELL 

soon, and that the slackening of public spirit should be 
proportionate to the previous over-tension, might well be 
foreseen by all who had studied human nature or history. 
Men acting gregariously are always in extremes. As they 
are one moment capable of higher courage, so they are 
liable, the next, to baser depression, and it is often a matter 
of chance whether numbers shall multiply confidence or 
discouragement. Nor does deception lead more surely to 
distrust of men than self-deception to suspicion of prin- 
ciples. (The only faith that wears well and holds its color 
in all weathers is that which is woven of conviction and 
set with the sharp mordant of experience.} Enthusiasm 
is good material for the orator, but the statesman needs 
something more durable to work in, — must be able to rely 
on the deliberate reason and consequent firmness of the 
people, without which that presence of mind, no less es- 
sential in times of moral than of material peril, will be 
wanting at the critical moment. Would this fervor of the 
Free States hold out? Was it kindled by a just feeling 
of the value of constitutional liberty? Had it body enough 
to withstand the inevitable dampening of checks, reverses, 
delays? Had our population intelligence enough to com- 
prehend that the choice was between order and anarchy, 
between the equilibrium of a government by law and the 
tussle of misrule by /pronunciamientof Could a war be 
maintained without the ordinary stimulus of hatred and 
plunder, and with the impersonal loyalty of principle? 
These were serious questions, and with no precedent to 
aid in answering them. 

At the beginning of the war there was, indeed, occasion 
for the most anxious apprehension. A President known to 
be infected with the political heresies, and suspected of 
sympathy with the treason, of the Southern conspirators, 
had just surrendered the reins, we will not say of power, 
but of chaos, to a successor known only as the representative 
of a party whose leaders, with long training in opposition, 
had none in the conduct of affairs; an empty treasury was 
called on to supply resources beyond precedent in the history 
of finance; the trees were yet growing and the iron unmined 
with which a navy was to be built and armored; officers 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 443 

without discipline were to make a mob into an army; and, 
above all, the public opinion of Europe, echoed and rein- 
forced with every vague hint and every specious argument 
of despondency by a powerful faction at home, was either 
contemptuously sceptical or actively hostile. It would be 
hard to over-estimate the force of this latter element of 
disintegration and discouragement among a people where 
every citizen at home, and every soldier in the field, is a 
reader of newspapers. The pedlers of rumor in the North 
were the most effective allies of the rebellion. A nation 
can be liable to no more insidious treachery than that of 
the telegraph, sending hourly its electric thrill of panic 
along the remotest nerves of the community, till the ex- 
cited imagination makes every real danger loom heightened 
with its unreal double. 

And even if we look only at more palpable difficulties, 
the problem to be solved by our civil war was so vast, 
both in its immediate relations and its future consequences; 
the conditions of . its solution were so intricate and so 
greatly dependent on incalculable and uncontrollable con- 
tingencies; so many of the data, whether for hope or fear, 
were, from their novelty, incapable of arrangement under 
any of the categories of historical precedent, that there 
were moments of crisis when the firmest believer in the 
strength and sufficiency of the democratic theory of govern- 
ment might well hold his breath in vague apprehension of 
disaster. Our teachers of political philosophy, solemnly argu- 
ing from the precedent of some petty Grecian, Italian, or 
Flemish city, whose long periods of aristocracy were broken 
now and then by awkward parentheses of mob, had always 
taught us that democracies were incapable of the senti- 
ment of loyalty, of concentrated and prolonged effort, of 
far-reaching conceptions ; were absorbed in material in- 
terests; impatient of regular, and much more of exceptional 
restraint; had no natural nucleus of gravitation, nor any 
forces but centrifugal; were always on the verge of civil 
war, and slunk at last into the natural almshouse of bank- 
rupt popular government, a military despotism. Here was 
indeed a dreary outlook for persons who knew democracy, 
not by rubbing shoulders with it lifelong, but merely from 



444 LOWELL 

books, and America only by the report of some fellow-Briton, 
who, having eaten a bad dinner or lost a carpet-bag here, 
had written to the " Times " demanding redress, and drawing 
a mournful inference of democratic instability. Nor were 
men wanting among ourselves who had so steeped their 
brains in London literature as to mistake Cockneyism for 
European culture, and contempt of their country for cos- 
mopolitan breadth of view, and who, owing all they had 
and all they were to democracy, thought it had an air of 
high-breeding to join in the shallow epicedium that our 
bubble had burst. 

But beside any disheartening influences which might 
affect the timid or the despondent, there were reasons 
enough of settled gravity against any over-confidence of 
hope. A war — which, whether we consider the expanse 
of the territory at stake, the hosts brought into the field, or 
the reach of the principles involved, may fairly be reckoned 
the most momentous of modern times — was to be waged by 
a people divided at home, unnerved by fifty years of peace, 
under a chief magistrate without experience and without 
reputation, whose every measure was sure to be cunningly 
hampered by a jealous and unscrupulous minority, and who, 
while dealing with unheard-of complications at home, must 
soothe a hostile neutrality abroad, waiting only a pretext 
to become war. All this was to be done without warning 
and without preparation, while at the same time a social 
revolution was to be accomplished in the political condition 
of four millions of people, by softening the prejudices, allay- 
ing the fears, and gradually obtaining the cooperation, of 
their unwilling liberators. Surely, if ever there were an 
occasion when the heightened imagination of the historian 
might see Destiny visibly intervening in human affairs, here 
was a knot worthy of her shears. Never, perhaps, was 
any system of government tried by so continuous and search- 
ing a strain as ours during the last three years; never has 
any shown itself stronger; and never could that strength 
be so directly traced to the virtue and intelligence of the 
people, — to that general enlightenment and prompt efficiency 
of public opinion possible only under the influence of a polit- 
ical framework like our own. We find it hard to under- 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 445 

stand how even a foreigner should be blind to the grandeur 
of the combat of ideas that has been going on here, — to 
the heroic energy, persistency, and self-reliance of a nation 
proving that it knows how much dearer greatness is than 
mere power; and we own that it is impossible for us to 
conceive the mental and moral condition of the American 
who does not feel his spirit braced and heightened by being 
even a spectator of such qualities and achievements. That 
a steady purpose and a definite aim have been given to the 
jarring forces which, at the beginning of the war, spent 
themselves in the discussion of schemes which could only 
become operative, if at all, after the war was over; that 
a popular excitement has been slowly intensified into an 
earnest national will; that a somewhat impracticable moral 
sentiment has been made the unconscious instrument of a 
practical moral end; that the treason of covert enemies, the 
jealousy of rivals, the unwise zeal of friends, have been 
made not only useless for mischief, but even useful for good; 
that the conscientious sensitiveness of England to the hor- 
rors of civil conflict has been prevented from complicating 
a domestic with a foreign war; — all these results, any one 
of which might suffice to prove greatness in a ruler, have 
been mainly due to the good sense, the good humor, the 
sagacity, the large-mindedness, and the unselfish honesty 
of the unknown man whom a blind fortune, as it seemed, 
had lifted from the crowd to the most dangerous and difficult 
eminence of modern times. It is by presence of mind in 
untried emergencies that the native metal of a man is 
tested; it is by the sagacity to see, and the fearless honesty 
to admit, whatever of truth there may be in an adverse 
opinion, in order more convincingly to expose the fallacy 
that lurks behind it, that a reasoner at length gains for his 
mere statement of a fact the force of argument; it is by 
a wise forecast which allows hostile combinations to go so 
far as by the inevitable reaction to become elements of 
his own power, that a politician proves his genius for state- 
craft; and especially it is by so gently guiding public senti- 
ment that he seems to follow it, by so yielding doubtful 
points that he can be firm without seeming obstinate in 
essential ones, and thus gain the advantages of compromise 



446 LOWELL 

without the weakness of concession ; by so instinctively com- 
prehending the temper and prejudices of a people as to 
make them gradually conscious of the superior wisdom of 
his freedom from temper and prejudice, — it is by qualities 
such as these that a magistrate shows himself worthy to be 
chief in a commonwealth of freemen. And it is for qualities 
such as these that we firmly believe History will rank Mr. 
Lincoln among the most prudent of statesmen and the most 
successful of rulers. If we wish to appreciate him, we 
have only to conceive the inevitable chaos in which we 
should now be weltering, had a weak man or an unwise 
one been chosen in his stead. 

" Bare is back," says the Norse proverb, " without brother 
behind it"; and this is, by analogy, true of an elective 
magistracy. The hereditary ruler in any critical emergency 
may reckon on the inexhaustible resources of prestige, of 
sentiment, of superstition, of dependent interest, while the 
new man must slowly and painfully create all these out of 
the unwilling material around him, by superiority of char- 
acter, by patient singleness of purpose, by sagacious pre- 
sentiment of popular tendencies and instinctive sympathy 
with the national character. Mr. Lincoln's task v/as one of 
peculiar and exceptional difficulty. Long habit had accus- 
tomed the American people to the notion of a party in power,, 
and of a President as its creature and organ, while the 
more vital fact, that the executive for the time being- 
represents the abstract idea of government as a permanent 
principle superior to all party and all private interest, had 
gradually become unfamiliar. They had so long seen the pub- 
lic policy more or less directed by views of party, and 
often even of personal advantage, as to be ready to suspect 
the motives of a chief magistrate compelled, for the first 
time in our history, to feel himself the head and hand 
of a great nation, and to act upon the fundamental maxim, 
laid down by all publicists, that the first duty of a government 
is to defend and maintain its own existence. Accordingly, a 
powerful weapon seemed to be put into the hands of the oppo- 
sition by the necessity under which the administration found 
itself of applying this old truth to new relations. Nor were 
the opposition his only nor his most dangerous opponents. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 447 

The Republicans had carried the country upon an issue 
in which ethics were more directly and visibly mingled 
with politics than usual. Their leaders were trained to a 
method of oratory which relied for its effect rather on 
the moral sense than the understanding. Their arguments 
were drawn, not so much from experience as from general 
principles of right and wrong. When the war came, 
their system continued to be applicable and effective, for 
here again the reason of the people was to be reached 
and kindled through their sentiments. It was one of those 
periods of excitement, gathering, contagious, universal, 
which, while they last, exalt and clarify the minds of men, 
giving to the mere words country, human rights, democracy, 
a meaning and a force beyond that of sober and logical 
argument. They were convictions, maintained and defended 
by the supreme logic of passion. That penetrating fire ran 
in and roused those primary instincts that make their lair 
in the dens and caverns of the mind. What is called the 
great popular heart was awakened, that indefinable some- 
thing which may be, according to circumstances, the highest 
reason or the most brutish unreason. But enthusiasm, once 
cold, can never be warmed over into anything better than 
cant, — and phrases, when once the inspiration that filled 
them with beneficent power has ebbed away, retain only 
that semblance of meaning which enables them to supplant 
reason in hasty minds. Among the lessons taught by the 
French Revolution there is none sadder or more striking 
than this, that you may make everything else out of the 
passions of men except a political system that will work, 
and that there is nothing so pitilessly and unconsciously 
cruel as sincerity formulated into dogma. It is always demor- 
alizing to extend the domain of sentiment over questions 
where it has no legitimate jurisdiction; and perhaps the 
severest strain upon Mr. Lincoln was in resisting a tendency 
of his own supporters which chimed with his own private 
desires, while wholly opposed to his convictions of what 
would be wise policy. 

