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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/3117.txt b/3117.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d16d6bf --- /dev/null +++ b/3117.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2052 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Relation of Literature to Life, by Charles Dudley Warner + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Relation of Literature to Life + +Author: Charles Dudley Warner + +Release Date: December 6, 2004 [EBook #3117] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + +By Charles Dudley Warner + + + + +CONTENTS: + +BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH BY THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY. +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH + +The county of Franklin in Northwestern Massachusetts, if not rivaling in +certain ways the adjoining Berkshire, has still a romantic beauty of its +own. In the former half of the nineteenth century its population was +largely given up to the pursuit of agriculture, though not under +altogether favorable conditions. Manufactures had not yet invaded the +region either to add to its wealth or to defile its streams. The villages +were small, the roads pretty generally wretched save in summer, and from +many of the fields the most abundant crop that could be gathered was that +of stones. + +The character of the people conformed in many ways to that of the soil. +The houses which lined the opposite sides of the single street, of which +the petty places largely consisted, as well as the dwellings which dotted +the country, were the homes of men who possessed in fullness many of the +features, good and bad, that characterized the Puritan stock to which +they belonged. There was a good deal of religion in these rural +communities and occasionally some culture. Still, as a rule, it must be +confessed, there would be found in them much more of plain living than of +high thinking. Broad thinking could hardly be said to exist at all. By +the dwellers in that region Easter had scarcely even been heard of; +Christmas was tolerated after a fashion, but was nevertheless looked upon +with a good deal of suspicion as a Popish invention. In the beliefs of +these men several sins not mentioned in the decalogue took really, if +unconsciously, precedence of those which chanced to be found in that +list. Dancing was distinctly immoral; card-playing led directly to +gambling with all its attendant evils; theatre-going characterized the +conduct of the more disreputable denizens of great cities. Fiction was +not absolutely forbidden; but the most lenient regarded it as a great +waste of time, and the boy who desired its solace on any large scale was +under the frequent necessity of seeking the seclusion of the haymow. + +But however rigid and stern the beliefs of men might be, nature was there +always charming, not only in her summer beauty, but even in her wildest +winter moods. Narrow, too, as might be the views of the members of these +communities about the conduct of life, there was ever before the minds of +the best of them an ideal of devotion to duty, an earnest all-pervading +moral purpose which implanted the feeling that neither personal success +nor pleasure of any sort could ever afford even remotely compensation for +the neglect of the least obligation which their situation imposed. It was +no misfortune for any one, who was later to be transported to a broader +horizon and more genial air, to have struck the roots of his being in a +soil where men felt the full sense of moral responsibility for everything +said or done, and where the conscience was almost as sensitive to the +suggestion of sin as to its actual accomplishment. + +It was amidst such surroundings that Charles Dudley Warner was born on +the 12th of September, 1829. His birthplace was the hill town of +Plainfield, over two thousand feet above the level of the sea. His +father, a farmer, was a man of cultivation, though not college-bred. He +died when his eldest son had reached the age of five, leaving to his +widow the care of two children. Three years longer the family continued +to remain on the farm. But however delightful the scenery of the country +might be, its aesthetic attractions did not sufficiently counterbalance +its agricultural disadvantages. Furthermore, while the summers were +beautiful on this high table land, the winters were long and dreary in +the enforced solitude of a thinly settled region. In consequence, the +farm was sold after the death of the grandfather, and the home broken up. +The mother with her two children, went to the neighboring village of +Charlemont on the banks of the Deerfield. There the elder son took up his +residence with his guardian and relative, a man of position and influence +in the community, who was the owner of a large farm. With him he stayed +until he was twelve years old, enjoying all the pleasures and doing all +the miscellaneous jobs of the kind which fall to the lot of a boy brought +up in an agricultural community. + +The story of this particular period of his life was given by Warner in a +work which was published about forty years later. It is the volume +entitled "Being a Boy." Nowhere has there been drawn a truer or more +vivid picture of rural New England. Nowhere else can there be found such +a portrayal of the sights and sounds, the pains and pleasures of life on +a farm as seen from the point of view of a boy. Here we have them all +graphically represented: the daily "chores" that must be looked after; +the driving of cows to and from the pasture; the clearing up of fields +where vegetation struggled with difficulty against the prevailing stones; +the climbing of lofty trees and the swaying back and forth in the wind on +their topmost boughs; the hunting of woodchucks; the nutting excursions +of November days, culminating in the glories of Thanksgiving; the romance +of school life, over which vacations, far from being welcomed with +delight, cast a gloom as involving extra work; the cold days of winter +with its deep or drifting snows, the mercury of the thermometer clinging +with fondness to zero, even when the sun was shining brilliantly; the +long chilling nights in which the frost carved fantastic structures on +the window-panes; the eager watching for the time when the sap would +begin to run in the sugar-maples; the evenings given up to reading, with +the inevitable inward discontent at being sent to bed too early; the +longing for the mild days of spring to come, when the heavy cowhide boots +could be discarded, and the boy could rejoice at last in the covering for +his feet which the Lord had provided. These and scores of similar +descriptions fill up the picture of the life furnished here. It was +nature's own school wherein was to be gained the fullest intimacy with +her spirit. While there was much which she could not teach, there was +also much which she alone could teach. From his communion with her the +boy learned lessons which the streets of crowded cities could never have +imparted. + +At the age of twelve this portion of his education came to an end. The +family then moved to Cazenovia in Madison county in Central New York, +from which place Warner's mother had come, and where her immediate +relatives then resided. Until he went to college this was his home. There +he attended a preparatory school under the direction of the Methodist +Episcopal Church, which was styled the Oneida Conference Seminary. It was +at this institution that he fitted mainly for college; for to college it +had been his father's dying wish that he should go, and the boy himself +did not need the spur of this parting injunction. A college near his home +was the excellent one of Hamilton in the not distant town of Clinton in +the adjoining county of Oneida. Thither he repaired in 1848, and as he +had made the best use of his advantages, he was enabled to enter the +sophomore class. He was graduated in 1851. + +But while fond of study he had all these years been doing something +besides studying. The means of the family were limited, and to secure the +education he desired, not only was it necessary to husband the resources +he possessed, but to increase them in every possible way. Warner had all +the American boy's willingness to undertake any occupation not in itself +discreditable. Hence to him fell a full share of those experiences which +have diversified the early years of so many men who have achieved +success. He set up type in a printing office; he acted as an assistant in +a bookstore; he served as clerk in a post-office. He was thus early +brought into direct contact with persons of all classes and conditions of +life. + +The experience gave to his keenly observant mind an insight into the +nature of men which was to be of special service to him in later years. +Further, it imparted to him a familiarity with their opinions and hopes +and aspirations which enabled him to understand and sympathize with +feelings in which he did not always share. + +During the years which immediately followed his departure from college, +Warner led the somewhat desultory and apparently aimless life of many +American graduates whose future depends upon their own exertions and +whose choice of a career is mainly determined by circumstances. From the +very earliest period of his life he had been fond of reading. It was an +inherited taste. The few books he found in his childhood's home would +have been almost swept out of sight in the torrent, largely of trash, +which pours now in a steady stream into the humblest household. But the +books, though few, were of a high quality; and because they were few they +were read much, and their contents became an integral part of his +intellectual equipment. Furthermore, these works of the great masters, +with which he became familiar, set for him a standard by which to test +the value of whatever he read, and saved him even in his earliest years +from having his taste impaired and his judgment misled by the vogue of +meretricious productions which every now and then gain popularity for the +time. They gave him also a distinct bent towards making literature his +profession. But literature, however pleasant and occasionally profitable +as an avocation, was not to be thought of as a vocation. Few there are at +any period who have succeeded in finding it a substantial and permanent +support; at that time and in this country such a prospect was practically +hopeless for any one. It is no matter of surprise, therefore, that +Warner, though often deviating from the direct path, steadily gravitated +toward the profession of law. + +Still, even in those early days his natural inclination manifested +itself. The Knickerbocker Magazine was then the chosen organ to which all +young literary aspirants sent their productions. To it even in his +college days Warner contributed to some extent, though it would doubtless +be possible now to gather out of this collection but few pieces which, +lacking his own identification, could be assigned to him positively. At a +later period he contributed articles to Putnam's Magazine, which began +its existence in 1853. Warner himself at one time, in that period of +struggle and uncertainty, expected to become an editor of a monthly which +was to be started in Detroit. But before the magazine was actually set on +foot the inability of the person who projected it to supply the necessary +means for carrying it on prevented the failure which would inevitably +have befallen a venture of that sort, undertaken at that time and in that +place. Yet he showed in a way the native bent of his mind by bringing out +two years after his graduation from college a volume of selections from +English and American authors entitled "The Book of Eloquence." This work +a publisher many years afterward took advantage of his later reputation +to reprint. + +This unsettled period of his life lasted for several years. He was +resident for a while in various places. Part of the time he seems to have +been in Cazenovia; part of the time in New York; part of the time in the +West. One thing in particular there was which stood in the way of fixing +definitely his choice of a profession. This was the precarious state of +his health, far poorer then than it was in subsequent years. Warner, +however, was never at any period of his life what is called robust. It +was his exceeding temperance in all things which enabled him to venture +upon the assumption and succeed in the accomplishment of tasks which men, +physically far stronger than he, would have shrunk from under-taking, +even had they been possessed of the same abilities. But his condition, +part of that time, was such that it led him to take a course of treatment +at the sanatorium in Clifton Springs. It became apparent, however, that +life in the open air, for a while at least, was the one thing essential. +Under the pressure of this necessity he secured a position as one of an +engineering party engaged in the survey of a railway in Missouri. In that +occupation he spent a large part of 1853 and 1854. He came back from this +expedition restored to health. With that result accomplished, the duty of +settling definitely upon what he was to do became more urgent. Among +other things he did, while living for a while with his uncle in +Binghamton, N. Y., he studied law in the office of Daniel S. Dickinson. + +In the Christmas season of 1854 he went with a friend on a visit to +Philadelphia and stayed at the house of Philip M. Price, a prominent +citizen of that place who was engaged, among other things, in the +conveyancing of real estate. It will not be surprising to any one who +knew the charm of his society in later life to be told that he became at +once a favorite with the older man. The latter was advanced in years, he +was anxious to retire from active business. Acting under his advice, +Warner was induced to come to Philadelphia in 1855 and join him, and to +form subsequently a partnership in legal conveyancing with another young +man who had been employed in Mr. Price's office. Thus came into being the +firm of Barton and Warner. Their headquarters were first in Spring Garden +Street and later in Walnut Street. The future soon became sufficiently +assured to justify Warner in marriage, and in October, 1856, he was +wedded to Susan Lee, daughter of William Elliott Lee of New York City. + +But though in a business allied to the law, Warner was not yet a lawyer. +His occupation indeed was only in his eyes a temporary makeshift while he +was preparing himself for what was to be his real work in life. +Therefore, while supporting himself by carrying on the business of +conveyancing, he attended the courses of study at the law department of +the University of Pennsylvania, during the academic years of 1856-57 and +1857-58. From that institution he received the degree of bachelor of law +in 1858--often misstated 1856--and was ready to begin the practice of +his, profession. + +In those days every young man of ability and ambition was counseled to go +West and grow up with the country, and was not unfrequently disposed to +take that course of his own accord. Warner felt the general impulse. He +had contemplated entering, in fact had pretty definitely made up his mind +to enter, into a law partnership with a friend in one of the smaller +places in that region. But on a tour, somewhat of exploration, he stopped +at Chicago. There he met another friend, and after talking over the +situation with him he decided to take up his residence in that city. So +in 1858 the law-firm of Davenport and Warner came into being. It lasted +until 1860. It was not exactly a favorable time for young men to enter +upon the practice of this profession. The country was just beginning to +recover from the depression which had followed the disastrous panic of +1857; but confidence was as yet far from being restored. The new firm did +a fairly good business; but while there was sufficient work to do, there +was but little money to pay for it. Still Warner would doubtless have +continued in the profession had he not received an offer, the acceptance +of which determined his future and changed entirely his career. + +Hawley, now United States Senator from Connecticut, was Warner's senior +by a few years. He had preceded him as a student at the Oneida Conference +Seminary and at Hamilton College. Practicing law in Hartford, he had +started in 1857, in conjunction with other leading citizens, a paper +called the Evening Press. It was devoted to the advocacy of the +principles of the Republican party, which was at that time still in what +may be called the formative state of its existence. This was a period in +which for some years the dissolution had been going on of the two old +parties which had divided the country. Men were changing sides and were +aligning themselves anew according to their views on questions which were +every day assuming greater prominence in the minds of all. There was +really but one great subject talked about or thought about. It split into +opposing sections the whole land over which was lowering the grim, though +as yet unrecognizable, shadow of civil war. The Republican party had been +in existence but a very few years, but in that short time it had +attracted to its ranks the young and enthusiastic spirits of the North, +just as to the other side were impelled the members of the same class in +the South. The intellectual contest which preceded the physical was +stirring the hearts of all men. Hawley, who was well aware of Warner's +peculiar ability, was anxious to secure his co-operation and assistance. +He urged him to come East and join him in the conduct of the new +enterprise he had undertaken. + +Warner always considered that he derived great benefit from his +comparatively limited study and practice of law; and that the little time +he had given up to it had been far from being misspent. But the opening +which now presented itself introduced him to a field of activity much +more suited to his talents and his tastes. He liked the study of law +better than its practice; for his early training had not been of a kind +to reconcile him to standing up strongly for clients and causes that he +honestly believed to be in the wrong. Furthermore, his heart, as has been +said, had always been in literature; and though journalism could hardly +be called much