But,

aid the resources of intonation, gesture, and vehemence. in a spirit of earnestness and sincerity, he spoke his deepest convictions; and, in spite of his unimpassioned delivery, he was singularly impressive. His discourses were enveloped in an atmosphere of cheerful hopefulness that was especially helpful to the young. He believed in the ultimate triumph of truth over

error, and inculcated a manly self-reliance and an absolute trust in God.

Such a preacher (for he regarded the platform as his pulpit) could not fail to exert a profound influence upon many lives. James Russell Lowell has described for us the effect of Emerson's lectures on his younger hearers: "To some of us that long past experience remains the most marvelous and fruitful we have ever had. Emerson awakened us, saved us from the body of this death. It is the sound of the trumpet that the young soul longs for, careless of what breath may fill it. Sidney heard

(

it in the ballad of Chevy Chase,' and we in Emerson. Nor did it blow retreat, but called us with assurance of victory.'

373. Residence at Concord. - In 1829, a few months after becoming a pastor in Boston, Emerson married Miss Ellen Louisa Tucker. It is to her that the poem, "To Ellen at the South,"

is addressed. Apparently as delicate as the flowers that called to her in their devotion, she died of consumption in 1832. Three years later Emerson married Miss Lydia Jackson, and at once occupied the house at Concord in which he resided till his death. In this town of historic and literary associations, "He was surrounded by men," to use the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes, "who ran to extremes in their idiosyncrasies: Alcott in speculations, which often led him into the fourth dimension of mental space; Hawthorne, who brooded himself into a

Thoreau, the nullifier of

civilization, who insisted on nibbling his asparagus at the wrong end; to say nothing of idolaters and echoes. He kept his balance among them all." He became the most distinguished citizen of the place; and, as the years passed by, his home became the object of pious pilgrimages for his disciples and admirers. In 1836 he composed the "Concord Hymn," which was sung at the completion of the battle monument:

"By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,

And fired the shot heard round the world."

374. Source and Message of Nature.' For some years Emerson's studies had been in the line of idealistic and mystical philosophy. He gave much time to Plato; dipped into Plotinus. and the German mystics; read with enthusiasm the poems of George Herbert, and the prose writings of Cudworth, Henry More, Milton, Jeremy Taylor, and Coleridge. In 1836, as a result of these studies, he published a little volume entitled “Nature," which contained the substance of his subsequent teachings in both prose and poetry. It is based on a pure idealism, which teaches that matter is only a manifestation of spirit. “We learn that the Highest is present to the soul of man, that the dread universal Essence, which is not wisdom, or love, or beauty, or power, but all in one, and each entirely, is that for which all things exist, and that by which they are; that spirit creates ; that behind nature, throughout nature, spirit is present; that spirit is one, and not compound; that spirit does not act upon us from without, that is, in space and time, but spiritually, or through ourselves." The book was variously judged, according to the insight or prejudices of the critics. From its very nature it could not be popular, and some years elapsed before it reached a sale of five hundred copies.

- The year 66 375. The Transcendental Club. Nature was published, the transcendental movement began to assume tangible form. Its representatives, drawn together by common sympathies and aspirations, organized themselves into a society. for mutual aid and encouragement. This society was known as "The Transcendental Club," and held informal meetings from house to house for the discussion of philosophical questions. As a class the transcendentalists, among whom were Emerson, Alcott, Channing, George Ripley, Theodore Parker, James Free

man Clarke, Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, and others, were earnest in their search after truth. They were optimistic, and generally

EMERSON'S STUDY

favorable to all sorts of reforms and innovations; but occasionally they were also extravagant and impractical - such people, in short, as in the hard realism of today are denominated

cranks.

ism.

376. TranscendentalTranscendentalism is but another name for idealism. It recognizes an all-pervading spiritual presence as the ultimate reality. It is opposed to materialism. It teaches that man has a faculty transcending the senses and the understanding as an organ of truth. It believes in the existence of a Universal Reason, of which the human soul is an individual manifestation

-a divine spark. The highest knowledge is intuitional; it is an inspiration of the omnipresent Spirit. All things, animate and inanimate, are but a manifestation of infinite Spirit, which binds the universe together in a sublime unity, and is the source of all wisdom, truth, and beauty. The material world is the image or symbol of the spiritual world; all natural objects and laws are ideas of God.

377. The Dial. For the dissemination of these philosophic principles, which now gave character to all of Emerson's thinking, The Dial was established. It was edited at first by Margaret Fuller, and afterwards by Emerson, who furnished numerous contributions in both prose and poetry. With its vague and often unintelligible lucubrations, it drew a

good deal of hostile criticism. Emerson complained that it was "honored by attacks from almost every newspaper and magazine." Even Carlyle wrote: "I love your Dial, and yet it is with a kind of shudder. You seem to me in danger of dividing yourselves from the Fact of this present Universe, in which alone, ugly as it is, can I find any anchorage, and soaring away after Ideas, Beliefs, Revelations, and such like, into perilous altitudes, as I think."

It

MARGARET FULLER

proved too ethereal a plant for this hard, common-sense world,

and after four years it died.

378. Brook Farm Experiment.

There was still another important product of the transcendental movement. In 1840 Emerson wrote to Carlyle: We are all a little wild here with numberless projects of social reform. Not a reading man but has a draft of a new community in his waistcoat pocket. I am gently mad myself, and am resolved to live cleanly. George Ripley is talking up a colony of agriculturists and scholars, with whom he threatens to take the field and the book. One man renounces the uses of animal food; and another, coin; and another, domestic hired service; and another, the state; and, on the whole, we have a commendable share of reason and hope."