The change which three years have brought about is too 
remarkable to be passed over without comment, too weighty 
in its lesson not to be laid to heart. Never did a President 



448 LOWELL 

enter upon office with less means at his command, outside 
his own strength of heart and steadiness of understanding, 
for inspiring confidence in the people, and so winning it for 
himself, than Mr. Lincoln. All that was known of him was 
that he was a good stump-speaker, nominated for his avail- 
ability, — that is, because he had no history, — and chosen by 
a party with whose more extreme opinions he was not in 
sympathy. It might well be feared that a man past fifty, 
against whom the ingenuity of hostile partisans could rake 
up no accusation, must be lacking in manliness of character, 
in decision of principle, in strength of will ; that a man who 
was at best only the representative of a party, and who yet 
did not fairly represent even that, would fail of political, 
much more of popular, support. And certainly no one ever 
entered upon office with so few resources of power in the 
past, and so many materials of weakness in the present, as 
Mr. Lincoln. Even in that half of the Union which acknowl- 
edged him as President, there was a large and at that time 
dangerous minority, that hardly admitted his claim to the 
office, and even in the party that elected him there was also 
a large minority that suspected him of being secretly a com- 
municant with the church of Laodicea. All that he did was 
sure to be virulently attacked as ultra by one side; all that 
he left undone, to be stigmatized as proof of lukewarmness 
and backsliding by the other. Meanwhile, he was to carry 
on a truly colossal war by means of both ; he was to disen- 
gage the country from diplomatic entanglements of unprec- 
edented peril undisturbed by the help or the hindrance of 
either, and to win from the crowning dangers of his admin- 
istration, in the confidence of the people, the means of his 
safety and their own. He has contrived to do it, and per- 
haps none of our Presidents since Washington has stood so 
firm in the confidence of the people as he does after three 
years of stormy administration. 

Mr. Lincoln's policy was a tentative one, and rightly so. 
He laid down no programme which must compel him to be 
either inconsistent or unwise, no cast-iron theorem to which 
circumstances must be fitted as they rose, or else be useless 
to his ends. He seemed to have chosen Mazarin's motto, 
Le temps et moi. The moi, to be sure, was not very promi- 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 449 

nent at first; but it has grown more and more so, till the 
world is beginning to be persuaded that it stands for a char- 
acter of marked individuality and capacity of affairs. Time 
was his prime-minister, and, we began to think, at one period, 
his general-in-chief also. At first he was so slow that he 
tired out all those who see no evidence of progress but in 
blowing up the engine; then he was so fast, that he took 
the breath away from those who think there is no getting 
on safely while there is a spark of fire under the boilers, 
/ood is the only being who has time enough; but a prudent 
Mnan, who knows how to seize occasion, can commonly make 
a shift to find as much as he needs. Mr. Lincoln, as it seems 
to us in reviewing his career, though we have sometimes in 
our impatience thought otherwise, has always waited, as a 
wise man should, till the right moment brought up all his re- 
serves. Semper nocuit differre paratis is a sound axiom, but 
the really efficacious man will also be sure to know when he 
is not ready, and be firm against all persuasion and reproach 
till he is. 

One would be apt to think, from some of the criticisms 
made on Mr. Lincoln's course by those who mainly agree 
with him in principle, that the chief object of a statesman 
should be rather to proclaim his adhesion to certain doc- 
trines, than to achieve their triumph by quietly accomplish- 
ing his ends. In our opinion, there is no more unsafe 
politician than a conscientiously rigid doctrinaire, nothing 
more sure to end in disaster than a theoretic scheme of 
policy that admits of no pliability for contingencies. True, 
there is a popular image of an impossible He, in whose 
plastic hands the submissive destinies of mankind become as 
wax, and to whose commanding necessity the toughest facts 
yield with the graceful pliancy of fiction ; but in real life we 
commonly find that the men who control circumstances, as 
it is called, are those who have learned to allow for the in- 
fluence of their eddies, and have the nerve to turn them to 
account at the happy instant. Mr. Lincoln's perilous task 
has been to carry a rather shaky raft through the rapids, 
making fast the unrulier logs as he could snatch opportunity, 
and the country is to be congratulated that he did not think 
it his duty to run straight at all hazards, but cautiously to 

Vol. 28 — o He 



450 LOWELL 

assure himself with his setting-pole where the main current 
was, and keep steadily to that. He is still in wild water, but 
we have faith that his skill and sureness of eye will bring 
him out right at last. 

A curious, and, as we think, not inapt parallel might be 
drawn between Mr. Lincoln and one of the most striking 
figures in modern history, — Henry IV. of France. The 
career of the latter may be more picturesque, as that of a 
daring captain always is; but in all its vicissitudes there is 
nothing more romantic than that sudden change, as by a 
rub of Aladdin's lamp, from the attorney's office in a coun- 
try town of Illinois to the helm of a great nation in times 
like these. The analogy between the characters and cir- 
cumstances of the two men is in many respects singularly 
close. Succeeding to a rebellion rather than a crown, 
Henry's chief material dependence was the Huguenot party, 
whose doctrines sat upon him with a looseness distasteful 
certainly, if not suspicious, to the more fanatical among 
them. King only in name over the greater part of France, 
and with his capital barred against him, it yet gradually be- 
came clear to the more far-seeing even of the Catholic 
party that he was the only centre of order and legitimate 
authority round which France could reorganize itself. 
While preachers who held the divine right of kings made 
the churches of Paris ring with declamations in favor of de- 
mocracy rather than submit to the heretic dog of a Bearnois, 
— much as our soi-disant Democrats have lately been preach- 
ing the divine right of slavery, and denouncing the heresies 
of the Declaration of Independence, — Henry bore both 
parties in hand till he was convinced that only one course 
of action could possibly combine his own interests and those 
of France. Meanwhile the Protestants believed somewhat 
doubtfully that he was theirs, the Catholics hoped somewhat 
doubtfully that he would be theirs, and Henry himself turned 
aside remonstrance, advice, and curiosity alike with a jest 
or a proverb (if a little high, he liked them none the worse), 
joking continually as his manner was. We have seen Mr. 
Lincoln contemptuously compared to Sancho Panza by per- 
sons incapable of appreciating one of the deepest pieces of 
wisdom in the profoundest romance ever written; namely, 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 451 

that, while Don Quixote was incomparable in theoretic and 
ideal statesmanship, Sancho, with his stock of proverbs, the 
ready money of human experience, made the best possible 
practical governor. Henry IV. was as full of wise saws 
and modern instances as Mr. Lincoln, but beneath all this 
was the thoughtful, practical, humane, and thoroughly ear- 
nest man, around whom the fragments of France were to 
gather themselves till she took her place again as a planet 
of the first magnitude in the European system. In one re- 
spect Mr. Lincoln was more fortunate than Henry. How- 
ever some may think him wanting in zeal, the most fanatical 
can find no taint of apostasy in any measure of his, nor can 
the most bitter charge him with being influenced by motives 
of personal interest. The leading distinction between the 
policies of the two is one of circumstances. Henry went 
over to the nation; Mr. Lincoln has steadily drawn the 
nation over to him. One left a united France; the other, 
we hope and believe, will leave a reunited America. We 
leave our readers 'to trace the further points of difference 
and resemblance for themselves, merely suggesting a general 
similarity which has often occurred to us. One only point 
of melancholy interest we will allow ourselves to touch 
upon. That Mr. Lincoln is not handsome nor elegant, v/e 
learn from certain English tourists who would consider 
similar revelations in regard to Queen Victoria as thor- 
oughly American in their want of bie'nseance. It is no con- 
cern of ours, nor does it affect his fitness for the high place 
he so worthily occupies; but he is certainly as fortunate as 
Henry in the matter of good looks, if we may trust con- 
temporary evidence. Mr. Lincoln has also been reproached 
with Americanism by some not unfriendly British critics; 
but, with all deference, we cannot say that we like him any 
the worse for it, or see in it any reason why he should gov- 
ern Americans the less wisely. 

People of more sensitive organizations may be shocked, 
but we are glad that in this our true war of independence, 
which is to free us forever from the Old World, we have 
had at the head of our affairs a man whom America made, 
as God made Adam, out of the very earth, unancestried, un- 
privileged, unknown, to show us how much truth, how much 



452 LOWELL 

magnanimity, and how much state-craft await the call of 
opportunity in simple manhood when it believes in the justice 
of God and the worth of man. Conventionalities are all very 
well in their proper place, but they shrivel at the touch of 
nature like stubble in the fire. The genius that sways a 
nation by its arbitrary will seems less august to us than that 
which multiplies and reinforces itself in the instincts and 
convictions of an entire people. Autocracy may have some- 
thing in it more melodramatic than this, but falls far short 
of it in human value and interest. 

Experience would have bred in us a rooted distrust of 
improvised statesmanship, even if we did not believe politics 
to be a science, which, if it cannot always command men of 
special aptitude and great powers, at least demands the long 
and steady application of the best powers of such men as it 
can command to master even its first principles. It is 
curious, that, in a country which boasts of its intelligence, 
the theory should be so generally held that the most compli- 
cated of human contrivances, and one which every day be- 
comes more complicated, can be worked at sight by any 
man able to talk for an hour or two without stopping to 
think. 