more than a half-sister, the one could provide the support +which the other could never promise with certainty. So in 1860 Warner +removed to Hartford and joined his friend as associate editor of the +newspaper he had founded. The next year the war broke out. Hawley at once +entered the army and took part in the four years' struggle. His departure +left Warner in editorial charge of the paper, into the conduct of which +he threw himself with all the earnestness and energy of his nature, and +the ability, both political and literary, displayed in its columns gave +it at once a high position which it never lost. + +At this point it may be well to give briefly the few further salient +facts of Warner's connection with journalism proper. In 1867 the owners +of the Press purchased the Courant, the well-known morning paper which +had been founded more than a century before, and consolidated the Press +with it. Of this journal, Hawley and Warner, now in part proprietors, +were the editorial writers. The former, who had been mustered out of the +army with the rank of brevet Major-General, was soon diverted from +journalism by other employments. He was elected Governor, he became a +member of Congress, serving successively in both branches. The main +editorial responsibility for the conduct of the paper devolved in +consequence upon Warner, and to it he gave up for years nearly all his +thought and attention. Once only during that early period was his labor +interrupted for any considerable length of time. In May, 1868, he set out +on the first of his five trips across the Atlantic. He was absent nearly +a year. Yet even then he cannot be said to have neglected his special +work. Articles were sent weekly from the other side, describing what he +saw and experienced abroad. His active connection with the paper he never +gave up absolutely, nor did his interest in it ever cease. But after he +became connected with the editorial staff of Harpers Magazine the +contributions he made to his journal were only occasional and what may be +called accidental. + +When 1870 came, forty years of Warner's life had gone by, and nearly +twenty years since he had left college. During the latter ten years of +this period he had been a most effective and forcible leader-writer on +political and social questions, never more so than during the storm and +stress of the Civil War. Outside of these topics he had devoted a great +deal of attention to matters connected with literature and art. His +varied abilities were fully recognized by the readers of the journal he +edited. + +But as yet there was little or no recognition outside. It is no easy +matter to tell what are the influences, what the circumstances, which +determine the success of a particular writer or of a particular work. +Hitherto Warner's repute was mainly confined to the inhabitants of a +provincial capital and its outlying and dependent towns. However +cultivated the class to which his writings appealed--and as a class it +was distinctly cultivated--their number was necessarily not great. To the +country at large what he did or what he was capable of doing was not +known at all. Some slight efforts he had occasionally put forth to secure +the publication of matter he had prepared. He experienced the usual fate +of authors who seek to introduce into the market literary wares of a new +and better sort. His productions did not follow conventional lines. +Publishers were ready to examine what he offered, and were just as ready +to declare that these new wares were of a nature in which they were not +inclined to deal. + +But during 1870 a series of humorous articles appeared in the Hartford +Courant, detailing his experiences in the cultivation of a garden. Warner +had become the owner of a small place then almost on the outskirts of the +city. With the dwelling-house went the possession of three acres of land. +The opportunity thus presented itself of turning into a blessing the +primeval curse of tilling the soil, in this instance not with a hoe, but +with a pen. These articles detailing his experiences excited so much +amusement and so much admiration that a general desire was manifested +that they should receive a more permanent life than that accorded to +articles appearing in the columns of newspapers, and should reach a +circle larger than that to be found in the society of the Connecticut +capital. Warner's previous experience had not disposed him to try his +fortunes with the members of the publishing fraternity. In fact he did +not lay so much stress upon the articles as did his readers and friends. +He always insisted that he had previously written other articles which in +his eyes certainly were just as good as they, if not better. + +It so chanced that about this time Henry Ward Beecher came to Hartford to +visit his sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe. Warner was invited to meet him. +In the course of the conversation the articles just mentioned were +referred to by some one of those present. Beecher's curiosity was aroused +and he expressed a desire to see them. To him they were accordingly sent +for perusal. No sooner had he run through them than he recognized in them +the presence of a rare and delicate humor which struck a distinctly new +note in American literature. It was something he felt which should not be +confined to the knowledge of any limited circle. He wrote at once to the +publisher James T. Fields, urging the production of these articles in +book form. Beecher's recommendation in those days was sufficient to +insure the acceptance of any book by any publisher. Mr. Fields agreed to +bring out the work, provided the great preacher would prefix an +introduction. This he promised to do and did; though in place of the +somewhat more formal piece he was asked to write, he sent what he called +an introductory letter. + +The series of papers published under the title of "My Summer in a Garden" +came out at the very end of 1870, with the date of 1871 on the +title-page. The volume met with instantaneous success. It was the subject +of comment and conversation everywhere and passed rapidly through several +editions. There was a general feeling that a new writer had suddenly +appeared, with a wit and wisdom peculiarly his own, precisely like which +nothing had previously existed in our literature. To the later editions +of the work was added an account of a cat which had been presented to the +author by the Stowes. For that reason it was given from the Christian +name of the husband of the novelist the title of Calvin. To this John was +sometimes prefixed, as betokening from the purely animal point of view a +certain resemblance to the imputed grimness and earnestness of the great +reformer. There was nothing in the least exaggerated in the account which +Warner gave of the character and conduct of this really remarkable member +of the feline race. No biography was ever truer; no appreciation was ever +more sympathetic; and in the long line of cats none was ever more worthy +to have his story truly and sympathetically told. All who had the fortune +to see Calvin in the flesh will recognize the accuracy with which his +portrait was drawn. All who read the account of him, though not having +seen him, will find it one of the most charming of descriptions. It has +the fullest right to be termed a cat classic. + +With the publication of "My Summer in a Garden" Warner was launched upon +a career of authorship which lasted without cessation during the thirty +years that remained of his life. It covered a wide field. His interests +were varied and his activity was unremitting. Literature, art, and that +vast diversity of topics which are loosely embraced under the general +name of social science--upon all these he had something fresh to say, and +he said it invariably with attractiveness and effect. It mattered little +what he set out to talk about, the talk was sure to be full both of +instruction and entertainment. No sooner had the unequivocal success of +his first published work brought his name before the public than he was +besieged for contributions by conductors of periodicals of all sorts; and +as he had ideas of his own upon all sorts of subjects, he was constantly +furnishing matter of the most diverse kind for the most diverse +audiences. + +As a result, the volumes here gathered together represent but a limited +portion of the work he accomplished. All his life, indeed, Warner was not +only an omnivorous consumer of the writings of others, but a constant +producer. The manifestation of it took place in ways frequently known to +but few. It was not merely the fact that as an editor of a daily paper he +wrote regularly articles on topics of current interest to which he never +expected to pay any further attention; but after his name became widely +known and his services were in request everywhere, he produced scores of +articles, some long, some short, some signed, some unsigned, of which he +made no account whatever. One looking through the pages of contemporary +periodical literature is apt at any moment to light upon pieces, and +sometimes upon series of them, which the author never took the trouble to +collect. Many of those to which his name was not attached can no longer +be identified with any approach to certainty. About the preservation of +much that he did--and some of it belonged distinctly to his best and most +characteristic work--he was singularly careless, or it may be better to +say, singularly indifferent. + +If I may be permitted to indulge in the recital of a personal experience, +there is one incident I recall which will bring out this trait in a +marked manner. Once on a visit to him I accompanied him to the office of +his paper. While waiting for him to discharge certain duties there, and +employing myself in looking over the exchanges, I chanced to light upon a +leading article on the editorial page of one of the most prominent of the +New York dailies. It was devoted to the consideration of some recent +utterances of a noted orator who, after the actual mission of his life +had been accomplished, was employing the decline of it in the +exploitation of every political and economic vagary which it had entered +into the addled brains of men to evolve. The article struck me as one of +the most brilliant and entertaining of its kind I had ever read; it was +not long indeed before it appeared that the same view of it was taken by +many others throughout the country. The peculiar wit of the comment, the +keenness of the satire made so much of an impression upon me that I +called Warner away from his work to look at it. At my request he hastily +glanced over it, but somewhat to my chagrin failed to evince any +enthusiasm about it. On our way home I again spoke of it and was a good +deal nettled at the indifference towards it which he manifested. It +seemed to imply that my critical judgment was of little value; and +however true might be his conclusion on that point, one does not enjoy +having the fact thrust too forcibly upon the attention in the familiarity +of conversation. Resenting therefore the tone he had assumed, I took +occasion not only to reiterate my previously expressed opinion somewhat +more aggressively, but also went on to insinuate that he was himself +distinctly lacking in any real appreciation of what was excellent. He +bore with me patiently for a while. "Well, sonny," he said at last, +"since you seem to take the matter so much to heart, I will tell you in +confidence that I wrote the piece myself." I found that this was not only +true in the case just specified, but that while engaged in preparing +articles for his own paper he occasionally prepared them for other +journals. No one besides himself and those immediately concerned, ever +knew anything about the matter. He never asserted any right to these +pieces, he never sought to collect them, though some of them exhibited +his happiest vein of humor. Unclaimed, unidentified, they are swept into +that wallet of oblivion in which time stows the best as well as the worst +of newspaper production. + +The next volume of Warner's writings that made its appearance was +entitled "Saunterings." It was the first and, though good of its kind, +was by no means the best of a class of productions in which he was to +exhibit signal excellence. It will be observed that of the various works +comprised in this collective edition, no small number consist of what by +a wide extension of the phrase may be termed books of travel. There are +two or three which fall strictly under that designation. Most of them, +however, can be more properly called records of personal experience and +adventure in different places and regions, with the comments on life and +character to which they gave rise. + +Books of travel, if they are expected to live, are peculiarly hard to +write. If they come out at a period when curiosity about the region +described is predominant, they are fairly certain, no matter how +wretched, to achieve temporary success. But there is no kind of literary +production to which, by the very law of its being, it is more difficult +to impart vitality. Paradoxical as it may seem, it is perfectly true that +the greatest hinderance to their permanent interest is the information +they furnish. The more full, specific and even accurate that is, the more +rapidly does the work containing it lose its value. The fresher knowledge +conveyed by a new, and it may be much inferior book, crowds out of +circulation those which have gone before. The changed or changing +conditions in the region traversed renders the information previously +furnished out of date and even misleading. Hence the older works come in +time to have only an antiquarian interest. Their pages are consulted only +by that very limited number of persons who are anxious to learn what has +been and view with stolid indifference what actually is. Something of +this transitory nature belongs to all sketches of travel. It is the one +great reason why so very few of the countless number of such works, +written, and sometimes written by men of highest ability, are hardly +heard of a few years after publication. Travels form a species of +literary production in which great classics are exceedingly rare. + +From this fatal characteristic, threatening the enduring life of such +works, most of Warner's writings of this sort were saved by the method of +procedure he followed. He made it his main object not to give facts but +impressions. All details of exact information, everything calculated to +gratify the statistical mind or to quench the thirst of the seeker for +purely useful information, he was careful, whether consciously or +unconsciously, to banish from those volumes of his in which he followed +his own bent and felt himself under no obligation to say anything but +what he chose. Hence these books are mainly a record of views of men and +manners made by an acute observer on the spot, and put down at the moment +when the impression created was most vivid, not deferred till familiarity +had dulled the sense of it or custom had caused it to be disregarded. +Take as an illustration the little book entitled "Baddeck," one of the +slightest of his productions in this field. It purports to be and is +nothing more than an account of a two weeks' tour made to a Cape Breton +locality in company with the delightful companion to whom it was +dedicated. You take it up with the notion that you are going to acquire +information about the whole country journeyed over, you are beguiled at +times with the fancy that you are getting it. In the best sense it may be +said that you do get it; for it is the general impression of the various +scenes through which the expedition leads the travelers that is left upon +the mind, not those accurate details of a single one of them which the +lapse of a year might render inaccurate. It is to the credit of the work +therefore than one gains from it little specific knowledge. In its place +are the reflections both wise and witty upon life, upon the characters of +the men that are met, upon the nature of the sights that are seen. + +This is what constitutes the enduring charm of the best of these pictures +of travel which Warner produced. It is perhaps misleading to assert that +they do not furnish a good deal of information. Still it is not the sort +of information which the ordinary tourist gives and which the cultivated +reader resents and is careful not to remember. Their dominant note is +rather the quiet humor of a delightful story-teller, who cannot fail to +say something of interest because he has seen so much; and who out of his +wide and varied observation selects for recital certain sights he has +witnessed, certain experiences he has gone through, and so relates them +that the way the thing is told is even more interesting than the thing +told. The chief value of these works does not accordingly depend upon the +accidental, which passes. Inns change and become better or worse. +Facilities for transportation increase or decrease. Scenery itself alters +to some extent under the operation of agencies brought to bear upon it +for its own improvement or for the improvement of something else. But +man's nature remains a constant quantity. Traits seen here and now are +sure to be met with somewhere else, and even in ages to come. Hence works +of this nature, embodying descriptions of men and manners, always retain +something of the freshness which characterized them on the day of their +appearance. + +Of these productions in which the personal element predominates, and +where the necessity of intruding information is not felt as a burden, +those of Warner's works which deal with the Orient take the first rank. +The two--"My Winter on the Nile" and "In the Levant"--constitute the +record of a visit to the East during the years 1875 and 1876. + +They would naturally have of themselves the most permanent value, +inasmuch as the countries described have for most educated men an abiding +interest. The lifelike representation and graphic characterization which +Warner was apt to display in his traveling sketches were here seen at +their best, because nowhere else did he find the task of description more +congenial. Alike the gorgeousness and the squalor of the Orient appealed +to his artistic sympathies. Egypt in particular had for him always a +special fascination. Twice he visited it--at the time just