Mr. Lincoln is sometimes claimed as an example of a 
ready-made ruler. But no case could well be less in point; 
for, besides that he was a man of such fair-mindedness as 
is always the raw material of wisdom, he had in his pro- 
fession a training precisely the opposite of that to which a 
partisan is subjected. His experience as a lawyer compelled 
him not only to see that there is a principle underlying 
every phenomenon in human affairs, but that there are al- 
ways two sides to every question, both of which must be 
fully understood in order to understand either, and that it 
is of greater advantage to an advocate to appreciate the 
strength than the weakness of his antagonist's position. 
Nothing is more remarkable than the unerring tact with 
which, in his debate with Mr. Douglas, he went straight to 
the reason of the question; nor have we ever had a more 
striking lesson in political tactics than the fact, that, op- 
posed to a man exceptionally adroit in using popular preju- 
dice and bigotry to his purpose, exceptionally unscrupulous in 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 453 

appealing to those baser motives that turn a meeting of citi- 
zens into a mob of barbarians, he should yet have won his 
case before a jury of the people. Mr. Lincoln was as far 
as possible from an impromptu politician. His wisdom was 
made up of a knowledge of things as well as of men; his 
sagacity resulted from a clear perception and honest ac- 
knowledgment of difficulties, which enabled him to see that 
the only durable triumph of political opinion is based, not 
on any abstract right, but upon so much of justice, the 
highest attainable at any given moment in human affairs, 
as may be had in the balance of mutual concession. Doubt- 
less he had an ideal, but it was the ideal of a practical 
statesman, — to aim at the best, and to take the next best, 
if he is lucky enough to get even that. His slow, but singu- 
larly masculine, intelligence taught him that precedent is 
only another name for embodied experience, and that it 
counts for even more in the guidance of communities of 
men than in that of the individual life. He was not a man 
who held it good public economy to pull down on the mere 
chance of rebuilding better. Mr. Lincoln's faith in God was 
qualified by a very well-founded distrust of the wisdom of 
man. Perhaps it was his want of self-confidence that more 
than anything else won him the unlimited confidence of the 
people, for they felt that there would be no need of retreat 
from any position he had deliberately taken. The cautious, 
but steady, advance of his policy during the war was like 
that of a Roman army. He left behind him a firm road on 
which public confidence could follow; he took America 
with him where he went; what he gained he occupied, and 
his advanced posts became colonies. The very homeliness 
of his genius was its distinction. His kingship was con- 
spicuous by its workday homespun. Never was ruler so 
absolute as he, nor so little conscious of it; for he was 
the incarnate common-sense of the people. With all that 
tenderness of nature whose sweet sadness touched whoever 
saw him with something of its own pathos, there was no 
trace of sentimentalism in his speech or action. He seems 
to have had but one rule of conduct, always that of practical 
and successful politics, to let himself be guided by events, 
when they were sure to bring him out where he wished to 



454 LOWELL 

go, though by what seemed to unpractical minds, which let 
go the possible to grasp at the desirable, a longer road. 

Undoubtedly the highest function of statesmanship is by 
degrees to accommodate the conduct of communities to 
ethical laws, and to subordinate the conflicting self-interests 
of the day to higher and more permanent concerns. But 
it is on the understanding, and not on the sentiment, of a 
nation that all safe legislation must be based. Voltaire's 
saying, that " a consideration of petty circumstances is the 
tomb of great things," may be true of individual men, but 
it certainly is not true of governments. It is by a multitude 
of such considerations, each in itself trifling, but all together 
weighty, that the framers of policy can alone divine what 
is practicable and therefore wise. The imputation of incon- 
sistency is one to which every sound politician and every 
honest thinker must sooner or later subject himself. The 
foolish and the dead alone never change their opinion. The 
course of a great statesman resembles that of navigable 
rivers, avoiding immovable obstacles with noble bends of 
concession, seeking the broad levels of opinion on which 
men soonest settle and longest dwell, following and mark- 
ing the almost imperceptible slopes of national tendency, yet 
always aiming at direct advances, always recruited from 
sources nearer heaven, and sometimes bursting open paths 
of progress and fruitful human commerce through what 
seem the eternal barriers of both. It is loyalty to great 
ends, even though forced to combine the small and opposing 
motives of selfish men to accomplish them ; it is the anchored 
cling to solid principles of duty and action, which knows 
how to swing with the tide, but is never carried away by it, — 
that we demand in public men, and not obstinacy in preju- 
dice, sameness of policy, or a conscientious persistency in 
what is impracticable. For the impracticable, however 
theoretically enticing, is always politically unwise, sound 
statesmanship being the application of that prudence to the 
public business which is the safest guide in that of private 
men. 

No doubt slavery was the most delicate and embarrassing 
question with which Mr. Lincoln was called on to deal, and it 
was one which no man in his position, whatever his opinions, 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 455 

could evade; for, though he might withstand the clamor of 
partisans, he must sooner or later yield to the persistent 
importunacy of circumstances, which thrust the problem 
upon him at every turn and in every shape. 

It has been brought against us as an accusation abroad 
and repeated here by people who measure their country 
rather by what is thought of it than by what it is, that our 
war has not been distinctly and avowedly for the extinction 
of slavery, but a war rather for the preservation of our 
national power and greatness, in which the emancipation of 
the negro has been forced upon us by circumstances and 
accepted as a necessity. We are very far from denying this ; 
nay, we admit that it is so far true that we were slow to 
renounce our constitutional obligations even toward those 
who had absolved us by their own act from the letter of 
our duty. We are speaking of the government which, legally 
installed for the whole country, was bound, so long as it 
was possible, not to overstep the limits of orderly prescrip- 
tion, and could not, without abnegating its own very nature, 
take the lead in making rebellion an excuse for revolution. 
There were, no doubt, many ardent and sincere persons who 
seemed to think this as simple a thing to do as to lead off 
a Virginia reel. They forgot what should be forgotten least 
of all in a system like ours, that the administration for the 
rime being represents not only the majority which elects it, 
but the minority as well, — a minority in this case powerful, 
and so little ready for emancipation that it was opposed 
even to war. Mr. Lincoln had not been chosen as general 
agent of an antislavery society, but President of the United 
States, to perform certain functions exactly defined by law. 
Whatever were his wishes, it was no less duty than policy 
to mark out for himself a line of action that would not 
further distract the country, by raising before their time 
questions which plainly would soon enough compel attention, 
and for which every day was making the answer more easy. 

Meanwhile he must solve the riddle of this new Sphinx, 
or be devoured. Though Mr. Lincoln's policy in this critical 
affair has not been such as to satisfy those who demand an 
heroic treatment for even the most trifling occasion, and 
who will not cut their coat according to their cloth, unless 



456 LOWELL 

they can borrow the scissors of Atropos, it has been at 
least not unworthy of the long-headed king of Ithaca. Mr. 
Lincoln had the choice of Bassanio offered him. Which of 
the three caskets held the prize that was to redeem the 
fortunes of the country? There was the golden one whose 
showy speciousness might have tempted a vain man; the 
silver of compromise, which might have decided the choice 
of a merely acute one; and the leaden, — dull and homely 
looking, as prudence always is, — yet with something about 
it sure to attract the eye of practical wisdom. Mr. Lincoln 
dallied with his decision perhaps longer than seemed needful 
to those on whom its awful responsibility was not to rest, 
but when he made it, it was worthy of his cautious but sure- 
footed understanding. The moral of the Sphinx-riddle, and 
it is a deep one, lies in the childish simplicity of the solution. 
Those who fail in guessing it, fail because they are over- 
ingenious, and cast about for an answer that shall suit their 
own notion of the gravity of the occasion and of their 
own dignity, rather than the occasion itself. 

In a matter which must be finally settled by public opinion, 
and in regard to which the ferment of prejudice and passion 
on both sides has not yet subsided to that equilibrium of 
compromise from which alone a sound public opinion can 
result, it is proper enough for the private citizen to press 
his own convictions with all possible force of argument and 
persuasion ; but the popular magistrate, whose judgment must 
become action, and whose action involves the whole country, 
is bound to wait till the sentiment of the people is so far 
advanced toward his own point of view, that what he does 
shall find support in it, instead of merely confusing it with 
new elements of division. It was not unnatural that men 
earnestly devoted to the saving of their country, and pro- 
foundly convinced that slavery was its only real enemy, 
should demand a decided policy round which all patriots 
might rally, — and this might have been the wisest course 
for an absolute ruler. But in the then unsettled state of 
the public mind, with a large party decrying even resistance 
to the slaveholders' rebellion as not only unwise, but 
even unlawful; with a majority, perhaps, even of 
the would-be loyal so long accustomed to regard the Con- 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 457 

stitution as a deed of gift conveying to the South their own 
judgment as to policy and instinct as to right, that they 
were in doubt at first whether their loyalty were due to 
the country or to slavery; and with a respectable body of 
honest and influential men who still believed in the possi- 
bility of conciliation, — Mr. Lincoln judged wisely, that, in 
laying down a policy in deference to one party, he should 
be giving to the other the very fulcrum for which their dis- 
loyalty had been waiting. 

It behooved a clear-headed man in his position not to 
yield so far to an honest indignation against the brokers of 
treason in the North as to lose sight of the materials for 
misleading which were their stock in trade, and to forget 
that it is not the falsehood of sophistry which is to be 
feared, but the grain of truth mingled with it to make it 
specious, — that it is not the knavery of the leaders so 
much as the honesty of the followers they may seduce, that 
gives them power for evil. It was especially his duty to 
do nothing which might help the people to forget the true 
cause of the war in fruitless disputes about its inevitable 
consequences. 

The doctrine of state rights can be so handled by an 
adroit demagogue as easily to confound the distinction be- 
tween liberty and lawlessness in the minds of ignorant per- 
sons, accustomed always to be influenced by the sound of 
certain words, rather than to reflect upon the principles 
which give them meaning. For, though Secession involves 
the manifest absurdity of denying to a State the right of 
making war against any foreign power while permitting it 
against the United States; though it supposes a compact of 
mutual concessions and guaranties among States without 
any arbiter in case of dissension ; though it contradicts com- 
mon-sense in assuming that the men who framed our gov- 
ernment did not know what they meant when they 
substituted Union for Confederation ; though it falsifies his- 
tory, which shows that the main opposition to the adoption 
of the Constitution was based on the argument that it did 
not allow that independence in the several States which alone 
would justify them in seceding; — yet, as slavery was uni- 
versally admitted to be a reserved right, an inference could 



458 LOWELL 

be drawn from any direct attack upon it (though only in 
self-defence) to a natural right of resistance, logical enough 
to satisfy minds untrained to detect fallacy, as the majority 
of men always are, and now too much disturbed by the 
disorder of the times to consider that the order of events 
had any legitimate bearing on the argument. Though Mr. 
Lincoln was too sagacious to give the Northern allies of 
the Rebels the occasion they desired and even strove to 
provoke, yet from the beginning of the war the most per- 
sistent efforts have been made to confuse the public mind 
as to its origin and motives, and to drag the people of the 
loyal States down from the national position they had in- 
stinctively taken to the old level of party squabbles and 
antipathies. The wholly unprovoked rebellion of an oligarchy 
proclaiming negro slavery the corner-stone of free institu- 
tions, and in the first flush of over-hasty confidence ven- 
turing to parade the logical sequence of fcheir leading dogma, 
" that slavery is right in principle, and has nothing to do 
with difference of complexion," has been represented as a 
legitimate and gallant attempt to maintain the true principles 
of democracy. The rightful endeavor of an established 
government, the least onerous that ever existed, to defend 
itself against a treacherous attack on its very existence, 
has been cunningly made to seem the wicked effort of a 
fanatical clique to force its doctrines on an oppressed popu- 
lation. 

Even so long ago as when Mr. Lincoln, not yet convinced 
of the danger and magnitude of the crisis, was endeavoring 
to persuade himself of Union majorities at the South, and 
to carry on a war that was half peace in the hope of a 
peace that would have been all war, — while he was still en- 
forcing the Fugitive Slave Law, under some theory that 
Secession, however it might absolve States from their 
obligations, could not escheat them of their claims under 
the Constitution, and that slaveholders in rebellion had alone 
among mortals the privilege of having their cake and eating 
it at the same time, — the enemies of free government were 
striving to persuade the people that the war was an Abolition 
crusade. To rebel without reason was proclaimed as one 
of the rights of man, while it was carefully kept out of 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 459 

sight that to suppress rebellion is the first duty of govern- 
ment. All the evils that have come upon the country have 
been attributed to the Abolitionists, though it is hard to see 
how any party can become permanently powerful except 
in one of two ways, — either by the greater truth of its prin- 
ciples, or the extravagance of the party opposed to it. To 
fancy the ship of state, riding safe at her constitutional 
moorings, suddenly engulfed by a huge kraken of Abolition- 
ism, rising from unknown depths and grasping it with slimy 
tentacles, is to look at the natural history of the matter with 
the eyes of Pontoppidan. To believe that the leaders in the 
Southern treason feared any danger from Abolitionism 
would be to deny them ordinary intelligence, though there 
can be little doubt that they made use of it to stir the 
passions and excite the fears of their deluded accomplices. 
They rebelled, not because they thought slavery weak, but 
because they belreved it strong enough, not to overthrow the 
government, but to get possession of it; for it becomes daily 
clearer that they used rebellion only as a means of revolu- 
tion, and if they got revolution, though not in the shape 
they looked for, is the American people to save them from 
its consequences at the cost of its own existence? The 
election of Mr. Lincoln, which it was clearly in their power 
to prevent had they wished, was the occasion merely, and 
not the cause, of their revolt. Abolitionism, till within a 
year or two, was the despised heresy of a few earnest 
persons, without political weight enough to carry the elec- 
tion of a parish constable; and their cardinal principle was 
disunion, because they were convinced that within the Union 
the position of slavery was impregnable. In spite of the 
proverb, great effects do not follow from small causes, — 
that is, disproportionately small, — but from adequate causes 
acting under certain required conditions. To contrast the 
size of the oak with that of the parent acorn, as if the poor 
seed had paid all costs from its slender strong-box, may 
serve for a child's wonder; but the real miracle lies in that 
divine league which bound all the forces of nature to the 
service of the tiny germ in fulfilling its destiny. Everything 
has been at work for the past ten years in the cause of anti- 
slavery, but Garrison and Phillips have been far less sue- 



460 LOWELL 

cessful propagandists than the slaveholders themselves, with 
the constantly growing arrogance of their pretensions and 
encroachments. They have forced the question upon the 
attention of every voter in the Free States, by defiantly 
putting freedom and democracy on the defensive. But, 
even after the Kansas outrages, there was no wide-spread 
desire on the part of the North to commit aggressions, 
though there was a growing determination to resist them. 
The popular unanimity in favor of the war three years ago 
was but in small measure the result of anti-slavery senti- 
ment, far less of any zeal for abolition. But every month of 
the war, every movement of the allies of slavery in the 
Free States, has been making Abolitionists by the thousand. 
The masses of any people, however intelligent, are very 
little moved by abstract principles of humanity and justice, 
until those principles are interpreted for them by the sting- 
ing commentary of some infringement upon their own 
rights, and then their instincts and passions, once aroused, 
do indeed derive an incalculable reinforcement of impulse 
and intensity from those higher ideas, those sublime tradi- 
tions, which have no motive political force till they are allied 
with a sense of immediate personal wrong or imminent 
peril. Then at last the stars in their courses begin to fight 
against Sisera. Had any one doubted before that the rights 
of human nature are unitary, that oppression is of one hue 
the world over, no matter what the color of the oppressed, 
— had any one failed to see what the real essence of the 
contest was, — the efforts of the advocates of slavery among 
ourselves to throw discredit upon the fundamental axioms 
of the Declaration of Independence and the radical doctrines 
of Christianity could not fail to sharpen his eyes. 

While every day was bringing the people nearer to the 
conclusion which all thinking men saw to be inevitable from 
the beginning, it was wise in Mr. Lincoln to leave the 
shaping of his policy to events. In this country, where the 
rough and ready understanding of the people is sure at 
last to be the controlling power, a profound common-sense 
is the best genius for statesmanship. Hitherto, the wisdom 
of the President's measures has been justified by the fact 
that they have always resulted in more firmly uniting public 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 461 

opinion. One of the things particularly admirable in the 
public utterances of President Lincoln is a certain tone of 
familiar dignity, which, while it is perhaps the most difficult 
attainment of mere style, is also no doubtful indication of 
personal character. There must be something essentially 
noble in an elective ruler who can descend to the level of 
confidential ease without forfeiting respect, something very 
manly in one who can break through the etiquette of his 
conventional rank and trust himself to the reason and 
intelligence of those who have elected him. No higher 
compliment was ever paid to a nation than the simple 
confidence, the fireside plainness, with which Mr. Lincoln 
always addresses himself to the reason of the Amer- 
ican people. This was, indeed, a true democrat, who 
grounded himself on the assumption that a democracy can 
think. " Come, let us reason together about this matter," 
has been the tone of all his addresses to the people; and 
accordingly we have never had a chief magistrate who so 
won to himself the love and at the same time the judgment 
of his countrymen. To us, that simple confidence of his in 
the right-mindedness of his fellow-men is very touching, 
and its success is as strong an argument as we have ever 
seen in favor of the theory that men can govern themselves. 
He never appeals to any vulgar sentiment, he never alludes 
to the humbleness of his origin; it probably never occurred 
to him, indeed, that there was anything higher to start from 
than manhood; and he put himself on a level with those he 
addressed, not by going down to them, but only by taking it 
for granted that they had brains and would come up to a 
common ground of reason. In an article lately printed in 
" The Nation," Mr. Bayard Taylor mentions the striking 
fact, that in the foulest dens of the Five Points he found 
the portrait of Lincoln. The wretched population that 
makes its hive there threw all its votes and more against 
him, and yet paid this instinctive tribute to the sweet hu- 
manity of his nature. Their ignorance sold its vote and 
took its money, but all that was left of manhood in them 
recognized its saint and martyr. 

Mr. Lincoln is not in the habit of saying, " This is my 
opinion, or my theory," but, 'This is the conclusion to 



462 LOWELL 

which, in my judgment, the time has come, and to which, 
accordingly, the sooner we come the better for us." His 
policy has been the policy of public opinion based on ad- 
equate discussion and on a timely recognition of the in- 
fluence of passing events in shaping the features of events 
to come. 

One secret of Mr. Lincoln's remarkable success in cap- 
tivating the popular mind is undoubtedly an unconsciousness 
of self which enables him, though under the necessity of 
constantly using the capital /, to do it without any sug- 
gestion of egotism. There is no single vowel which men's 
mouths can pronounce with such difference of effect. That 
which one shall hide away, as it were, behind the substance 
of his discourse, or, if he bring it to the front, shall 
use merely to give an agreeable accent of individuality to 
what he says, another shall make an offensive challenge 
to the self-satisfaction of all his hearers, and an unwarranted 
intrusion upon each man's sense of personal importance, 
irritating every pore of his vanity, like a dry northeast wind, 
to a goose-flesh of opposition and hostility. Mr. Lincoln 
has never studied Quinctilian; but he has, in the earnest 
simplicity and unaffected Americanism of his own char- 
acter, one art of oratory worth all the rest. He forgets him- 
self so entirely in his object as to give his / the sympathetic 
and persuasive effect of We with the great body of his country- 
men. Homely, dispassionate, showing all the rough-edged 
process of his thought as it goes along, yet arriving at his 
conclusions with an honest kind of every-day logic, he is so 
eminently our representative man, that, when he speaks, it 
seems as if the people were listening to their own thinking 
aloud. The dignity of his thought owes nothing to any 
ceremonial garb of words, but to the manly movement 
that comes of settled purpose and an energy of reason that 
knows not what rhetoric means. There has been nothing 
of Cleon, still less of Strepsiades striving to underbid 
him in demagogism, to be found in the public utterances 
of Mr. Lincoln. He has always addressed the intelligence 
of men, never their prejudice, their passion, or their 
ignorance. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 463 

On the day of his death, this simple Western attorney, 
who according to one party was a vulgar joker, and whom 
the doctrinaires among his own supporters accused of want- 
ing every element of statesmanship, was the most absolute 
ruler in Christendom, and this solely by the hold his good- 
humored sagacity had laid on the hearts and understandings 
of his countrymen. Nor was this all, for it appeared that 
he had drawn the great majority, not only of his fellow- 
citizens, but of mankind also, to his side. So strong and 
so persuasive is honest manliness without a single quality of 
romance or unreal sentiment to help it] A civilian during 
times of the most captivating military achievement, awkward, 
with no skill in the lower technicalities of manners, he left 
behind him a fame beyond that of any conqueror, the 
memory of a grace higher than that of outward person, and 
of a gentlemanliness deeper than mere breeding. Never 
before that startled April morning did such multitudes of 
men shed tears for the death of one they had never seen, 
as if with him a friendly presence had been taken away 
from their lives, leaving them colder and darker. Never was 
funeral panegyric so eloquent as the silent look of sympathy 
which strangers exchanged when they met on that day. 
Their common manhood had lost a kinsman. 