mentioned and +again in the winter of 1881-82. He rejoiced in every effort made to +dispel the obscurity which hung over its early history. No one, outside +of the men most immediately concerned, took a deeper interest than he in +the work of the Egyptian Exploration Society, of which he was one of the +American vice-presidents. To promoting its success he gave no small share +of time and attention. Everything connected with either the past or the +present of the country had for him an attraction. A civilization which +had been flourishing for centuries, when the founder of Israel was a +wandering sheik on the Syrian plains or in the hill-country of Canaan; +the slow unraveling of records of dynasties of forgotten kings; the +memorials of Egypt's vanished greatness and the vision of her future +prosperity these and things similar to these made this country, so +peculiarly the gift of the Nile, of fascinating interest to the modern +traveler who saw the same sights which had met the eyes of Herodotus +nearly twenty-five hundred years before. + +To the general public the volume which followed--"In the Levant"--was +perhaps of even deeper interest. At all events it dealt with scenes and +memories with which every reader, educated or uneducated, had +associations. The region through which the founder of Christianity +wandered, the places he visited, the words he said in them, the acts he +did, have never lost their hold over the hearts of men, not even during +the periods when the precepts of Christianity have had the least +influence over the conduct of those who professed to it their allegiance. +In the Levant, too, were seen the beginnings of commerce, of art, of +letters, in the forms in which the modern world best knows them. These, +therefore, have always made the lands about the eastern Mediterranean an +attraction to cultivated men and the interest of the subject accordingly +reinforced the skill of the writer. + +There are two or three of these works which can not be included in the +class just described. They were written for the specific purpose of +giving exact information at the time. Of these the most noticeable are +the volumes entitled "South and West" and the account of Southern +California which goes under the name of "Our Italy." They are the outcome +of journeys made expressly with the intent of investigating and reporting +upon the actual situation and apparent prospects of the places and +regions described. As they were written to serve an immediate purpose, +much of the information contained in them tends to grow more and more out +of date as time goes on; and though of value to the student of history, +these volumes must necessarily become of steadily diminishing interest to +the ordinary reader. Yet it is to be said of them that while the pill of +useful information is there, it has at least been sugar-coated. Nor can +we afford to lose sight of the fact that the widely-circulated articles, +collected under the title of "South and West," by the spirit pervading +them as well as by the information they gave, had a marked effect in +bringing the various sections of the country into a better understanding +of one another, and in imparting to all a fuller sense of the community +they possessed in profit and loss, in honor and dishonor. + +It is a somewhat singular fact that these sketches of travel led Warner +incidentally to enter into an entirely new field of literary exertion. +This was novel-writing. Something of this nature he had attempted in +conjunction with Mark Twain in the composition of "The Gilded Age," which +appeared in 1873. The result, however, was unsatisfactory to both the +collaborators. Each had humor, but the humor of each was fundamentally +different. But the magazine with which Warner had become connected was +desirous that he should prepare for it an account of some of the +principal watering-places and summer resorts of the country. Each was to +be visited in turn and its salient features were to be described. It was +finally suggested that this could be done most effectively by weaving +into a love story occurrences that might happen at a number of these +places which were made the subjects of description. The principal +characters were to take their tours under the personal conduct of the +novelist. They were to go to the particular spots selected North and +South, according to the varying seasons of the year. It was a somewhat +novel way of, visiting resorts of this nature; there are those to whom it +will seem altogether more agreeable than would be the visiting of them in +person. Hence appeared in 1886 the articles which were collected later in +the volume entitled "Their Pilgrimage." + +Warner executed the task which had been assigned him with his wonted +skill. The completed work met with success--with so much success indeed +that he was led later to try his fortune further in the same field and +bring out the trilogy of novels which go under the names respectively of +"A Little Journey in the World," "The Golden House," and "That Fortune." +Each of these is complete in itself, each can be read by itself; but the +effect of each and of the whole series can be best secured by reading +them in succession. In the first it is the story of how a great fortune +was made in the stock market; in the second, how it was fraudulently +diverted from the object for which it was intended; and in the third, how +it was most beneficially and satisfactorily lost. The scene of the last +novel was laid in part in Warner's early home in Charlemont. These works +were produced with considerable intervals of time between their +respective appearances, the first coming out in 1889 and the third ten +years later. This detracted to some extent from the popularity which they +would have attained had the different members followed one another +rapidly. Still, they met with distinct success, though it has always been +a question whether this success was due so much to the story as to the +shrewd observation and caustic wit which were brought to bear upon what +was essentially a serious study of one side of American social life. + +The work with which Warner himself was least satisfied was his life of +Captain John Smith, which came out in 18881. It was originally intended +to be one of a series of biographies of noted men, which were to give the +facts accurately but to treat them humorously. History and comedy, +however, have never been blended successfully, though desperate attempts +have occasionally been made to achieve that result. Warner had not long +been engaged in the task before he recognized its hopelessness. For its +preparation it required a special study of the man and the period, and +the more time he spent upon the preliminary work, the more the humorous +element tended to recede. Thus acted on by two impulses, one of a light +and one of a grave nature, he moved for a while in a sort of diagonal +between the two to nowhere in particular; but finally ended in treating +the subject seriously. + +In giving himself up to a biography in which he had no special interest, +Warner felt conscious that he could not interest others. His forebodings +were realized. The work, though made from a careful study of original +sources, did not please him, nor did it attract the public. The attempt +was all the more unfortunate because the time and toil he spent upon it +diverted him from carrying out a scheme which had then taken full +possession of his thoughts. This was the production of a series of essays +to be entitled "Conversations on Horseback." Had it been worked up as he +sketched it in his mind, it would have been the outdoor counterpart of +his "Backlog Studies." Though in a measure based upon a horseback ride +which he took in Pennsylvania in 1880, the incidents of travel as he +outlined its intended treatment would have barely furnished the slightest +of backgrounds. Captain John Smith, however, interfered with a project +specially suited to his abilities and congenial to his tastes. That he +did so possibly led the author of his life to exhibit a somewhat hostile +attitude towards his hero. When the biography was finished, other +engagements were pressing upon his attention. The opportunity of taking +up and completing the projected series of essays never presented itself, +though the subject lay in his mind for a long time and he himself +believed that it would have turned out one of the best pieces of work he +ever did. + +It was unfortunate. For to me--and very likely to many others if not to +most--Warner's strength lay above all in essay-writing. What he +accomplished in this line was almost invariably pervaded by that genial +grace which makes work of the kind attractive, and he exhibited +everywhere in it the delicate but sure touch which preserves the just +mean between saying too much and too little. The essay was in his nature, +and his occupation as a journalist had developed the tendency towards +this form of literary activity, as well as skill in its manipulation. +Whether he wrote sketches of travel, or whether he wrote fiction, the +scene depicted was from the point of view of the essayist rather than +from that of the tourist or of the novelist. It is this characteristic +which gives to his work in the former field its enduring interest. Again +in his novels, it was not so much the story that was in his thoughts as +the opportunity the varying scenes afforded for amusing observations upon +manners, for comments upon life, sometimes good-natured, sometimes +severe, but always entertaining, and above all, for serious study of the +social problems which present themselves on every side for examination. +This is distinctly the province of the essayist, and in it Warner always +displayed his fullest strength. + +We have seen that his first purely humorous publication of this nature +was the one which made him known to the general public. It was speedily +followed, however, by one of a somewhat graver character, which became at +the time and has since remained a special favorite of cultivated readers. +This is the volume entitled "Backlog Studies." The attractiveness of this +work is as much due to the suggestive social and literary discussions +with which it abounds as to the delicate and refined humor with which the +ideas are expressed. Something of the same characteristics was displayed +in the two little volumes of short pieces dealing with social topics, +which came out later under the respective titles of "As We Were Saying," +and "As We Go." But there was a deeper and more serious side of his +nature which found utterance in several of his essays, particularly in +some which were given in the form of addresses delivered at various +institutions of learning. They exhibit the charm which belongs to all his +writings; but his feelings were too profoundly interested in the subjects +considered to allow him to give more than occasional play to his humor. +Essays contained in such a volume, for instance, as "The Relation of +Literature to Life" will not appeal to him whose main object in reading +is amusement. Into them Warner put his deepest and most earnest +convictions. The subject from which the book just mentioned derived its +title lay near to his heart. No one felt more strongly than he the +importance of art of all kinds, but especially of literary art, for the +uplifting of a nation. No one saw more distinctly the absolute necessity +of its fullest recognition in a moneymaking age and in a money-making +land, if the spread of the dry rot of moral deterioration were to be +prevented. The ampler horizon it presented, the loftier ideals it set up, +the counteracting agency it supplied to the sordidness of motive and act +which, left unchecked, was certain to overwhelm the national spirit--all +these were enforced by him again and again with clearness and +effectiveness. His essays of this kind will never be popular in the sense +in which are his other writings. But no thoughtful man will rise up from +reading them without having gained a vivid conception of the part which +literature plays in the life of even the humblest, and without a deeper +conviction of its necessity to any healthy development of the character +of a people. + +During the early part of his purely literary career a large proportion of +Warner's collected writings, which then appeared, were first published in +the Atlantic Monthly. But about fourteen years before his death he became +closely connected with Harper's Magazine. From May, 1886, to March, 1892, +he conducted the Editor's Drawer of that periodical. The month following +this last date he succeeded William Dean Howells as the contributor of +the Editor's Study. This position he held until July, 1898. The scope of +this department was largely expanded after the death of George William +Curtis in the summer of 1892, and the consequent discontinuance of the +Editor's Easy Chair. Comments upon other topics than those to which his +department was originally devoted, especially upon social questions, were +made a distinct feature. His editorial connection with the magazine +naturally led to his contributing to it numerous articles besides those +which were demanded by the requirements of the position he held. Nearly +all these, as well as those which appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, are +indicated in the bibliographical notes prefixed to the separate works. + +There were, however, other literary enterprises in which he was +concerned; for the calls upon him were numerous, his own appetite for +work was insatiable, and his activity was indefatigable. In 1881 he +assumed the editorship of the American Men of Letters series. This he +opened with his own biography of Washington Irving, the resemblance +between whom and himself has been made the subject of frequent remark. +Later he became the editor-in-chief of the thirty odd volumes which make +up the collection entitled "The World's Best Literature." To this he +contributed several articles of his own and carefully allotted and +supervised the preparation of a large number of others. The labor he put +upon the editing of this collection occupied him a great deal of the time +from 1895 to 1898. + +But literature, though in it lay his chief interest, was but one of the +subjects which employed his many-sided activity. He was constantly called +upon for the discharge of civic duties. The confidence felt by his +fellow-citizens in his judgment and taste was almost equal to the +absolute trust reposed in his integrity. The man who establishes a +reputation for the possession of these qualities can never escape from +bearing the burdens which a good character always imposes. If any work of +art was ordered by the state, Warner was fairly certain to be chosen a +member of the commission selected to decide upon the person who was to do +it and upon the way it was to be done. By his fellow-townsmen he was made +a member of the Park Commission. Such were some of the duties imposed; +there were others voluntarily undertaken. During the latter years of his +life he became increasingly interested in social questions, some of which +partook of a semi-political character. One of the subjects which engaged +his attention was the best method to be adopted for elevating the +character and conduct of the negro population of the country. He +recognized the gravity of the problem with which the nation had to deal +and the difficulties attending its solution. One essay on the subject was +prepared for the meeting held at Washington in May, 1900, of the American +Social Science Association, of which he was president. He was not able to +be there in person. The disease which was ultimately to strike him down +had already made its preliminary attack. His address was accordingly read +for him. It was a subject of special regret that he could not be present +to set forth more fully his views; for the debate, which followed the +presentation of his paper, was by no means confined to the meeting, but +extended to the press of the whole country. Whether the conclusions he +reached were right or wrong, they were in no case adopted hastily nor +indeed without the fullest consideration. + +But a more special interest of his lay in prison reform. The subject had +engaged his attention long before he published anything in connection +with it. Later one of the earliest articles he wrote for Harper's +Magazine was devoted to it. It was in his thoughts just before his death. +He was a member of the Connecticut commission on prisons, of the National +Prison Association, and a vice-president of the New York Association for +Prison Reform. A strong advocate of the doctrine of the indeterminate +sentence, he had little patience with many of the judicial outgivings on +that subject. To him they seemed opinions inherited, not formed, and in +most cases were nothing more than the result of prejudice working upon +ignorance. This particular question was one which he purposed to make the +subject of his address as president of the Social Science Association, at +its annual meeting in 1901. He never lived to complete what he had in +mind. + +During his later years the rigor of the Northern winter had been too +severe for Warner's health. He had accordingly found it advisable to +spend as much of this season as he could in warmer regions. He visited at +various times parts of the South, Mexico, and California. He passed the +winter of 1892-93 at Florence; but he found the air of the valley of the +Arno no perceptible improvement upon that of the valley of the +Connecticut. In truth, neither disease nor death entertains a prejudice +against any particular locality. This fact he was to learn by personal +experience. In the spring of 1899, while at New Orleans, he was stricken +by pneumonia which nearly brought him to the grave. He recovered, but it +is probable that the strength of his system was permanently impaired, and +with it his power of resisting disease. Still his condition was not such +as to prevent him from going on with various projects he had been +contemplating or from forming new ones. The first distinct warning of the +approaching end was the facial paralysis which suddenly attacked him in +April, 1900, while on a visit to Norfolk, Va. Yet even from that he +seemed to be apparently on the full road to recovery during the following +summer. + +It was in the second week of October, 1900, that Warner paid me a visit +of two or three days. He was purposing to spend the winter in Southern +California, coming back to the East in ample time to attend the annual +meeting of the Social Science Association. His thoughts were even then +busy with the subject of the address which, as president, he was to +deliver on that occasion. It seemed to me that I had never seen him when +his mind was more active or more vigorous. I was not only struck by the +clearness of his views--some of which were distinctly novel, at least to +me--but by the felicity and effectiveness with which they were put. + +Never, too, had I been more impressed with the suavity, the +agreeableness, the general charm of his manner. He had determined during +the coming winter to learn to ride the wheel, and we then and there +planned to take a bicycle trip during the following summer, as we had +previously made excursions together on horseback. When we parted, it was +with the agreement that we should meet the next spring in Washington and +fix definitely upon the time and region of our intended ride. It was on a +Saturday morning that I bade him good-by, apparently in the best of +health and spirits. It was on the evening of the following Saturday +--October 20th--that the condensed, passionless, relentless message which +the telegraph transmits, informed me that he had died that afternoon. + +That very day he had lunched at a friend's, where were gathered several +of his special associates who had chanced to come together at the same +house, and then had gone to the office of the Hartford Courant. There was +not the slightest indication apparent of the end that was so near. After +the company broke up, he started out to pay a visit to one of the city +parks, of which he was a commissioner. On his way thither, feeling a +certain faintness, he turned aside into a small house whose occupants he +knew, and asked to sit down for a brief rest, and then, as the faintness +increased, to lie undisturbed on the lounge for a few minutes. The few +minutes passed, and with them his life. In the strictest sense of the +words, he had fallen asleep. From one point of view it was an ideal way +to die. To the individual, death coming so gently, so suddenly, is shorn +of all its terrors. It is only those who live to remember and to lament +that the suffering comes which has been spared the victim. Even to them, +however, is the consolation that though they may have been fully prepared +for the coming of the inevitable event, it would have been none the less +painful when it actually came. + +Warner as a writer we all know. The various and varying opinions +entertained about the quality and value of his work do not require notice +here. Future times will assign him his exact position in the roll of +American authors, and we need not trouble ourselves to anticipate, as we +shall certainly not be able to influence, its verdict. But to only a +comparatively few of those who knew him as a writer was it given to know +him as a man; to still fewer to know him in that familiarity of intimacy +which reveals all that is fine or ignoble in a man's personality. Scanty +is the number of those who will come out of that severest of ordeals so +successfully as he. The same conclusion would be reached, whether we were +to consider him in his private relations or in his career as a man of +letters. Among the irritable race of authors no one was freer from petty +envy or jealousy. During many years of close intercourse, in which he +constantly gave utterance to his views both of men and things with +absolute unreserve, I recall no disparaging opinion ever expressed of any +writer with whom he had been compared either for praise or blame. He had +unquestionably definite and decided opinions. He would point out that +such or such a work was above or below its author's ordinary level; but +there was never any ill-nature in his comment, no depreciation for +depreciation's sake. Never in truth was any one more loyal to his +friends. If his literary conscience would not permit him to say anything +in favor of something which they had done, he usually contented himself +with saying nothing. Whatever failing there was on his critical side was +due to this somewhat uncritical attitude; for it is from his particular +friends that the writer is apt to get the most dispassionate +consideration and sometimes the coldest commendation. It was a part of +Warner's generous recognition of others that he was in all sincerity +disposed to attribute to those he admired and to whom he was attached an +ability of which some of them at least were much inclined to doubt their +own possession. + +Were I indeed compelled to select any one word which would best give the +impression, both social and literary, of Warner's personality, I should +be disposed to designate it as urbanity. That seems to indicate best the +one trait which most distinguished him either in conversation or writing. +Whatever it was, it was innate, not assumed. It was the genuine outcome +of the kindliness and broad-mindedness of his nature and led him to +sympathize with men of all positions in life and of all kinds of ability. +It manifested itself in his attitude towards every one with whom he came +in contact. It led him to treat with fullest consideration all who were +in the least degree under his direction, and converted in consequence the +toil of subordinates into a pleasure. It impelled him to do unsought +everything which lay in his power for the success of those in whom he +felt interest. Many a young writer will recall his words of encouragement +at some period in his own career when the quiet appreciation of one meant +more to him than did later the loud applause of many. As it was in +public, so it was in private life. The generosity of his spirit, the +geniality and high-bred courtesy of his manner, rendered a visit to his +home as much a social delight as his wide knowledge of literature and his +appreciation of what was best in it made it an intellectual +entertainment. + + +THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY. + + + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE +PRELIMINARY + +This paper was prepared and delivered at several of our universities as +introductory to a course of five lectures which insisted on the value of +literature in common life--some hearers thought with an exaggerated +emphasis--and attempted to maintain the thesis that all genuine, enduring +literature is the outcome of the time that produces it, is responsive to +the general sentiment of its time; that this close relation to human life +insures its welcome ever after as a true representation of human nature; +and that consequently the most remunerative method of studying a +literature is to study the people for whom it was produced. Illustrations +of this were drawn from the Greek, the French, and the English +literatures. This study always throws a flood of light upon the meaning +of the text of an old author, the same light that the reader +unconsciously has upon contemporary pages dealing with the life with +which he is familiar. The reader can test this by taking up his +Shakespeare after a thorough investigation of the customs, manners, and +popular life of the Elizabethan period. Of course the converse is true +that good literature is an open door into the life and mode of thought of +the time and place where it originated. + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + +I hade a vision once--you may all have had a like one--of the stream of +time flowing through a limitless land. Along its banks sprang up in +succession the generations of man. They did not move with the stream-they +lived their lives and sank away; and always below them new generations +appeared, to play their brief parts in what is called history--the +sequence of human actions. The stream flowed on, opening for itself +forever a way through the land. I saw that these successive dwellers on +the stream were busy in constructing and setting afloat vessels of +various size and form and rig--arks, galleys, galleons, sloops, brigs, +boats propelled by oars, by sails, by steam. I saw the anxiety with which +each builder launched his venture, and watched its performance and +progress. The anxiety was to invent and launch something that should +float on to the generations to come, and carry the name of the builder +and the fame of his generation. It was almost pathetic, these puny +efforts, because faith always sprang afresh in the success of each new +venture. Many of the vessels could scarcely be said to be launched at +all; they sank like lead, close to the shore. Others floated out for a +time, and then, struck by a flaw in the wind, heeled over and +disappeared. Some, not well put together, broke into fragments in the +bufleting of the waves. Others danced on the flood, taking the sun on +their sails, and went away with good promise of a long voyage. But only a +few floated for any length of time, and still fewer were ever seen by the +generation succeeding that which launched them. The shores of the stream +were strewn with wrecks; there lay bleaching in the sand the ribs of many +a once gallant craft. + +Innumerable were the devices of the builders to keep their inventions +afloat. Some paid great attention to the form of the hull, others to the +kind of cargo and the loading of it, while others--and these seemed the +majority--trusted more to some new sort of sail, or new fashion of +rudder, or new application of propelling power. And it was wonderful to +see what these new ingenuities did for a time, and how each generation +was deceived into the belief that its products would sail on forever. But +one fate practically came to the most of them. They were too heavy, they +were too light, they were built of old material, and they went to the +bottom, they went ashore, they broke up and floated in fragments. And +especially did the crafts built in imitation of something that had +floated down from a previous generation come to quick disaster. I saw +only here and there a vessel, beaten by weather and blackened by time +--so old, perhaps, that the name of the maker was no longer legible; or +some fragments of antique wood that had evidently come from far up the +stream. When such a vessel appeared there was sure to arise great dispute +about it, and from time to time expeditions were organized to ascend the +river and discover the place and circumstances of its origin. Along the +banks, at intervals, whole fleets of boats and fragments had gone ashore, +and were piled up in bays, like the driftwood of a subsided freshet. +Efforts were made to dislodge these from time to time and set them afloat +again, newly christened, with fresh paint and sails, as if they stood a +better chance of the voyage than any new ones. Indeed, I saw that a large +part of the commerce of this river was, in fact, the old hulks and +stranded wrecks that each generation had set afloat again. As I saw it in +this foolish vision, how pathetic this labor was from generation to +generation; so many vessels launched; so few making a voyage even for a +lifetime; so many builders confident of immortality; so many lives +outlasting this coveted reputation! And still the generations, each with +touching hopefulness, busied themselves with this child's play on the +banks of the stream; and still the river flowed on, whelming and wrecking +the most of that so confidently committed to it, and bearing only here +and there, on its swift, wide tide, a ship, a boat, a shingle. + +These hosts of men whom I saw thus occupied since history began were +authors; these vessels were books; these heaps of refuse in the bays were +great libraries. The allegory admits of any amount of ingenious +parallelism. It is nevertheless misleading; it is the illusion of an idle +fancy. I have introduced it because it expresses, with some whimsical +exaggeration--not much more than that of "The Vision of Mirza"--the +popular notion about literature and its relation to human life. In the +popular conception, literature is as much a thing apart from life as +these boats on the stream of time were from the existence, the struggle, +the decay of the generations along the shore. I say in the popular +conception, for literature is wholly different from this, not only in its +effect upon individual lives, but upon the procession of lives upon this +earth; it is not only an integral part of all of them, but, with its +sister arts, it is the one unceasing continuity in history. Literature +and art are not only the records and monuments made by the successive +races of men, not only the local expressions of thought and emotion, but +they are, to change the figure, the streams that flow on, enduring, amid +the passing show of men, reviving, transforming, ennobling the fleeting +generations. Without this continuity of thought and emotion, history +would present us only a succession of meaningless experiments. The +experiments fail, the experiments succeed--at any rate, they end--and +what remains for transmission, for the sustenance of succeeding peoples? +Nothing but the thought and emotion evolved and expressed. It is true +that every era, each generation, seems to have its peculiar work to do; +it is to subdue the intractable earth, to repel or to civilize the +barbarians, to settle society in order, to build cities, to amass wealth +in centres, to make deserts bloom, to construct edifices such as were +never made before, to bring all men within speaking distance of each +other--lucky if they have anything to say when that is accomplished--to +extend the information of the few among the many, or to multiply the +means of easy and luxurious living. Age after age the world labors for +these things with the busy absorption of a colony of ants in its castle +of sand. And we must confess that the process, such, for instance, as +that now going on here--this onset of many peoples, which is transforming +the continent of America--is a spectacle to excite the imagination in the +highest degree. If there were any poet capable of putting into an epic +the spirit of this achievement, what an epic would be his! Can it be that +there is anything of more consequence in life than the great business in +hand, which absorbs the vitality and genius of this age? Surely, we say, +it is better to go by steam than to go afoot, because we reach our +destination sooner--getting there quickly being a supreme object. It is +well to force the soil to yield a hundred-fold, to congregate men in +masses so that all their energies shall be taxed to bring food to +themselves, to stimulate industries, drag coal and metal from the bowels +of the earth, cover its surface with rails for swift-running carriages, +to build ever larger palaces, warehouses, ships. This gigantic +achievement strikes the imagination. + +If the world in which you live happens to be the world of books, if your +pursuit is to know what has been done and said in the world, to the end +that your own conception of the value of life may be enlarged, and that +better things may be done and said hereafter, this world and this pursuit +assume supreme importance in your mind. But you can in a moment place +yourself in relations--you have not to go far, perhaps only to speak to +your next neighbor--where the very existence of your world is scarcely +recognized. All that has seemed to you of supreme importance is ignored. +You have entered a world that is called practical, where the things that +we have been speaking of are done; you have interest in it and sympathy +with it, because your scheme of life embraces the development of ideas +into actions; but these men of realities have only the smallest +conception of the world that seems to you of the highest importance; and, +further, they have no idea that they owe anything to it, that it has ever +influenced their lives or can add anything to them. And it may chance +that you have, for the moment, a sense of insignificance in the small +part you are playing in the drama going forward. Go out of your library, +out of the small circle of people who talk of books, who are engaged in +research, whose liveliest interest is in the progress of ideas, in the +expression of thought and emotion that is in literature; go out of this +atmosphere into a region where it does not exist, it may be into a place +given up to commerce and exchange, or to manufacturing, or to the +development of certain other industries, such as mining, or the pursuit +of office--which is sometimes called politics. You will speedily be aware +how completely apart from human life literature is held to be, how few +people regard it seriously as a necessary element in life, as anything +more than an amusement or a vexation. I have in mind a mountain district, +stripped, scarred, and blackened by the ruthless lumbermen, ravished of +its forest wealth; divested of its beauty, which has recently become the +field of vast coal-mining operations. Remote from communication, it was +yesterday an exhausted, wounded, deserted country. Today audacious +railways are entering it, crawling up its mountain slopes, rounding its +dizzy precipices, spanning its valleys on iron cobwebs, piercing its +hills with tunnels. Drifts are opened in its coal seams, to which iron +tracks shoot away from the main line; in the woods is seen the gleam of +the engineer's level, is heard the rattle of heavily-laden wagons on the +newly-made roads; tents are pitched, uncouth shanties have sprung up, +great stables, boarding-houses, stores, workshops; the miner, the +blacksmith, the mason, the carpenter have arrived; households have been +set up in temporary barracks, children are already there who need a +school, women who must have a church and society; the stagnation has +given place to excitement, money has flowed in, and everywhere are the +hum of industry and the swish of the goad of American life. On this +hillside, which in June was covered with oaks, is already in October a +town; the stately trees have been felled; streets are laid out and graded +and named; there are a hundred dwellings, there are a store, a +post-office, an inn; the telegraph has reached it, and the telephone and +the electric light; in a few weeks more it will be in size a city, with +thousands of people--a town made out of hand by drawing men and women +from other towns, civilized men and women, who have voluntarily put +themselves in a position where they must