DEMOCRACY 

Inaugural Address on Assuming the Presidency of the 
Birmingham and Midland Institute, Birming- 
ham, England, 6 October, 1884 



H 



E must be a born leader or misleader of men, or must 
have been sent into the world unfurnished with 
that modulating and restraining balance-wheel 
which we call a sense of humor, who, in old age, has as 
strong a confidence in his opinions and in the necessity of 
bringing the universe into conformity with them as he had 
in youth. In a world the very condition of whose being is 
that it should be in perpetual flux, where all seems mirage, 
and the one abiding thing is the effort to distinguish reali- 
ties from appearances, the elderly man must be indeed of a 
singularly tough and valid fibre who is certain that he has 
any clarified residuum of experience, any assured verdict 
of reflection, that deserves to be called an opinion, or who, 
even if he had, feels that he is justified in holding mankind 
by the button while he is expounding it. And in a world 
of daily — nay, almost hourly — journalism, where every 
clever man, every man who thinks himself clever, or whom 
anybody else thinks clever, is called upon to deliver his judg- 
ment point-blank and at the word of command on every 
conceivable subject of human thought, or on what some- 
times seems to him very much the same thing, on every 
inconceivable display of human want of thought, there is 
such a spendthrift waste of all those commonplaces which 
furnish the permitted staple of public discourse that there is 
little chance of beguiling a new tune out of the one- 
stringed instrument on which we have been thrumming so 

Copyright, 1886, by James Russell Lowell. 
Published by arrangement with Houghton Mifflin Company. 

464 



DEMOCRACY 465 

long. In this desperate necessity one is often tempted to 
think that, if all the words of the dictionary were tumbled 
down in a heap and then all those fortuitous juxtapositions 
and combinations that made tolerable sense were picked out 
and pieced together, we might find among them some 
poignant suggestions towards novelty of thought or expres- 
sion. But, alas ! it is only the great poets who seem to have 
this unsolicited profusion of unexpected and incalculable 
phrase, this infinite variety of topic. For everybody else 
everything has been said before, and said over again after. 
He who has read his Aristotle will be apt to think that 
observation has on most points of general applicability said 
its last word, and he who has mounted the tower of Plato 
to look abroad from it will never hope to climb another with 
so lofty a vantage of speculation. Where it is so simple 
if not so easy a thing to hold one's peace, why add to the 
general confusion of tongues? There is something disheart- 
ening, too, in being expected to fill up not less than a cer- 
tain measure of time, as if the mind were an hour-glass, that 
need only be shaken and set on one end or the other, as the 
case may be, to run its allotted sixty minutes with decorous 
exactitude. I recollect being once told by the late eminent 
naturalist, Agassiz, that when he was to deliver his first 
lecture as professor (at Zurich, I believe) he had grave 
doubts of his ability to occupy the prescribed three quarters 
of an hour. He was speaking without notes, and glancing 
anxiously from time to time at the watch that lay before him 
on the desk. " When I had spoken a half hour/' he said, 
" I had told them everything I knew in the world, every- 
thing ! Then I began to repeat myself," he added, roguishly, 
" and I have done nothing else ever since." Beneath the 
humorous exaggeration of the story I seemed to see the 
face of a very serious and improving moral. And yet if one 
were to say only what he had to say and then stopped, his 
audience would feel defrauded of their honest measure. 
Let us take courage by the example of the French, whose 
exportation of Bordeaux wines increases as the area of 
their land in vineyards is diminished. 

To me, somewhat hopelessly revolving these things, the 
undelayable year has rolled round, and I find myself called 



466 LOWELL 

upon to say something in this place, where so many wiser 
men have spoken before me. Precluded, in my quality of 
national guest, by motives of taste and discretion, from deal- 
ing with any question of immediate and domestic concern, 
it seemed to me wisest, or at any rate most prudent, to 
choose a topic of comparatively abstract interest, and to 
ask your indulgence for a few somewhat generalized re- 
marks on a matter concerning which I had some experi- 
mental knowledge, derived from the use of such eyes and 
ears as Nature had been pleased to endow me withal, and 
such report as I had been able to win from them. The 
subject which most readily suggested itself was the spirit 
and the working of those conceptions of life and polity 
which are lumped together, whether for reproach or com- 
mendation, under the name of Democracy. By temperament 
and education of a conservative turn, I saw the last years 
of that quaint Arcadia which French travellers saw with 
delighted amazement a century ago, and have watched the 
change (to me a sad one) from an agricultural to a prole- 
tary population. The testimony of Balaam should carry 
some conviction. I have grown to manhood and am now 
growing old with the growth of this system of government 
in my native land, have watched its advances, or what some 
would call its encroachments, gradual and irresistible as 
those of a glacier, have been an ear-witness to the forebod- 
ings of wise and good and timid men, and have lived to see 
those forebodings belied by the course of events, which is 
apt to show itself humorously careless of the reputation of 
prophets. I recollect hearing a sagacious old gentleman say 
in 1840 that the doing away with the property qualification 
for suffrage twenty years before had been the ruin of the 
State of Massachusetts; that it had put public credit and 
private estate alike at the mercy of demagogues. I lived 
to see that Commonwealth twenty odd years later paying the 
interest on her bonds in gold, though it cost her sometimes 
nearly three for one to keep her faith, and that while suffer- 
ing an unparalleled drain of men and treasure in helping 
to sustain the unity and self-respect of the nation. 

If universal suffrage has worked ill in our larger cities, 
as it certainly has, this has been mainly because the hands 



DEMOCRACY 467 

that wielded it were untrained to its use. There the elec- 
tion of a majority of the trustees of the public money is 
controlled by the most ignorant and vicious of a population 
which has come to us from abroad, wholly unpractised in 
self-government and incapable of assimilation by American 
habits and methods. But the finances of our towns, where 
the native tradition is still dominant and whose affairs are 
discussed and settled in a public assembly of the people, 
have been in general honestly and prudently administered. 
Even in manufacturing towns, where a majority of the 
voters live by their daily wages, it is not so often the reck- 
lessness as the moderation of public expenditure that sur- 
prises an old-fashioned observer. " The beggar is in the 
saddle at last," cries Proverbial Wisdom. " Why, in the 
name of all former experience, doesn't he ride to the 
Devil?" Because in the very act of mounting he ceased to 
be a beggar and became part owner of the piece of prop- 
erty he bestrides. The last thing we need be anxious about 
is property. It always has friends or the means of making 
them. If riches have wings to fly away from their owner, 
they have wings also to escape danger. 

I hear America sometimes playfully accused of sending 
you all your storms, and am in the habit of parrying the 
charge by alleging that we are enabled to do this because, 
in virtue of our protective system, we can afford to make 
better bad weather than anybody else. And what wiser use 
could we make of it than to export it in return for the 
paupers which some European countries are good enough 
to send over to us who have not attained to the same skill in 
the manufacture of them ? But bad weather is not the worst 
thing that is laid at our door. A French gentleman, not 
long ago, forgetting Burke's monition of how unwise it is 
to draw an indictment against a whole people, has charged 
us with the responsibility of whatever he finds disagreeable 
in the morals or manners of his countrymen. If M. Zola 
or some other competent witness would only go into the box 
and tell us what those morals and manners were before our 
example corrupted them ! But I confess that I find little 
to interest and less to edify me in these international 
bandyings of " You're another." 



468 LOWELL 

I shall address myself to a single point only in the long 
list of offences of which we are more or less gravely 
accused, because that really includes all the rest. It is that 
we are infecting the Old World with what seems to be 
thought the entirely new disease of Democracy. It is 
generally people who are in what are called easy circum- 
stances who can afford the leisure to treat themselves to 
a handsome complaint, and these experience an immediate 
alleviation when once they have found a sonorous Greek 
name to abuse it by. There is something consolatory also, 
something flattering to their sense of personal dignity, and 
to that conceit of singularity which is the natural recoil 
from our uneasy consciousness of being commonplace, in 
thinking ourselves victims of a malady by which no one 
had ever suffered before. Accordingly they find it simpler 
to class under one comprehensive heading whatever they 
find offensive to their nerves, their tastes, their interests, 
or what they suppose to be their opinions, and christen it 
Democracy, much as physicians label every obscure disease 
gout, or as cross-grained fellows lay their ill-temper to the 
weather. But is it really a new ailment, and, if it be, is 
America answerable for it? Even if she were, would it 
account for the phylloxera, and hoof-and-mouth disease, 
and bad harvests, and bad English, and the German bands, 
and the Boers, and all the other discomforts with which 
these later days have vexed the souls of them that go in 
chariots? Yet I have seen the evil example of Democracy 
in America cited as the source and origin of things quite 
as heterogeneous and quite as little connected with it by 
any sequence of cause and effect. Surely this ferment is 
nothing new. It has been at work for centuries, and we 
are more conscious of it only because in this age of pub- 
licity, where the newspapers offer a rostrum to whoever 
has a grievance, or fancies that he has, the bubbles and 
scum thrown up by it are more noticeable on the surface 
than in those dumb ages when there was a cover of silence 
and suppression on the cauldron. Bernardo Navagero, 
speaking of the Provinces of Lower Austria in 1546, tells 
us that " in them there are five sorts of persons, Clergy, 
Barons, Nobles, Burghers, and Peasants. Of these last 



DEMOCRACY 469 

no account is made, because they have no voice in the 
Diet/' 1 

Nor was it among the people that subversive or mistaken 
doctrines had their rise. A Father of the Church said that 
property was theft many centuries before Proudhon was 
born. Bourdaloue reaffirmed it. Montesquieu was the 
inventor of national workshops, and of the theory that the 
State owed every man a living. Nay, was not the Church 
herself the first organized Democracy? A few centuries 
ago the chief end of man was to keep his soul alive, and 
then the little kernel of leaven that sets the gases at work 
was religious, and produced the Reformation. Even in that, 
far-sighted persons like the Emperor Charles V. saw the 
germ of political and social revolution. Now that the chief 
end of man seems to have become the keeping of the body 
alive, and as comfortably alive as possible, the leaven also 
has become wholly political and social. But there had also 
been social upheavals before the Reformation and contem- 
poraneously with it, especially among men of Teutonic race. 
The Reformation gave outlet and direction to. an unrest 
already existing. Formerly the immense majority of men 
— our brothers — knew only their sufferings, their wants, 
and their desires. They are beginning now to know their 
opportunity and their power. All persons who see deeper 
than their plates are rather inclined to thank God for it 
than to bewail it, for the sores of Lazarus have a poison 
in them against which Dives has no antidote. 