be civilized over again. + +This is a marvelous exhibition of what energy and capital can do. You +acknowledge as much to the creators of it. You remember that not far back +in history such a transformation as this could not have been wrought in a +hundred years. This is really life, this is doing something in the world, +and in the presence of it you can see why the creators of it regard your +world, which seemed to you so important, the world whose business is the +evolution and expression of thought and emotion, as insignificant. Here +is a material addition to the business and wealth of the race, here +employment for men who need it, here is industry replacing stagnation, +here is the pleasure of overcoming difficulties and conquering obstacles. +Why encounter these difficulties? In order that more coal may be procured +to operate more railway trains at higher speed, to supply more factories, +to add to the industrial stir of modern life. The men who projected and +are pushing on this enterprise, with an executive ability that would +maintain and manoeuvre an army in a campaign, are not, however, +consciously philanthropists, moved by the charitable purpose of giving +employment to men, or finding satisfaction in making two blades of grass +grow where one grew before. They enjoy no doubt the sense of power in +bringing things to pass, the feeling of leadership and the consequence +derived from its recognition; but they embark in this enterprise in order +that they may have the position and the luxury that increased wealth will +bring, the object being, in most cases, simply material +advantages--sumptuous houses, furnished with all the luxuries which are +the signs of wealth, including, of course, libraries and pictures and +statuary and curiosities, the most showy equipages and troops of +servants; the object being that their wives shall dress magnificently, +glitter in diamonds and velvets, and never need to put their feet to the +ground; that they may command the best stalls in the church, the best +pews in the theatre, the choicest rooms in the inn, and--a consideration +that Plato does not mention, because his world was not our world--that +they may impress and reduce to obsequious deference the hotel clerk. + +This life--for this enterprise and its objects are types of a +considerable portion of life--is not without its ideal, its hero, its +highest expression, its consummate flower. It is expressed in a word +which I use without any sense of its personality, as the French use the +word Barnum--for our crude young nation has the distinction of adding a +verb to the French language, the verb to barnum--it is expressed in the +well-known name Croesus. This is a standard--impossible to be reached +perhaps, but a standard. If one may say so, the country is sown with +seeds of Croesus, and the crop is forward and promising. The interest to +us now in the observation of this phase of modern life is not in the +least for purposes of satire or of reform. We are inquiring how wholly +this conception of life is divorced from the desire to learn what has +been done and said to the end that better things may be done and said +hereafter, in order that we may understand the popular conception of the +insignificant value of literature in human affairs. But it is not aside +from our subject, rather right in its path, to take heed of what the +philosophers say of the effect in other respects of the pursuit of +wealth. + +One cause of the decay of the power of defense in a state, says the +Athenian Stranger in Plato's Laws--one cause is the love of wealth, which +wholly absorbs men and never for a moment allows them to think of +anything but their private possessions; on this the soul of every citizen +hangs suspended, and can attend to nothing but his daily gain; mankind +are ready to learn any branch of knowledge and to follow any pursuit +which tends to this end, and they laugh at any other; that is the reason +why a city will not be in earnest about war or any other good and +honorable pursuit. + +The accumulation of gold in the treasury of private individuals, says +Socrates, in the Republic, is the ruin of democracy. They invent illegal +modes of expenditure; and what do they or their wives care about the law? + +"And then one, seeing another's display, proposes to rival him, and thus +the whole body of citizens acquires a similar character. + +"After that they get on in a trade, and the more they think of making a +fortune, the less they think of virtue; for when riches and virtue are +placed together in the balance, the one always rises as the other falls. + +"And in proportion as riches and rich men are honored in the state, +virtue and the virtuous are dishonored. + +"And what is honored is cultivated, and that which has no honor is +neglected. + +"And so at last, instead of loving contention and glory, men become +lovers of trade and money, and they honor and reverence the rich man and +make a ruler of him, and dishonor the poor man. + +"They do so." + +The object of a reasonable statesman (it is Plato who is really speaking +in the Laws) is not that the state should be as great and rich as +possible, should possess gold and silver, and have the greatest empire by +sea and land. + +The citizen must, indeed, be happy and good, and the legislator will seek +to make him so; but very rich and very good at the same time he cannot +be; not at least in the sense in which many speak of riches. For they +describe by the term "rich" the few who have the most valuable +possessions, though the owner of them be a rogue. And if this is true, I +can never assent to the doctrine that the rich man will be happy: he must +be good as well as rich. And good in a high degree and rich in a high +degree at the same time he cannot be. Some one will ask, Why not? And we +shall answer, Because acquisitions which come from sources which are just +and unjust indifferently are more than double those which come from just +sources only; and the sums which are expended neither honorably nor +disgracefully are only half as great as those which are expended +honorably and on honorable purposes. Thus if one acquires double and +spends half, the other, who is in the opposite case and is a good man, +cannot possibly be wealthier than he. The first (I am speaking of the +saver, and not of the spender) is not always bad; he may indeed in some +cases be utterly bad, but as I was saying, a good man he never is. For he +who receives money unjustly as well as justly, and spends neither justly +nor unjustly, will be a rich man if he be also thrifty. On the other +hand, the utterly bad man is generally profligate, and therefore poor; +while he who spends on noble objects, and acquires wealth by just means +only, can hardly be remarkable for riches any more than he can be very +poor. The argument, then, is right in declaring that the very rich are +not good, and if they are not good they are not happy. + +And the conclusion of Plato is that we ought not to pursue any occupation +to the neglect of that for which riches exist--"I mean," he says, "soul +and body, which without gymnastics and without education will never be +worth anything; and therefore, as we have said not once but many times, +the care of riches should have the last place in our thoughts." + +Men cannot be happy unless they are good, and they cannot be good unless +the care of the soul occupies the first place in their thoughts. That is +the first interest of man; the interest in the body is midway; and last +of all, when rightly regarded, is the interest about money. + +The majority of mankind reverses this order of interests, and therefore +it sets literature to one side as of no practical account in human life. +More than this, it not only drops it out of mind, but it has no +conception of its influence and power in the very affairs from which it +seems to be excluded. It is my purpose to show not only the close +relation of literature to ordinary life, but its eminent position in +life, and its saving power in lives which do not suspect its influence or +value. Just as it is virtue that saves the state, if it be saved, +although the majority do not recognize it and attribute the salvation of +the state to energy, and to obedience to the laws of political economy, +and to discoveries in science, and to financial contrivances; so it is +that in the life of generations of men, considered from an ethical and +not from a religious point of view, the most potent and lasting influence +for a civilization that is worth anything, a civilization that does not +by its own nature work its decay, is that which I call literature. It is +time to define what we mean by literature. We may arrive at the meaning +by the definition of exclusion. We do not mean all books, but some books; +not all that is written and published, but only a small part of it. We do +not mean books of law, of theology, of politics, of science, of medicine, +and not necessarily books of travel, or adventure, or biography, or +fiction even. These may all be ephemeral in their nature. The term +belles-lettres does not fully express it, for it is too narrow. In books +of law, theology, politics, medicine, science, travel, adventure, +biography, philosophy, and fiction there may be passages that possess, or +the whole contents may possess, that quality which comes within our +meaning of literature. It must have in it something of the enduring and +the universal. When we use the term art, we do not mean the arts; we are +indicating a quality that may be in any of the arts. In art and +literature we require not only an expression of the facts in nature and +in human life, but of feeling, thought, emotion. There must be an appeal +to the universal in the race. It is, for example, impossible for a +Christian today to understand what the religious system of the Egyptians +of three thousand years ago was to the Egyptian mind, or to grasp the +idea conveyed to a Chinaman's thought in the phrase, "the worship of the +principle of heaven"; but the Christian of today comprehends perfectly +the letters of an Egyptian scribe in the time of Thotmes III., who +described the comical miseries of his campaign with as clear an appeal to +universal human nature as Horace used in his 'Iter Brundusium;' and the +maxims of Confucius are as comprehensible as the bitter-sweetness of +Thomas a Kempis. De Quincey distinguishes between the literature of +knowledge and the literature of power. The definition is not exact; but +we may say that the one is a statement of what is known, the other is an +emanation from the man himself; or that one may add to the sum of human +knowledge, and the other addresses itself to a higher want in human +nature than the want of knowledge. We select and set aside as literature +that which is original, the product of what we call genius. As I have +said, the subject of a production does not always determine the desired +quality which makes it literature. A biography may contain all the facts +in regard to a man and his character, arranged in an orderly and +comprehensible manner, and yet not be literature; but it may be so +written, like Plutarch's Lives or Defoe's account of Robinson Crusoe, +that it is literature, and of imperishable value as a picture of human +life, as a satisfaction to the want of the human mind which is higher +than the want of knowledge. And this contribution, which I desire to be +understood to mean when I speak of literature, is precisely the thing of +most value in the lives of the majority of men, whether they are aware of +it or not. It may be weighty and profound; it may be light, as light as +the fall of a leaf or a bird's song on the shore; it may be the thought +of Plato when he discourses of the character necessary in a perfect +state, or of Socrates, who, out of the theorem of an absolute beauty, +goodness, greatness, and the like, deduces the immortality of the soul; +or it may be the lovesong of a Scotch plowman: but it has this one +quality of answering to a need in human nature higher than a need for +facts, for knowledge, for wealth. + +In noticing the remoteness in the popular conception of the relation of +literature to life, we must not neglect to take into account what may be +called the arrogance of culture, an arrogance that has been emphasized, +in these days of reaction from the old attitude of literary +obsequiousness, by harsh distinctions and hard words, which are paid back +by equally emphasized contempt. The apostles of light regard the rest of +mankind as barbarians and Philistines, and the world retorts that these +self-constituted apostles are idle word-mongers, without any sympathy +with humanity, critics and jeerers who do nothing to make the conditions +of life easier. It is natural that every man should magnify the circle of +the world in which he is active and imagine that all outside of it is +comparatively unimportant. Everybody who is not a drone has his +sufficient world. To the lawyer it is his cases and the body of law, it +is the legal relation of men that is of supreme importance; to the +merchant and manufacturer all the world consists in buying and selling, +in the production and exchange of products; to the physician all the +world is diseased and in need of remedies; to the clergyman speculation +and the discussion of dogmas and historical theology assume immense +importance; the politician has his world, the artist his also, and the +man of books and letters a realm still apart from all others. And to each +of these persons what is outside of his world seems of secondary +importance; he is absorbed in his own, which seems to him all-embracing. +To the lawyer everybody is or ought to be a litigant; to the grocer the +world is that which eats, and pays--with more or less regularity; to the +scholar the world is in books and ideas. One realizes how possessed he is +with his own little world only when by chance he changes his profession +or occupation and looks back upon the law, or politics, or journalism, +and sees in its true proportion what it was that once absorbed him and +seemed to him so large. When Socrates discusses with Gorgias the value of +rhetoric, the use of which, the latter asserts, relates to the greatest +and best of human things, Socrates says: I dare say you have heard men +singing--at feasts the old drinking-song, in which the singers enumerate +the goods of life-first, health; beauty next; thirdly, wealth honestly +acquired. The producers of these things--the physician, the trainer, the +money-maker--each in turn contends that his art produces the greatest +good. Surely, says the physician, health is the greatest good; there is +more good in my art, says the trainer, for my business is to make men +beautiful and strong in body; and consider, says the money-maker, whether +any one can produce a greater good than wealth. But, insists Gorgias, the +greatest good of men, of which I am the creator, is that which gives men +freedom in their persons, and the power of ruling over others in their +several states--that is, the word which persuades the judge in the court, +or the senators in the council, or the citizens in the assembly: if you +have the power of uttering this word, you will have the physician your +slave, and the trainer your slave, and the moneymaker of whom you talk +will be found to gather treasures, not for himself, but for those who are +able to speak and persuade the multitude. + +What we call life is divided into occupations and interest, and the +horizons of mankind are bounded by them. It happens naturally enough, +therefore, that there should be a want of sympathy in regard to these +pursuits among men, the politician despising the scholar, and the scholar +looking down upon the politician, and the man of affairs, the man of +industries, not caring to conceal his contempt for both the others. And +still more reasonable does the division appear between all the world +which is devoted to material life, and the few who live in and for the +expression of thought and emotion. It is a pity that this should be so, +for it can be shown that life would not be worth living divorced from the +gracious and ennobling influence of literature, and that literature +suffers atrophy when it does not concern itself with the facts and +feelings of men. + +If the poet lives in a world apart from the vulgar, the most lenient +apprehension of him is that his is a sort of fool's paradise. One of the +most curious features in the relation of literature to life is this, that +while poetry, the production of the poet, is as necessary to universal +man as the atmosphere, and as acceptable, the poet is regarded with that +mingling of compassion and undervaluation, and perhaps awe, which once +attached to the weak-minded and insane, and which is sometimes expressed +by the term "inspired idiot." However the poet may have been petted and +crowned, however his name may have been diffused among peoples, I doubt +not that the popular estimate of him has always been substantially what +it is today. And we all know that it is true, true in our individual +consciousness, that if a man be known as a poet and nothing else, if his +character is sustained by no other achievement than the production of +poetry, he suffers in our opinion a loss of respect. And this is only +recovered for him after he is dead, and his poetry is left alone to speak +for his name. However fond my lord and lady were of the ballad, the place +of the minstrel was at the lower end of the hall. If we are pushed to say +why this is, why this happens to the poet and not to the producers of +anything else that excites the admiration of mankind, we are forced to +admit that there is something in the poet to sustain the popular judgment +of his in utility. In all the occupations and professions of life there +is a sign put up, invisible--but none the less real, and expressing an +almost universal feeling--"No poet need apply." And this is not because +there are so many poor poets; for there are poor lawyers, poor soldiers, +poor statesmen, incompetent business men; but none of the personal +disparagement attaches to them that is affixed to the poet. This popular +estimate of the poet extends also, possibly in less degree, to all the +producers of the literature that does not concern itself with knowledge. +It is not our care to inquire further why this is so, but to repeat that +it is strange that it should be so when poetry is, and has been at all +times, the universal solace of all peoples who have emerged out of +barbarism, the one thing not supernatural and yet akin to the +supernatural, that makes the world, in its hard and sordid conditions, +tolerable to the race. For poetry is not merely the comfort of the +refined and the delight of the educated; it is the alleviator of poverty, +the pleasure-ground of the ignorant, the bright spot in the most dreary +pilgrimage. We cannot conceive the abject animal condition of our race +were poetry abstracted; and we do not wonder that this should be so when +we reflect that it supplies a want higher than the need for food, for +raiment, or ease of living, and that the mind needs support as much as +the body. The majority of mankind live largely in the imagination, the +office or use of which is to lift them in spirit out of the bare physical +conditions in which the majority exist. There are races, which we may +call the poetical races, in which this is strikingly exemplified. It +would be difficult to find poverty more complete, physical wants less +gratified, the conditions of life more bare than among the Oriental +peoples from the Nile to the Ganges and from the Indian Ocean to the +steppes of Siberia. But there are perhaps none among the more favored +races who live so much in the world of imagination fed by poetry and +romance. Watch the throng seated about an Arab or Indian or Persian +story-teller and poet, men and women with all the marks of want, hungry, +almost naked, without any prospect in life of ever bettering their sordid +condition; see their eyes kindle, their breathing suspended, their tense +absorption; see their tears, hear their laughter, note their excitement +as the magician unfolds to them a realm of the imagination in which they +are free for the hour to wander, tasting a keen and deep enjoyment that +all the wealth of Croesus cannot purchase for his disciples. Measure, if +you can, what poetry is to them, what their lives would be without it. To +the millions and millions of men who are in this condition, the bard, the +story-teller, the creator of what we are considering as literature, comes +with the one thing that can lift them out of poverty, suffering--all the +woe of which nature is so heedless. + +It is not alone of the poetical nations of the East that this is true, +nor is this desire for the higher enjoyment always wanting in the savage +tribes of the West. When the Jesuit Fathers in 1768 landed upon the +almost untouched and unexplored southern Pacific coast, they found in the +San Gabriel Valley in Lower California that the Indians had games and +feasts at which they decked themselves in flower garlands that reached to +their feet, and that at these games there were song contests which +sometimes lasted for three days. This contest of the poets was an old +custom with them. And we remember how the ignorant Icelanders, who had +never seen a written character, created the splendid Saga, and handed it +down from father to son. We shall scarcely find in Europe a peasantry +whose abject poverty is not in some measure alleviated by this power +which literature gives them to live outside it. Through our sacred +Scriptures, through the ancient storytellers, through the tradition which +in literature made, as I said, the chief continuity in the stream of +time, we all live a considerable, perhaps the better, portion of our +lives in the Orient. But I am not sure that the Scotch peasant, the +crofter in his Highland cabin, the operative in his squalid +tenement-house, in the hopelessness of poverty, in the grime of a life +made twice as hard as that of the Arab by an inimical climate, does not +owe more to literature than the man of culture, whose material +surroundings are heaven in the imagination of the poor. Think what his +wretched life would be, in its naked deformity, without the popular +ballads, without the romances of Scott, which have invested his land for +him, as for us, with enduring charm; and especially without the songs of +Burns, which keep alive in him the feeling that he is a man, which impart +to his blunted sensibility the delicious throb of spring-songs that +enable him to hear the birds, to see the bits of blue sky-songs that make +him tender of the wee bit daisy at his feet--songs that hearten him when +his heart is fit to break with misery. Perhaps the English peasant, the +English operative, is less susceptible to such influences than the Scotch +or the Irish; but over him, sordid as his conditions are, close kin as he +is to the clod, the light of poetry is diffused; there filters into his +life, also, something of that divine stream of which we have spoken, a +dialect poem that touches him, the leaf of a psalm, some bit of +imagination, some tale of pathos, set afloat by a poor writer so long ago +that it has become the common stock of human tradition-maybe from +Palestine, maybe from the Ganges, perhaps from Athens--some expression of +real emotion, some creation, we say, that makes for him a world, vague +and dimly apprehended, that is not at all the actual world in which he +sins and suffers. The poor woman, in a hut with an earth floor, a reeking +roof, a smoky chimney, barren of comfort, so indecent that a gentleman +would not stable his horse in it, sits and sews upon a coarse garment, +while she rocks the cradle of an infant about whom she cherishes no +illusions that his lot will be other than that of his father before him. +As she sits forlorn, it is not the wretched hovel that she sees, nor +other hovels like it--rows of tenements of hopeless poverty, the +ale-house, the gin-shop, the coal-pit, and the choking factory--but: + + "Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood + Stand dressed in living green" + +for her, thanks to the poet. But, alas for the poet there is not a +peasant nor a wretched operative of them all who will not shake his head +and tap his forehead with his forefinger when the poor poet chap passes +by. The peasant has the same opinion of him that the physician, the +trainer, and the money-lender had of the rhetorician. + +The hard conditions of the lonely New England life, with its religious +theories as sombre as its forests, its rigid notions of duty as difficult +to make bloom into sweetness and beauty as the stony soil, would have +been unendurable if they had not been touched with the ideal created by +the poet. There was in creed and purpose the virility that creates a +state, and, as Menander says, the country which is cultivated with +difficulty produces brave men; but we leave out an important element in +the lives of the Pilgrims if we overlook the means they had of living +above their barren circumstances. I do not speak only of the culture +which many of them brought from the universities, of the Greek and Roman +classics, and what unworldly literature they could glean from the +productive age of Elizabeth and James, but of another source, more +universally resorted to, and more powerful in exciting imagination and +emotion, and filling the want in human nature of which we have spoken. +They had the Bible, and it was more to them, much more, than a book of +religion, than a revelation of religious truth, a rule for the conduct of +life, or a guide to heaven. It supplied the place to them of the +Mahabharata to the Hindoo, of the story-teller to the Arab. It opened to +them a boundless realm of poetry and imagination. + +What is the Bible? It might have sufficed, accepted as a book of +revelation, for all the purposes of moral guidance, spiritual +consolation, and systematized authority, if it had been a collection of +precepts, a dry code of morals, an arsenal of judgments, and a treasury +of promises. We are accustomed to think of the Pilgrims as training their +intellectual faculties in the knottiest problems of human responsibility +and destiny, toughening their mental fibre in wrestling with dogmas and +the decrees of Providence, forgetting what else they drew out of the +Bible: what else it was to them in a degree it has been to few peoples +many age. For the Bible is the unequaled record of thought and emotion, +the reservoir of poetry, traditions, stories, parables, exaltations, +consolations, great imaginative adventure, for which the spirit of man is +always longing. It might have been, in warning examples and commands, +all-sufficient to enable men to make a decent pilgrimage on earth and +reach a better country; but it would have been a very different book to +mankind if it had been only a volume of statutes, and if it lacked its +wonderful literary quality. It might have enabled men to reach a better +country, but not, while on earth, to rise into and live in that better +country, or to live in a region above the sordidness of actual life. For, +apart from its religious intention and sacred character, the book is so +written that it has supremely in its history, poetry, prophecies, +promises, stories, that clear literary quality that supplies, as +certainly no other single book does, the want in the human mind which is +higher than the want of facts or knowledge. + +The Bible is the best illustration of the literature of power, for it +always concerns itself with life, it touches it at all points. And this +is the test of any piece of literature--its universal appeal to human +nature. When I consider the narrow limitations of the Pilgrim households, +the absence of luxury, the presence of danger and hardship, the harsh +laws--only less severe than the contemporary laws of England and +Virginia--the weary drudgery, the few pleasures, the curb upon the +expression of emotion and of tenderness, the ascetic repression of +worldly thought, the absence of poetry in the routine occupations and +conditions, I can feel what the Bible must have been to them. It was an +open door into a world where emotion is expressed, where imagination can +range, where love and longing find a language, where imagery is given to +every noble and suppressed passion of the soul, where every aspiration +finds wings. It was history, or, as Thucydides said, philosophy teaching +by example; it was the romance of real life; it was entertainment +unfailing; the wonder-book of childhood, the volume of sweet sentiment to +the shy maiden, the sword to the soldier, the inciter of the youth to +heroic enduring of hardness, it was the refuge of the aged in failing +activity. Perhaps we can nowhere find a better illustration of the true +relation of literature to life than in this example. + +Let us consider the comparative value of literature to mankind. By +comparative value I mean its worth to men in comparison with other things +of acknowledged importance, such as the creation of industries, the +government of States, the manipulation of the politics of an age, the +achievements in war and discovery, and the lives of admirable men. It +needs a certain perspective to judge of this aright, for the near and the +immediate always assume importance. The work that an age has on hand, +whether it be discovery, conquest, the wars that determine boundaries or +are fought for policies, the industries that develop a country or affect +the character of a people, the wielding of power, the accumulation of +fortunes, the various activities of any given civilization or period, +assume such enormous proportions to those engaged in them that such a +modest thing as the literary product seems insignificant in comparison; +and hence it is that the man of action always holds in slight esteem the +man of thought, and especially the expresser of feeling and emotion, the +poet and the humorist. It is only when we look back over the ages, when +civilizations have passed or changed, over the rivalries of States, the +ambitions and enmities of men, the shining deeds and the base deeds that +make up history, that we are enabled to see what remains, what is +permanent. Perhaps the chief result left to the world out of a period of +heroic exertion, of passion and struggle and accumulation, is a sheaf of +poems, or the record by a man of letters of some admirable character. +Spain filled a large place in the world in the sixteenth century, and its +influence upon history is by no means spent yet; but we have inherited +out of that period nothing, I dare say, that is of more value than the +romance of Don Quixote. It is true that the best heritage of generation +from generation is the character of great men; but we always owe its +transmission to the poet and the writer. Without Plato there would be no +Socrates. There is no influence comparable in human life to the +personality of a powerful man, so long as he is present to his +generation, or lives in the memory of those who felt his influence. But +after time has passed, will the world, will human life, that is +essentially the same in all changing conditions, be more affected by what +Bismarck did or by what Goethe said? + +We may without impropriety take for an illustration of the comparative +value of literature to human needs the career of a man now living. In the +opinion of many, Mr. Gladstone is the greatest Englishman of this age. +What would be the position of the British empire, what would be the +tendency of English politics and society without him, is a matter for +speculation. He has not played such a role for England and its neighbors +as Bismarck has played for Germany and the Continent, but he has been one +of the most powerful influences in molding English action. He is the +foremost teacher. Rarely in history has a nation depended more upon a +single man, at times, than the English upon Gladstone, upon his will, his +ability, and especially his character. In certain recent crises the +thought of losing him produced something like a panic in the English +mind, justifying in regard to him, the hyperbole of Choate upon the death +of Webster, that the sailor on the distant sea would feel less safe--as +if a protecting providence had been withdrawn from the world. His mastery +of finance and of economic problems, his skill in debate, his marvelous +achievements in oratory, have extorted the admiration of his enemies. +There is scarcely a province in government, letters, art, or research in +which the mind can win triumphs that he has not invaded and displayed his +power in; scarcely a question in politics, reform, letters, religion, +archaeology, sociology, which he has not discussed with ability. He is a +scholar, critic, parliamentarian, orator, voluminous writer. He seems +equally at home in every field of human activity--a man of prodigious +capacity and enormous acquirements. He can take up, with a turn of the +hand, and always with vigor, the cause of the Greeks, Papal power, +education, theology, the influence of Egypt on Homer, the effect of +English legislation on King O'Brien, contributing something noteworthy to +all the discussions of the day. But I am not aware that he has ever +produced a single page of literature. Whatever space he has filled in his +own country, whatever and however enduring the impression he has made +upon English life and society, does it seem likely that the sum total of +his immense activity in so many fields, after the passage of so many +years, will be worth to the world as much as the simple story of Rab and +his Friends? Already in America I doubt if it is. The illustration might +have more weight with some minds if I contrasted the work of this great +man--as to its answering to a deep want in human nature--with a novel +like 'Henry Esmond' or a poem like 'In Memoriam'; but I think it is +sufficient to rest it upon so slight a performance as the sketch by Dr. +John Brown, of Edinburgh. For the truth is that a little page of +literature, nothing more than a sheet of paper with a poem written on it, +may have that vitality, that enduring quality, that adaptation to life, +that make it of more consequence to all who inherit it than every +material achievement of the age that produced it. It was nothing but a +sheet of paper with a poem on it, carried to the door of his London +patron, for which the poet received a guinea, and perhaps a seat at the +foot of my lord's table. What was that scrap compared to my lord's +business, his great establishment, his equipages in the Park, his +position in society, his weight in the House of Lords, his influence in +Europe? And yet that scrap of paper has gone the world over; it has been +sung in the camp, wept over in the lonely cottage; it has gone with the +marching regiments, with the explorers--with mankind, in short, on its +way down the ages, brightening, consoling, elevating life; and my lord, +who regarded as scarcely above a menial the poet to whom he tossed the +guinea--my lord, with all his pageantry and power, has utterly gone and +left no witness. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Relation of Literature to Life +by Charles Dudley Warner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE *** + +***** This file should be named 3117.txt or 3117.