There can be no doubt that the spectacle of a great and 
prosperous Democracy on the other side of the Atlantic 
must react powerfully on the aspirations and political 
theories of men in the Old World who do not find things 
to their mind; but, whether for good or evil, it should not 
be overlooked that the acorn from which it sprang was 
ripened on the British oak. Every successive swarm that 
has gone out from this ofdcina gentium has, when left to 

1 Below the Peasants, it should be remembered, was still another even more 
helpless class, the servile farm-laborers. The same witness informs us that 
of the extraordinary imposts the Peasants paid nearly twice as much in 
proportion to their estimated property as the Barons, Nobles, and Burghers 
together. Moreover, the upper classes were assessed at their own valua- 
tion, while they arbitrarily fixed that of the Peasants, who had no voice. 
(" Relazioni degli Ambasciatori Veneti." Serie I., tomo i., pp. 378, 379. 389.) 



470 LOWELL 

its own instincts — may I not call them hereditary instincts? 
— assumed a more or less thoroughly democratic form. 
This would seem to show, what I believe to be the fact, 
that the British Constitution, under whatever disguises of 
prudence or decorum, is essentially democratic. England, 
indeed, may be called a monarchy with democratic ten- 
dencies, the United States a democracy with conservative 
instincts. People are continually saying that America is 
in the air, and I am glad to think it is, since this means 
only that a clearer conception of human claims and human 
duties is beginning to be prevalent. The discontent with 
the existing order of things, however, pervaded the atmos- 
phere wherever the conditions were favorable, long before 
Columbus, seeking the back door of Asia, found himself 
knocking at the front door of America. I say wherever 
the conditions were favorable, for it is certain that the 
germs of disease do not stick or find a prosperous field for 
their development and noxious activity unless where the 
simplest sanitary precautions have been neglected. " For 
this effect defective comes by cause," as Polonius said long 
ago. It is only by instigation of the wrongs of men that 
what are called the Rights of Man become turbulent and 
dangerous. It is then only that they syllogize unwelcome 
truths. It is not the insurrections of ignorance that are 
dangerous, but the revolts of intelligence: — 

" The wicked and the weak rebel in vain, 
Slaves by their own compulsion." 

Had the governing classes in France during the last century 
paid as much heed to their proper business as to their 
pleasures or manners, the guillotine need never have severed 
that spinal marrow of orderly and secular tradition through 
which in a normally constituted state the brain sympathizes 
with the extremities and sends will and impulsion thither. 
It is only when the reasonable and practicable are denied 
that men demand the unreasonble and impracticable; only 
when the possible is made difficult that they fancy the 
impossible to be easy. Fairy tales are made out of the 
dreams of the poor. No; the sentiment which lies at the 
root of democracy is nothing new. I am speaking always 



DEMOCRACY 471 

of a sentiment, a spirit, and not of a form of government; 
for this was but the outgrowth of the other and not its 
cause. This sentiment is merely an expression of the 
natural wish of people to have a hand, if need be a con- 
trolling hand, in the management of their own affairs. 
What is new is that they are more and more gaining that 
control, and learning more and more how to be worthy of 
it. What we used to call the tendency or drift — what we 
are being taught to call more wisely the evolution of things 
— has for some time been setting steadily in this direction. 
There is no good in arguing with the inevitable. The only 
argument available with an east wind is to put on your 
overcoat. And in this case, also, the prudent will prepare 
themselves to encounter what they cannot prevent. Some 
people advise us to put on the brakes, as if the movement 
of which we are conscious were that of a railway train 
running down an incline. But a metaphor is no argument, 
though it be sometimes the gunpowder to drive one home 
and imbed it in the memory. Our disquiet comes of what 
nurses and other experienced persons call growing-pains, 
and need not seriously alarm us. They are what every 
generation before us — certainly every generation since the 
invention of printing — has gone through with more or less 
good fortune. To the door of every generation there comes 
a knocking, and unless the household, like the Thane of 
Cawdor and his wife, have been doing some deed without 
a name, they need not shudder. It turns out at worst to be 
a poor relation who wishes to come in out of the cold. The 
porter always grumbles and is slow to open. " Who's 
there, in the name of Beelzebub?" he mutters. Not a 
change for the better in our human housekeeping has ever 
taken place that wise and good men have not opposed it, — 
have not prophesied with the alderman that the world would 
wake up to find its throat cut in consequence of it. The 
world, on the contrary, wakes up, rubs its eyes, yawns, 
stretches itself, and goes about its business as if nothing 
had happened. Suppression of the slave trade, abolition of 
slavery, trade unions, — at all of these excellent people shook 
their heads despondingly, and murmured " Ichabod." But 
the trade unions are now debating instead of conspiring, 



472 LOWELL 

and we all read their discussions with comfort and hope, 
sure that they are learning the business of citizenship and 
the difficulties of practical legislation. 

One of the most curious of these frenzies of exclusion 
was that against the emancipation of the Jews. All share 
in the government of the world was denied for centuries 
to perhaps the ablest, certainly the most tenacious, race 
that had ever lived in it — the race to whom we owed our 
religion and the purest spiritual stimulus and consolation 
to be found in all literature — a race in which ability seems 
as natural and hereditary as the curve of their noses, and 
whose blood, furtively mingling with the bluest bloods in 
Europe, has quickened them with its own indomitable im- 
pulsion. We drove them into a corner, but they had their 
revenge, as the wronged are always sure to have it sooner 
or later. They made their corner the counter and banking- 
house of the world, and thence they rule it and us with the 
ignobler sceptre of finance. Your grandfathers mobbed 
Priestley only that you might set up his statue and make 
Birmingham the headquarters of English Unitarianism. 
We hear it said sometimes that this is an age of transition, 
as if that made matters clearer; but can any one point us 
to an age that was not? If he could, he would show us 
an age of stagnation. The question for us, as it has been 
for all before us, is to make the transition gradual and 
easy, to see that our points are right so that the train may 
not come to grief. For we should remember that nothing 
is more natural for people whose education has been neg- 
lected than to spell evolution with an initial " r." A great 
man struggling with the storms of fate has been called a 
sublime spectacle; but surely a great man wrestling with 
these new forces that have come into the world, mastering 
them and controlling them to beneficent ends, would be a 
yet sublimer. Here is not a danger, and if there were it 
would be only a better school of manhood, a nobler scope 
for ambition. I have hinted that what people are afraid 
of in democracy is less the thing itself than what they con- 
ceive to be its necessary adjuncts and consequences. It is 
supposed to reduce all mankind to a dead level of mediocrity 
in character and culture, to vulgarize men's conceptions of 



DEMOCRACY 473 

life, and therefore their code of morals, manners, and con- 
duct — to endanger the rights of property and possession. 
But I believe that the real gravamen of the charges lies in 
the habit it has of making itself generally disagreeable by 
asking the Powers that Be at the most inconvenient moment 
whether they are the powers that ought to be. If the 
powers that be are in a condition to give a satisfactory 
answer to this inevitable question, they need feel in no way 
discomfited by it. 

Few people take the trouble of trying to find out what 
democracy really is. Yet this would be a great help, for 
it is our lawless and uncertain thoughts, it is the indefinite- 
ness of our impressions, that fill darkness, whether mental 
or physical, with* spectres and hobgoblins. Democracy is 
nothing more than an experiment in government, more 
likely to succeed in a new soil, but likely to be tried in all 
soils, which must stand or fall on its own merits as others 
have done before it. For there is no trick of perpetual 
motion in politics any more than in mechanics. President 
Lincoln defined democracy to be " the government of the 
people by the people for the people." This is a sufficiently 
compact statement of it as a political arrangement. 
Theodore Parker said that " Democracy meant not ' I'm as 
good as you are,' but * You're as good as I am.' " And 
this is the ethical conception of it, necessary as a com- 
plement of the other; a conception which, could it be made 
actual and practical, would easily solve all the riddles that 
the old sphinx of political and social economy who sits by 
the roadside has been proposing to mankind from the be- 
ginning, and which mankind have shown such a singular 
talent for answering wrongly. In this sense Christ was the 
first true democrat that ever breathed, as the old dramatist 
Dekker said he was the first true gentleman. The charac- 
ters may be easily doubled, so strong is the likeness between 
them. A beautiful and profound parable of the Persian 
poet Jellaladeen tells us that " One knocked at the Beloved's 
door, and a voice asked from within ' Who is there ? ' and 
he answered ' It is I.' Then the voice said, ' This house 
will not hold me and thee ; ' and the door was not opened. 
Then went the lover into the desert and fasted and prayed 



474 LOWELL 

in solitude, and after a year he returned and knocked again 
at the door; and again the voice asked 'Who is there?' 
and he said 'It is thyself;' and the door was opened to 
him." But that is idealism, you will say, and this is an 
only too practical world. I grant it; but I am one of those 
who believe that the real will never find an irremovable 
basis till it rests on the ideal. It used to be thought that a 
democracy was possible only in a small territory, and this 
is doubtless true of a democracy strictly defined, for in 
such all the citizens' decide directly upon every question of 
public concern in a general assembly. An example still 
survives in the tiny Swiss canton of Appenzell. But this 
immediate intervention of the people in their own affairs is 
not of the essence of democracy; it is not necessary, nor 
indeed, in most cases, practicable. Democracies to which 
Mr. Lincoln's definition would fairly enough apply have 
existed, and now exist, in which, though the supreme 
authority reside in the people, yet they can act only indi- 
rectly on the national policy. This generation has seen a 
democracy with an imperial figurehead, and in all that 
have ever existed the body politic has never embraced all 
the inhabitants included within its territory, the right to 
share in the direction of affairs has been confined to citizens, 
and citizenship has been further restricted by various limita- 
tions, sometimes of property, sometimes of nativity, and 
always of age and sex. 

The framers of the American Constitution were far from 
wishing or intending to found a democracy in the strict 
sense of the word, though, as was inevitable, every expan- 
sion of the scheme of government they elaborated has been 
in a democratical direction. But this has been generally 
the slow result of growth, and not the sudden innovation of 
theory; in fact they had a profound disbelief in theory, 
and knew better than to commit the folly of breaking with 
the past. They were not seduced by the French fallacy 
that a new system of government could be ordered like a 
new suit of clothes. They would as soon have thought of 
ordering a new suit of flesh and skin. It is only on the 
roaring loom of time that the stuff is woven for such a 
vesture of their thought and experience as they were med- 



DEMOCRACY 475 

itating. They recognized fully the value of tradition and 
habit as the great allies of permanence and stability. They 
all had that distaste for innovation which belonged to their 
race, and many of them a distrust of human nature derived 
from their creed. The day of sentiment was over, and no 
dithyrambic affirmations or fine-drawn analyses of the 
Rights of Man would serve their present turn. This was 
a practical question, and they addressed themselves to it 
as men of knowledge and judgment should. Their problem 
was how to adapt English principles and precedents to the 
new conditions of American life, and they solved it with 
singular discretion. They put as many obstacles as they 
could contrive, not in the way of the people's will, but of 
their whim. With' few exceptions they probably admitted 
the logic of the then accepted syllogism, — democracy, an- 
archy, despotism. But this formula was framed upon the 
experience of small cities shut up to stew within their nar- 
row walls, where the number of citizens made but an incon- 
siderable fraction of the inhabitant , where every passion 
was reverberated from house to house and from man to 
man with gathering rumor till every impulse became gre- 
garious and therefore inconsiderate, and every popular 
assembly needed but an infusion of eloquent sophistry to 
turn it into a mob, all the more dangerous because sanctified 
with the formality of law. 2 

Fortunately their case was wholly different. They were 
to legislate for k widely scattered population and for 
States already practised in the discipline of a partial inde- 
pendence. They had an unequalled opportunity and enor- 
mous advantages. The material they had to work upon was 
already democratical by instinct and habitude. It was 
tempered to their hands by more than a century's schooling 
in self-government. They had but to give permanent and 
conservative form to a ductile mass. In giving impulse 
and direction to their new institutions, especially in supply- 
ing them with checks and balances, they had a great help 
and safeguard in their federal organization. The different, 

a The effect of the electric telegraph in reproducing this trooping of emo- 
tion and perhaps of opinion is yet to be measured. The effect of Darwin- 
ism as a disintegrator of humanitarianism is also to be reckoned with. 



476 LOWELL 

sometimes conflicting, interests and social systems of the 
several States made existence as a Union and coalescence 
into a nation conditional on a constant practice of modera- 
tion and compromise. The very elements of disintegration 
were the best guides in political training. Their children 
learned the lesson of compromise only too well, and it was 
the application of it to a question of fundamental morals 
that cost us our civil war. We learned once for all that 
compromise makes a good umbrella but a poor roof; that 
it is a temporary expedient, often wise in party politics, 
almost sure to be unwise in statesmanship. 

Has not the trial of democracy in America proved, on 
the whole, successful? If it had not, would the Old World 
be vexed with any fears of its proving contagious? This 
trial would have been less severe could it have been made 
with a people homogeneous in race, language, and tradi- 
tions, whereas the United States have been called on to 
absorb and assimilate enormous masses of foreign popula- 
tion, heterogeneous in all these respects, and drawn mainly 
from that class which might fairly say that the world was 
not their friend, nor the world's law. The previous con- 
dition too often justified the traditional Irishman, who, 
landing in New York and asked what his politics were, in- 
quired if there was a Government there, and on being told 
that there was, retorted, " Thin I'm agin it ! " We have 
taken from Europe the poorest, the most ignorant, the most 
turbulent of her people, and have made them over into good 
citizens, who have added to our wealth, and who are ready 
to die in defence of a country and of institutions which 
they know to be worth dying for. The exceptions have 
been (and they are lamentable exceptions) where these 
hordes of ignorance and poverty have coagulated in great 
cities. But the social system is yet to seek which has not to 
look the same terrible wolf in the eyes. On the other hand, 
at this very moment Irish peasants are buying up the worn- 
out farms of Massachusetts, and making them productive 
again by the same virtues of industry and thrift that once 
made them profitable to the English ancestors of the men who 
are deserting them. To have achieved even these prosaic 
results (if you choose to call them so), and that out 



DEMOCRACY 477 

of materials the most discordant, — I might say the most 
recalcitrant, — argues a certain beneficent virtue in the sys- 
tem that could do it, and is not to be accounted for by 
mere luck. 

Carlyle said scornfully that America meant only roast 
turkey every day for everybody. He forgot that States, as 
Bacon said of wars, go on their bellies. As for the security 
of property, it should be tolerably well secured in a country 
where every other man hopes to be rich, even though the 
only property qualification be the ownership of two hands 
that add to the general wealth. Is it not the best security 
for anything to interest the largest possible number of per- 
sons in its preservation and the smallest in its division? In 
point of fact, far-seeing men count the increasing power 
of wealth and its combinations as one of the chief dangers 
with which the institutions of the United States are threat- 
ened in the not distant future. The right of individual prop- 
erty is no doubt the very corner-stone of civilization as 
hitherto understood, but I am a little impatient of being told 
that property is entitled to exceptional consideration be- 
cause it bears all the burdens of the State. It bears those, 
indeed, which can most easily be borne, but poverty pays 
with its person the chief expenses of war, pestilence, and 
famine. Wealth should not forget this, for poverty is be- 
ginning to think of it now and then. Let me not be mis- 
understood. I see as clearly as any man possibly can, 
and rate as highly, the value of wealth, and of hereditary 
wealth, as the security of refinement, the feeder of all 
those arts that ennoble and beautify life, and as making a 
country worth living in. Many an ancestral hall here in 
England has been a nursery of that culture which has 
been of example and benefit to all. Old gold has a civ- 
ilizing virtue which new gold must grow old to be capable 
of secreting. 

I should not think of coming before you to defend or to 
criticise any form of government. All have their virtues, 
all their defects, and all have illustrated one period or an- 
other in the history of the race, with signal services to 
humanity and culture. There is not one that could stand 
a cynical cross-examination by an experienced criminal law- 



478 LOWELL 

yer, except that of a perfectly wise and perfectly good 
despot, such as the world has never seen, except in that 
white-haired king of Browning's who 

" Lived long ago 
In the morning of the world, 
When Earth was nearer Heaven than now." 

The English race, if they did not invent government by 
discussion, have at least carried it nearest to perfection in 
practice. It seems a very safe and reasonable contrivance 
for occupying the attention of the country, and is certainly 
a better way of settling questions than by push of pike. 
Yet, if one should ask it why it should not rather 
be called government by gabble, it would have to 
fumble in its pocket a good while before it found the 
change for a convincing reply. As matters stand, too, 
it is beginning to be doubtful whether Parliament and 
Congress sit at Westminster and Washington or in the 
editors' rooms of the leading journals, so thoroughly is 
everything debated before the authorized and responsible 
debaters get on their legs. And what shall we say of 
government by a majority of voices? To a person who in 
the last century would have called himself an Impartial 
Observer, a numerical preponderance seems, on the whole, 
as clumsy a way of arriving at truth as could well be 
devised, but experience has apparently shown it to be a 
convenient arrangement for determining what may be ex- 
pedient or advisable or practicable at any given moment. 
Truth, after all, wears a different face to everybody, and 
it would be too tedious to wait till all were agreed. She 
is said to lie at the bottom of a well, for the very reason, 
perhaps, that whoever looks down in search of her sees his 
own image at the bottom, and is persuaded not only that 
he has seen the goddess, but that she is far better-looking 
than he had ::naginca. 

The arguments against universal suffrage are equally 
unanswerable. " What," we exclaim, " shall Tom, Dick, 
and Harry have as much weight in the scale as I?" Of 
course, nothing could be more absurd. And yet universal 
suffrage has not been the instrument of greater unwisdom 



DEMOCRACY 479 

than contrivances of a more select description. Assemblies 
could be mentioned composed entirely of Masters of Arts 
and Doctors in Divinity which have sometimes shown traces 
of human passion or prejudice in their votes. Have the 
Serene Highnesses and Enlightened Classes carried on the 
business of Mankind so well, then, that there is no use in 
trying a less costly method? The democratic theory is 
that those Constitutions are likely to prove steadiest which 
have the broadest base, that the right to vote makes a 
safety-valve of every voter, and that the best way of teach- 
ing a man how to vote is to give him the chance of practice. 
For the question is no longer the academic one, " Is it 
wise to give every man the ballot ?" but rather the practi- 
cal one, " Is it prudent to deprive whole classes of it any 
longer ?" It may be conjectured that it is cheaper in the 
long run to lift men up than to hold them down, and that 
the ballot in their hands is less dangerous to society than 
a sense of wrong in their heads. At any rate this is the 
dilemma to which the drift of opinion has been for some 
time sweeping us, and in politics a dilemma is a more un- 
manageable thing to hold by the horns than a wolf by the 
ears. It is said that the right of suffrage is not valued 
when it is indiscriminately bestowed, and there may be 
some truth in this, for I have observed that what men 
prize most is a privilege, even if it be that of chief mourner 
at a funeral. But is there not danger that it will be valued 
at more than its worth if denied, and that some illegitimate 
way will be sought to make up for the want of it? Men 
who have a voice in public affairs are at once affiliated 
with one or other of the great parties between which society 
is divided, merge their individual hopes and opinions in its 
safer, because more generalized, hopes and opinions, are 
disciplined by its tactics, and acquire, to a certain degree, 
the orderly qualities of an army. They no longer belong 
to a class, but to a body corporate. Of one thing, at least, 
we may be certain, that, under whatever method of help- 
ing things to go wrong man's wit can contrive, those who 
have the divine right to govern will be found to govern 
in the end, and that the highest privilege to which the 
majority of mankind can aspire is that of being governed 



480 LOWELL 

by those wiser than they. Universal suffrage has in the 
United States sometimes been made the instrument of in- 
considerate changes, under the notion of reform, and this 
from a misconception of the true meaning of popular govern- 
ment. One of these has been the substitution in many of 
the States of popular election for official selection in the 
choice of judges. The same system applied to military 
officers was the source of much evil during our civil war, 
and, I believe, had to be abandoned. But it has been also 
true that on all great questions of national policy a reserve 
of prudence and discretion has been brought out at the criti- 
cal moment to turn the scale in favor of a wiser decision. 
An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known 
to fail in the long run. It is, perhaps, true that, by 
effacing the principle of passive obedience, democracy, ill 
understood, has slackened the spring of that ductility to dis- 
cipline which is essential to "the unity and married calm of 
States." But I feel assured that experience and necessity 
will cure this evil, as they have shown their power to 
cure others. And under what frame of policy have evils ever 
been remedied till they became intolerable, and shook men 
out of their indolent indifference through their fears? 