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/1/3117/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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LOUNSBURY. +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH + +The county of Franklin in Northwestern Massachusetts, if not rivaling in +certain ways the adjoining Berkshire, has still a romantic beauty of its +own. In the former half of the nineteenth century its population was +largely given up to the pursuit of agriculture, though not under +altogether favorable conditions. Manufactures had not yet invaded the +region either to add to its wealth or to defile its streams. The +villages were small, the roads pretty generally wretched save in summer, +and from many of the fields the most abundant crop that could be gathered +was that of stones. + +The character of the people conformed in many ways to that of the soil. +The houses which lined the opposite sides of the single street, of which +the petty places largely consisted, as well as the dwellings which dotted +the country, were the homes of men who possessed in fullness many of the +features, good and bad, that characterized the Puritan stock to which +they belonged. There was a good deal of religion in these rural +communities and occasionally some culture. Still, as a rule, it must be +confessed, there would be found in them much more of plain living than of +high thinking. Broad thinking could hardly be said to exist at all. +By the dwellers in that region Easter had scarcely even been heard of; +Christmas was tolerated after a fashion, but was nevertheless looked upon +with a good deal of suspicion as a Popish invention. In the beliefs of +these men several sins not mentioned in the decalogue took really, if +unconsciously, precedence of those which chanced to be found in that +list. Dancing was distinctly immoral; card-playing led directly to +gambling with all its attendant evils; theatre-going characterized the +conduct of the more disreputable denizens of great cities. Fiction was +not absolutely forbidden; but the most lenient regarded it as a great +waste of time, and the boy who desired its solace on any large scale was +under the frequent necessity of seeking the seclusion of the haymow. + +But however rigid and stern the beliefs of men might be, nature was there +always charming, not only in her summer beauty, but even in her wildest +winter moods. Narrow, too, as might be the views of the members of these +communities about the conduct of life, there was ever before the minds of +the best of them an ideal of devotion to duty, an earnest all-pervading +moral purpose which implanted the feeling that neither personal success +nor pleasure of any sort could ever afford even remotely compensation for +the neglect of the least obligation which their situation imposed. +It was no misfortune for any one, who was later to be transported to a +broader horizon and more genial air, to have struck the roots of his +being in a soil where men felt the full sense of moral responsibility for +everything said or done, and where the conscience was almost as sensitive +to the suggestion of sin as to its actual accomplishment. + +It was amidst such surroundings that Charles Dudley Warner was born on +the 12th of September, 1829. His birthplace was the hill town of +Plainfield, over two thousand feet above the level of the sea. +His father, a farmer, was a man of cultivation, though not college-bred. +He died when his eldest son had reached the age of five, leaving to his +widow the care of two children. Three years longer the family continued +to remain on the farm. But however delightful the scenery of the country +might be, its aesthetic attractions did not sufficiently counterbalance +its agricultural disadvantages. Furthermore, while the summers were +beautiful on this high table land, the winters were long and dreary in +the enforced solitude of a thinly settled region. In consequence, the +farm was sold after the death of the grandfather, and the home broken up. +The mother with her two children, went to the neighboring village of +Charlemont on the banks of the Deerfield. There the elder son took up +his residence with his guardian and relative, a man of position and +influence in the community, who was the owner of a large farm. With him +he stayed until he was twelve years old, enjoying all the pleasures and +doing all the miscellaneous jobs of the kind which fall to the lot of a +boy brought up in an agricultural community. + +The story of this particular period of his life was given by Warner in a +work which was published about forty years later. It is the volume +entitled "Being a Boy." Nowhere has there been drawn a truer or more +vivid picture of rural New England. Nowhere else can there be found such +a portrayal of the sights and sounds, the pains and pleasures of life on +a farm as seen from the point of view of a boy. Here we have them all +graphically represented: the daily "chores" that must be looked after; +the driving of cows to and from the pasture; the clearing up of fields +where vegetation struggled with difficulty against the prevailing stones; +the climbing of lofty trees and the swaying back and forth in the wind on +their topmost boughs; the hunting of woodchucks; the nutting excursions +of November days, culminating in the glories of Thanksgiving; the romance +of school life, over which vacations, far from being welcomed with +delight, cast a gloom as involving extra work; the cold days of winter +with its deep or drifting snows, the mercury of the thermometer clinging +with fondness to zero, even when the sun was shining brilliantly; the +long chilling nights in which the frost carved fantastic structures on +the window-panes; the eager watching for the time when the sap would +begin to run in the sugar-maples; the evenings given up to reading, with +the inevitable inward discontent at being sent to bed too early; the +longing for the mild days of spring to come, when the heavy cowhide boots +could be discarded, and the boy could rejoice at last in the covering for +his feet which the Lord had provided. These and scores of similar +descriptions fill up the picture of the life furnished here. It was +nature's own school wherein was to be gained the fullest intimacy with +her spirit. While there was much which she could not teach, there was +also much which she alone could teach. From his communion with her the +boy learned lessons which the streets of crowded cities could never have +imparted. + +At the age of twelve this portion of his education came to an end. +The family then moved to Cazenovia in Madison county in Central New York, +from which place Warner's mother had come, and where her immediate +relatives then resided. Until he went to college this was his home. +There he attended a preparatory school under the direction of the +Methodist Episcopal Church, which was styled the Oneida Conference +Seminary. It was at this institution that he fitted mainly for college; +for to college it had been his father's dying wish that he should go, +and the boy himself did not need the spur of this parting injunction. +A college near his home was the excellent one of Hamilton in the not +distant town of Clinton in the adjoining county of Oneida. Thither he +repaired in 1848, and as he had made the best use of his advantages, he +was enabled to enter the sophomore class. He was graduated in 1851. + +But while fond of study he had all these years been doing something +besides studying. The means of the family were limited, and to secure +the education he desired, not only was it necessary to husband the +resources he possessed, but to increase them in every possible way. +Warner had all the American boy's willingness to undertake any occupation +not in itself discreditable. Hence to him fell a full share of those +experiences which have diversified the early years of so many men who +have achieved success. He set up type in a printing office; he acted as +an assistant in a bookstore; he served as clerk in a post-office. He was +thus early brought into direct contact with persons of all classes and +conditions of life. + +The experience gave to his keenly observant mind an insight into the +nature of men which was to be of special service to him in later years. +Further, it imparted to him a familiarity with their opinions and hopes +and aspirations which enabled him to understand and sympathize with +feelings in which he did not always share. + +During the years which immediately followed his departure from college, +Warner led the somewhat desultory and apparently aimless life of many +American graduates whose future depends upon their own exertions and +whose choice of a career is mainly determined by circumstances. From the +very earliest period of his life he had been fond of reading. It was an +inherited taste. The few books he found in his childhood's home would +have been almost swept out of sight in the torrent, largely of trash, +which pours now in a steady stream into the humblest household. But the +books, though few, were of a high quality; and because they were few they +were read much, and their contents became an integral part of his +intellectual equipment. Furthermore, these works of the great masters, +with which he became familiar, set for him a standard by which to test +the value of whatever he read, and saved him even in his earliest years +from having his taste impaired and his judgment misled by the vogue of +meretricious productions which every now and then gain popularity for the +time. They gave him also a distinct bent towards making literature his +profession. But literature, however pleasant and occasionally profitable +as an avocation, was not to be thought of as a vocation. Few there are +at any period who have succeeded in finding it a substantial and +permanent support; at that time and in this country such a prospect was +practically hopeless for any one. It is no matter of surprise, +therefore, that Warner, though often deviating from the direct path, +steadily gravitated toward the profession of law. + +Still, even in those early days his natural inclination manifested +itself. The Knickerbocker Magazine was then the chosen organ to which +all young literary aspirants sent their productions. To it even in his +college days Warner contributed to some extent, though it would doubtless +be possible now to gather out of this collection but few pieces which, +lacking his own identification, could be assigned to him positively. +At a later period he contributed articles to Putnam's Magazine, which +began its existence in 1853. Warner himself at one time, in that period +of struggle and uncertainty, expected to become an editor of a monthly +which was to be started in Detroit. But before the magazine was actually +set on foot the inability of the person who projected it to supply the +necessary means for carrying it on prevented the failure which would +inevitably have befallen a venture of that sort, undertaken at that time +and in that place. Yet he showed in a way the native bent of his mind by +bringing out two years after his graduation from college a volume of +selections from English and American authors entitled "The Book of +Eloquence." This work a publisher many years afterward took advantage of +his later reputation to reprint. + +This unsettled period of his life lasted for several years. He was +resident for a while in various places. Part of the time he seems to +have been in Cazenovia; part of the time in New York; part of the time in +the West. One thing in particular there was which stood in the way of +fixing definitely his choice of a profession. This was the precarious +state of his health, far poorer then than it was in subsequent years. +Warner, however, was never at any period of his life what is called +robust. It was his exceeding temperance in all things which enabled him +to venture upon the assumption and succeed in the accomplishment of tasks +which men, physically far stronger than he, would have shrunk from under- +taking, even had they been possessed of the same abilities. But his +condition, part of that time, was such that it led him to take a course +of treatment at the sanatorium in Clifton Springs. It became apparent, +however, that life in the open air, for a while at least, was the one +thing essential. Under the pressure of this necessity he secured a +position as one of an engineering party engaged in the survey of a +railway in Missouri. In that occupation he spent a large part of 1853 +and 1854. He came back from this expedition restored to health. With +that result accomplished, the duty of settling definitely upon what he +was to do became more urgent. Among other things he did, while living +for a while with his uncle in Binghamton, N. Y., he studied law in the +office of Daniel S. Dickinson. + +In the Christmas season of 1854 he went with a friend on a visit to +Philadelphia and stayed at the house of Philip M. Price, a prominent +citizen of that place who was engaged, among other things, in the +conveyancing of real estate. It will not be surprising to any one who +knew the charm of his society in later life to be told that he became at +once a favorite with the older man. The latter was advanced in years, +he was anxious to retire from active business. Acting under his advice, +Warner was induced to come to Philadelphia in 1855 and join him, and to +form subsequently a partnership in legal conveyancing with another young +man who had been employed in Mr. Price's office. Thus came into being +the firm of Barton and Warner. Their headquarters were first in Spring +Garden Street and later in Walnut Street. The future soon became +sufficiently assured to justify Warner in marriage, and in October, 1856, +he was wedded to Susan Lee, daughter of William Elliott Lee of New York +City. + +But though in a business allied to the law, Warner was not yet a lawyer. +His occupation indeed was only in his eyes a temporary makeshift while he +was preparing himself for what was to be his real work in life. +Therefore, while supporting himself by carrying on the business of +conveyancing, he attended the courses of study at the law department of +the University of Pennsylvania, during the academic years of 1856-57 and +1857-58. From that institution he received the degree of bachelor of law +in 1858--often misstated 1856--and was ready to begin the practice of +his, profession. + +In those days every young man of ability and ambition was counseled to go +West and grow up with the country, and was not unfrequently disposed to +take that course of his own accord. Warner felt the general impulse. +He had contemplated entering, in fact had pretty definitely made up his +mind to enter, into a law partnership with a friend in one of the smaller +places in that region. But on a tour, somewhat of exploration, he +stopped at Chicago. There he met another friend, and after talking over +the situation with him he decided to take up his residence in that city. +So in 1858 the law-firm of Davenport and Warner came into being. +It lasted until 1860. It was not exactly a favorable time for young men +to enter upon the practice of this profession. The country was just +beginning to recover from the depression which had followed the +disastrous panic of 1857; but confidence was as yet far from being +restored. The new firm did a fairly good business; but while there was +sufficient work to do, there was but little money to pay for it. Still +Warner would doubtless have continued in the profession had he not +received an offer, the acceptance of which determined his future and +changed entirely his career. + +Hawley, now United States Senator from Connecticut, was Warner's senior +by a few years. He had preceded him as a student at the Oneida +Conference Seminary and at Hamilton College. Practicing law in Hartford, +he had started in 1857, in conjunction with other leading citizens, a +paper called the Evening Press. It was devoted to the advocacy of the +principles of the Republican party, which was at that time still in what +may be called the formative state of its existence. This was a period in +which for some years the dissolution had been going on of the two old +parties which had divided the country. Men were changing sides and were +aligning themselves anew according to their views on questions which were +every day assuming greater prominence in the minds of all. There was +really but one great subject talked about or thought about. It split +into opposing sections the whole land over which was lowering the grim, +though as yet unrecognizable, shadow of civil war. The Republican party +had been in existence but a very few years, but in that short time it had +attracted to its ranks the young and enthusiastic spirits of the North, +just as to the other side were impelled the members of the same class in +the South. The intellectual contest which preceded the physical was +stirring the hearts of all men. Hawley, who was well aware of Warner's +peculiar ability, was anxious to secure his co-operation and assistance. +He urged him to come East and join him in the conduct of the new +enterprise he had undertaken. + +Warner always considered that he derived great benefit from his +comparatively limited study and practice of law; and that the little time +he had given up to it had been far from being misspent. But the opening +which now presented itself introduced him to a field of activity much +more suited to his talents and his tastes. He liked the study of law +better than its practice; for his early training had not been of a kind +to reconcile him to standing up strongly for clients and causes that he +honestly believed to be in the wrong. Furthermore, his heart, as has +been said, had always been in literature; and though journalism could +hardly be called much more than a half-sister, the one could provide the +support which the other could never promise with certainty. So in 1860 +Warner removed to Hartford and joined his friend as associate editor of +the newspaper he had founded. The next year the war broke out. Hawley +at once entered the army and took part in the four years' struggle. His +departure left Warner in editorial charge of the paper, into the conduct +of which he threw himself with all the earnestness and energy of his +nature, and the ability, both political and literary, displayed in its +columns gave it at once a high position which it never lost. + +At this point it may be well to give briefly the few further salient +facts of Warner's connection with journalism proper. In 1867 the owners +of the Press purchased the Courant, the well-known morning paper which +had been founded more than a century before, and consolidated the Press +with it. Of this journal, Hawley and Warner, now in part proprietors, +were the editorial writers. The former, who had been mustered out of the +army with the rank of brevet Major-General, was soon diverted from +journalism by other employments. He was elected Governor, he became a +member of Congress, serving successively in both branches. The main +editorial responsibility for the conduct of the paper devolved in +consequence upon Warner, and to it he gave up for years nearly all his +thought and attention. Once only during that early period was his labor +interrupted for any considerable length of time. In May, 1868, he set +out on the first of his five trips across the Atlantic. He was absent +nearly a year. Yet even then he cannot be said to have neglected his +special work. Articles were sent weekly from the other side, describing +what he saw and experienced abroad. His active connection with the paper +he never gave up absolutely, nor did his interest in it ever cease. +But after he became connected with the editorial staff of Harpers +Magazine the contributions he made to his