We are told that the inevitable result of democracy is to 
sap the foundations of personal independence, to weaken 
the principle of authority, to lessen the respect due to emi- 
nence, whether in station, virtue, or genius. If these things 
were so, society could not hold together. Perhaps the 
best forcing-house of robust individuality would be where 
public opinion is inclined to be most overbearing, as he 
must be of heroic temper who should walk along Piccadilly 
at the height of the season in a soft hat. As for authority, 
it is one of the symptoms of the time that the religious 
reverence for it is declining everywhere, but this is due 
partly to the fact that state-craft is no longer looked upon 
as a mystery, but as a business, and partly to the decay 
of superstition, by which I mean the habit of respecting 
what we are told to respect rather than what is respectable 
in itself. There is more rough and tumble in the American 
democracy than is altogether agreeable to people of sensitive 
nerves and refined habits, and the people take their political 



DEMOCRACY 481 

duties lightly and laughingly, as is, perhaps, neither un- 
natural nor unbecoming in a young giant. Democracies 
can no more jump away from their own shadows than the 
rest of us can. They no doubt sometimes make mistakes 
and pay honor to men who do not deserve it. But they do 
this because they believe them worthy of it, and though it 
be true that the idol is the measure of the worshipper, yet 
the worship has in it the germ of a nobler religion. But 
is it democracies alone that fall into these errors? I, who 
have seen it proposed to erect a statue to Hudson, the 
railway king, and have heard Louis Napoleon hailed as the 
saviour of society by men who certainly had no democratic 
associations or leanings, am not ready to think so. But 
democracies have likewise their finer instincts. I have also 
seen the wisest statesman and most pregnant speaker of our 
generation, a man of humble birth and ungainly manners, 
of little culture beyond what his own genius supplied, be- 
come more absolute in power than any monarch of modern 
times through the reverence of his countrymen for his 
honesty, his wisdom, his sincerity, his faith in God and 
man, and the nobly humane simplicity of his character. 
And I remember another whom popular respect enveloped 
as with a halo, the least vulgar of men, the most austerely 
genial, and the most independent of opinion. Wherever he 
went he never met a stranger, but everywhere neighbors 
and friends proud of him as their ornament and decoration. 
Institutions which could bear and breed such men as Lin- 
coln and Emerson had surely some energy for good. No, 
amid all the fruitless turmoil and miscarriage of the world, 
if there be one thing steadfast and of favorable omen, one 
thing to make optimism distrust its own obscure distrust, 
it is the rooted instinct in men to admire what is better 
and more beautiful than themselves. The touchstone of 
political and social institutions is their ability to supply them 
with worthy objects of this sentiment, which is the very 
tap-root of civilization and progress. There would seem 
to be no readier way of feeding it with the elements of 
growth and vigor than such an organization of society as 
will enable men to respect themselves, and so to justify them 
in respecting others. 

Vol. 28— P HG 



482 LOWELL 

Such a result is quite possible under other conditions 
than those of an avowedly democratical Constitution. For 
I take it that the real essence of democracy was fairly 
enough defined by the First Napoleon when he said that 
the French Revolution meant ' la carriere ouverte aux 
talents " — a clear pathway for merit of whatever kind. I 
should be inclined to paraphrase this by calling democracy 
that form of society, no matter what its political classifica- 
tion, in which every man had a chance and knew that he 
had it. If a man can climb, and feels himself encouraged 
to climb, from a coalpit to the highest position for which 
he is fitted, he can well afford to be indifferent what name 
is given to the government under which he lives. The 
Bailli of Mirabeau, uncle of the more famous tribune of 
that name, wrote in 1771 : " The English are, in my opinion, 
a hundred times more agitated and more unfortunate than 
the very Algerines themselves, because they do not know 
and will not know- till the destruction of their over-swollen 
power, which I believe very near, whether they are mon- 
archy, aristocracy, or democracy, and wish to play the part 
of all three." 

England has not been obliging enough to fulfil the 
Bailli's prophecy, and perhaps it was this very care- 
lessness about the name, and concern about the sub- 
stance of popular government, this skill in getting the best 
out of things as they are, in utilizing all the motives which 
influence men, and in giving one direction to many impulses, 
that has been a principal factor of her greatness and power. 
Perhaps it is fortunate to have an unwritten Constitution, 
for men are prone to be tinkering the work of their own 
hands, whereas they are more willing to let time and cir- 
cumstance mend or modify what time and circumstance 
have made. All free governments, whatever their name, are 
in reality governments by public opinion, and it is on the 
quality of this public opinion that their prosperity depends. 
It is, therefore, their first duty to purify the element from 
which they draw the breath of life. With the growth 
of democracy grows also the fear, if not the danger, that 
this atmosphere may be corrupted with poisonous exhala- 
tions from lower and more malarious levels, and the question 



DEMOCRACY 483 

of sanitation becomes more instant and pressing. Democracy 
in its best sense is merely the letting in of light and air. 
Lord Sherbrooke, with his usual epigrammatic terseness, 
bids you educate your future rulers. But would this alone 
be a sufficient safeguard? To educate the intelligence is to 
enlarge the horizon of its desires and wants. And it is well 
that this should be so. But the enterprise must go deeper 
and prepare the way for satisfying those desires and wants 
in so far as they are legitimate. What is really ominous 
of danger to the existing order of things is not democracy 
(which, properly understood, is a conservative force), but 
the Socialism, which may find a fulcrum in it. If we can- 
not equalize conditions and fortunes any more than we 
can equalize the brains of men — and a very sagacious per- 
son has said that " where two men ride of a horse one 
must ride behind " — we can yet, perhaps, do something to 
correct those methods and influences that lead to enormous 
inequalities, and to prevent their growing more enormous. 
It is all very well to pooh-pooh Mr. George and to prove him 
mistaken in his ' political economy. I do not believe that 
land should be divided because the quantity of it is limited 
by nature. Of what may this not be said? A fortiori, we 
might on the same principle insist on a division of human 
wit, for I have observed that the quantity of this has been 
even more inconveniently limited. Mr. George himself 
has an inequitably large share of it. But he is right in 
his impelling motive; right, also, I am convinced, in in- 
sisting that humanity makes a part, by far the most im- 
portant part, of political economy; and in thinking man to 
be of more concern and more convincing than the longest 
columns of figures in the world. For unless you include 
human nature in your addition, your total is sure to be 
wrong and your deductions from it fallacious. Communism 
means barbarism, but Socialism means, or wishes to mean, 
cooperation and community of interests, sympathy, the 
giving to the hands not so large a share as to the brains, 
but a larger share than hitherto in the wealth they 
must combine to produce — means, in short, the practical 
application of Christianity to life, and has in it the se- 
cret of an orderly and benign reconstruction. State Social- 



484 LOWELL 

ism would cut off the very roots in personal charac- 
ter — self-help, forethought, and frugality — which nourish 
and sustain the trunk and branches of every vigorous 
Commonwealth. 

I do not believe in violent changes, nor do I expect them. 
Things in possession have a very firm grip. One of the 
strongest cements of society is the conviction of man- 
kind that the state of things into which they are born 
is a part of the order of the universe, as natural, let us 
say, as that the sun should go round the earth. It is a 
conviction that they will not surrender except on compulsion, 
and a wise society should look to it that this compulsion be 
not put upon them. For the individual man there is no 
radical cure, outside of human nature itself, for the evils to 
which human nature is heir. The rule will always hold 
good that you must 

" Be your own palace or the world's your gaol." 

But for artificial evils, for evils that spring from want of 
thought, thought must find a remedy somewhere. There has 
been no period of time in which wealth has been more sensible 
of its duties than now. It builds hospitals, it establishes 
missions among the poor, it endows schools. It is one of 
the advantages of accumulated wealth, and of the leisure 
it renders possible, that people have time to think of the 
wants and sorrows of their fellows. But all these remedies 
are partial and palliative merely. It is as if we should apply 
plasters to a single pustule of the small-pox with a view of 
driving out the disease. The true way is to discover and to 
extirpate the germs. As society is now constituted these 
are in the air it breathes, in the water it drinks, in things 
that seem, and which it has always believed, to be the 
most innocent and healthful. The evil elements it neglects 
corrupt these in their springs and pollute them in their 
courses. Let us be of good cheer, however, remembering 
that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never 
come. The world has outlived much, and will outlive a 
great deal more, and men have contrived to be happy in it. 
It has shown the strength of its constitution in nothing more 
than in surviving the quack medicines it has tried. In the 



DEMOCRACY 485 

scales of the destinies brawn will never weigh so much as 
brain. Our healing is not in the storm or in the whirlwind, 
it is not in monarchies, or aristocracies, or democracies, but 
will be revealed by the still small voice that speaks to 
the conscience and the heart, prompting us to a wider 
and wiser humanity. 



BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY 




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Vol 28: The Classics - Part 2