journal were only occasional +and what may be called accidental. + +When 1870 came, forty years of Warner's life had gone by, and nearly +twenty years since he had left college. During the latter ten years of +this period he had been a most effective and forcible leader-writer on +political and social questions, never more so than during the storm and +stress of the Civil War. Outside of these topics he had devoted a great +deal of attention to matters connected with literature and art. His +varied abilities were fully recognized by the readers of the journal he +edited. + +But as yet there was little or no recognition outside. It is no easy +matter to tell what are the influences, what the circumstances, which +determine the success of a particular writer or of a particular work. +Hitherto Warner's repute was mainly confined to the inhabitants of a +provincial capital and its outlying and dependent towns. However +cultivated the class to which his writings appealed--and as a class it +was distinctly cultivated--their number was necessarily not great. To +the country at large what he did or what he was capable of doing was not +known at all. Some slight efforts he had occasionally put forth to +secure the publication of matter he had prepared. He experienced the +usual fate of authors who seek to introduce into the market literary +wares of a new and better sort. His productions did not follow +conventional lines. Publishers were ready to examine what he offered, +and were just as ready to declare that these new wares were of a nature +in which they were not inclined to deal. + +But during 1870 a series of humorous articles appeared in the Hartford +Courant, detailing his experiences in the cultivation of a garden. +Warner had become the owner of a small place then almost on the outskirts +of the city. With the dwelling-house went the possession of three acres +of land. The opportunity thus presented itself of turning into a +blessing the primeval curse of tilling the soil, in this instance not +with a hoe, but with a pen. These articles detailing his experiences +excited so much amusement and so much admiration that a general desire +was manifested that they should receive a more permanent life than that +accorded to articles appearing in the columns of newspapers, and should +reach a circle larger than that to be found in the society of the +Connecticut capital. Warner's previous experience had not disposed him +to try his fortunes with the members of the publishing fraternity. +In fact he did not lay so much stress upon the articles as did his +readers and friends. He always insisted that he had previously written +other articles which in his eyes certainly were just as good as they, if +not better. + +It so chanced that about this time Henry Ward Beecher came to Hartford to +visit his sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe. Warner was invited to meet him. +In the course of the conversation the articles just mentioned were +referred to by some one of those present. Beecher's curiosity was +aroused and he expressed a desire to see them. To him they were +accordingly sent for perusal. No sooner had he run through them than he +recognized in them the presence of a rare and delicate humor which struck +a distinctly new note in American literature. It was something he felt +which should not be confined to the knowledge of any limited circle. +He wrote at once to the publisher James T. Fields, urging the production +of these articles in book form. Beecher's recommendation in those days +was sufficient to insure the acceptance of any book by any publisher. +Mr. Fields agreed to bring out the work, provided the great preacher +would prefix an introduction. This he promised to do and did; though in +place of the somewhat more formal piece he was asked to write, he sent +what he called an introductory letter. + +The series of papers published under the title of "My Summer in a Garden" +came out at the very end of 1870, with the date of 1871 on the title- +page. The volume met with instantaneous success. It was the subject of +comment and conversation everywhere and passed rapidly through several +editions. There was a general feeling that a new writer had suddenly +appeared, with a wit and wisdom peculiarly his own, precisely like which +nothing had previously existed in our literature. To the later editions +of the work was added an account of a cat which had been presented to the +author by the Stowes. For that reason it was given from the Christian +name of the husband of the novelist the title of Calvin. To this John +was sometimes prefixed, as betokening from the purely animal point of +view a certain resemblance to the imputed grimness and earnestness of the +great reformer. There was nothing in the least exaggerated in the +account which Warner gave of the character and conduct of this really +remarkable member of the feline race. No biography was ever truer; no +appreciation was ever more sympathetic; and in the long line of cats none +was ever more worthy to have his story truly and sympathetically told. +All who had the fortune to see Calvin in the flesh will recognize the +accuracy with which his portrait was drawn. All who read the account of +him, though not having seen him, will find it one of the most charming of +descriptions. It has the fullest right to be termed a cat classic. + +With the publication of "My Summer in a Garden" Warner was launched upon +a career of authorship which lasted without cessation during the thirty +years that remained of his life. It covered a wide field. His interests +were varied and his activity was unremitting. Literature, art, and that +vast diversity of topics which are loosely embraced under the general +name of social science--upon all these he had something fresh to say, and +he said it invariably with attractiveness and effect. It mattered little +what he set out to talk about, the talk was sure to be full both of +instruction and entertainment. No sooner had the unequivocal success of +his first published work brought his name before the public than he was +besieged for contributions by conductors of periodicals of all sorts; and +as he had ideas of his own upon all sorts of subjects, he was constantly +furnishing matter of the most diverse kind for the most diverse +audiences. + +As a result, the volumes here gathered together represent but a limited +portion of the work he accomplished. All his life, indeed, Warner was +not only an omnivorous consumer of the writings of others, but a constant +producer. The manifestation of it took place in ways frequently known to +but few. It was not merely the fact that as an editor of a daily paper +he wrote regularly articles on topics of current interest to which he +never expected to pay any further attention; but after his name became +widely known and his services were in request everywhere, he produced +scores of articles, some long, some short, some signed, some unsigned, +of which he made no account whatever. One looking through the pages of +contemporary periodical literature is apt at any moment to light upon +pieces, and sometimes upon series of them, which the author never took +the trouble to collect. Many of those to which his name was not attached +can no longer be identified with any approach to certainty. About the +preservation of much that he did--and some of it belonged distinctly to +his best and most characteristic work--he was singularly careless, or it +may be better to say, singularly indifferent. + +If I may be permitted to indulge in the recital of a personal experience, +there is one incident I recall which will bring out this trait in a +marked manner. Once on a visit to him I accompanied him to the office of +his paper. While waiting for him to discharge certain duties there, and +employing myself in looking over the exchanges, I chanced to light upon a +leading article on the editorial page of one of the most prominent of the +New York dailies. It was devoted to the consideration of some recent +utterances of a noted orator who, after the actual mission of his life +had been accomplished, was employing the decline of it in the +exploitation of every political and economic vagary which it had entered +into the addled brains of men to evolve. The article struck me as one of +the most brilliant and entertaining of its kind I had ever read; it was +not long indeed before it appeared that the same view of it was taken by +many others throughout the country. The peculiar wit of the comment, the +keenness of the satire made so much of an impression upon me that I +called Warner away from his work to look at it. At my request he hastily +glanced over it, but somewhat to my chagrin failed to evince any +enthusiasm about it. On our way home I again spoke of it and was a good +deal nettled at the indifference towards it which he manifested. +It seemed to imply that my critical judgment was of little value; and +however true might be his conclusion on that point, one does not enjoy +having the fact thrust too forcibly upon the attention in the familiarity +of conversation. Resenting therefore the tone he had assumed, I took +occasion not only to reiterate my previously expressed opinion somewhat +more aggressively, but also went on to insinuate that he was himself +distinctly lacking in any real appreciation of what was excellent. He +bore with me patiently for a while. "Well, sonny," he said at last, +"since you seem to take the matter so much to heart, I will tell you in +confidence that I wrote the piece myself." I found that this was not +only true in the case just specified, but that while engaged in preparing +articles for his own paper he occasionally prepared them for other +journals. No one besides himself and those immediately concerned, ever +knew anything about the matter. He never asserted any right to these +pieces, he never sought to collect them, though some of them exhibited +his happiest vein of humor. Unclaimed, unidentified, they are swept into +that wallet of oblivion in which time stows the best as well as the worst +of newspaper production. + +The next volume of Warner's writings that made its appearance was +entitled "Saunterings." It was the first and, though good of its kind, +was by no means the best of a class of productions in which he was to +exhibit signal excellence. It will be observed that of the various works +comprised in this collective edition, no small number consist of what by +a wide extension of the phrase may be termed books of travel. There are +two or three which fall strictly under that designation. Most of them, +however, can be more properly called records of personal experience and +adventure in different places and regions, with the comments on life and +character to which they gave rise. + +Books of travel, if they are expected to live, are peculiarly hard to +write. If they come out at a period when curiosity about the region +described is predominant, they are fairly certain, no matter how +wretched, to achieve temporary success. But there is no kind of literary +production to which, by the very law of its being, it is more difficult +to impart vitality. Paradoxical as it may seem, it is perfectly true +that the greatest hinderance to their permanent interest is the +information they furnish. The more full, specific and even accurate that +is, the more rapidly does the work containing it lose its value. The +fresher knowledge conveyed by a new, and it may be much inferior book, +crowds out of circulation those which have gone before. The changed or +changing conditions in the region traversed renders the information +previously furnished out of date and even misleading. Hence the older +works come in time to have only an antiquarian interest. Their pages are +consulted only by that very limited number of persons who are anxious to +learn what has been and view with stolid indifference what actually is. +Something of this transitory nature belongs to all sketches of travel. +It is the one great reason why so very few of the countless number of +such works, written, and sometimes written by men of highest ability, are +hardly heard of a few years after publication. Travels form a species of +literary production in which great classics are exceedingly rare. + +From this fatal characteristic, threatening the enduring life of such +works, most of Warner's writings of this sort were saved by the method of +procedure he followed. He made it his main object not to give facts but +impressions. All details of exact information, everything calculated to +gratify the statistical mind or to quench the thirst of the seeker for +purely useful information, he was careful, whether consciously or +unconsciously, to banish from those volumes of his in which he followed +his own bent and felt himself under no obligation to say anything but +what he chose. Hence these books are mainly a record of views of men and +manners made by an acute observer on the spot, and put down at the moment +when the impression created was most vivid, not deferred till familiarity +had dulled the sense of it or custom had caused it to be disregarded. +Take as an illustration the little book entitled "Baddeck," one of the +slightest of his productions in this field. It purports to be and is +nothing more than an account of a two weeks' tour made to a Cape Breton +locality in company with the delightful companion to whom it was +dedicated. You take it up with the notion that you are going to acquire +information about the whole country journeyed over, you are beguiled at +times with the fancy that you are getting it. In the best sense it may +be said that you do get it; for it is the general impression of the +various scenes through which the expedition leads the travelers that is +left upon the mind, not those accurate details of a single one of them +which the lapse of a year might render inaccurate. It is to the credit +of the work therefore than one gains from it little specific knowledge. +In its place are the reflections both wise and witty upon life, upon the +characters of the men that are met, upon the nature of the sights that +are seen. + +This is what constitutes the enduring charm of the best of these pictures +of travel which Warner produced. It is perhaps misleading to assert that +they do not furnish a good deal of information. Still it is not the sort +of information which the ordinary tourist gives and which the cultivated +reader resents and is careful not to remember. Their dominant note is +rather the quiet humor of a delightful story-teller, who cannot fail to +say something of interest because he has seen so much; and who out of his +wide and varied observation selects for recital certain sights he has +witnessed, certain experiences he has gone through, and so relates them +that the way the thing is told is even more interesting than the thing +told. The chief value of these works does not accordingly depend upon +the accidental, which passes. Inns change and become better or worse. +Facilities for transportation increase or decrease. Scenery itself +alters to some extent under the operation of agencies brought to bear +upon it for its own improvement or for the improvement of something else. +But man's nature remains a constant quantity. Traits seen here and now +are sure to be met with somewhere else, and even in ages to come. Hence +works of this nature, embodying descriptions of men and manners, always +retain something of the freshness which characterized them on the day of +their appearance. + +Of these productions in which the personal element predominates, and +where the necessity of intruding information is not felt as a burden, +those of Warner's works which deal with the Orient take the first rank. +The two--"My Winter on the Nile" and "In the Levant"--constitute the +record of a visit to the East during the years 1875 and 1876. + +They would naturally have of themselves the most permanent value, +inasmuch as the countries described have for most educated men an abiding +interest. The lifelike representation and graphic characterization which +Warner was apt to display in his traveling sketches were here seen at +their best, because nowhere else did he find the task of description more +congenial. Alike the gorgeousness and the squalor of the Orient appealed +to his artistic sympathies. Egypt in particular had for him always a +special fascination. Twice he visited it--at the time just mentioned and +again in the winter of 1881-82. He rejoiced in every effort made to +dispel the obscurity which hung over its early history. No one, outside +of the men most immediately concerned, took a deeper interest than he in +the work of the Egyptian Exploration Society, of which he was one of the +American vice-presidents. To promoting its success he gave no small +share of time and attention. Everything connected with either the past +or the present of the country had for him an attraction. A civilization +which had been flourishing for centuries, when the founder of Israel was +a wandering sheik on the Syrian plains or in the hill-country of Canaan; +the slow unraveling of records of dynasties of forgotten kings; the +memorials of Egypt's vanished greatness and the vision of her future +prosperity these and things similar to these made this country, so +peculiarly the gift of the Nile, of fascinating interest to the modern +traveler who saw the same sights which had met the eyes of Herodotus +nearly twenty-five hundred years before. + +To the general public the volume which followed--"In the Levant"--was +perhaps of even deeper interest. At all events it dealt with scenes and +memories with which every reader, educated or uneducated, had +associations. The region through which the founder of Christianity +wandered, the places he visited, the words he said in them, the acts he +did, have never lost their hold over the hearts of men, not even during +the periods when the precepts of Christianity have had the least +influence over the conduct of those who professed to it their allegiance. +In the Levant, too, were seen the beginnings of commerce, of art, of +letters, in the forms in which the modern world best knows them. These, +therefore, have always made the lands about the eastern Mediterranean an +attraction to cultivated men and the interest of the subject accordingly +reinforced the skill of the writer. + +There are two or three of these works which can not be included in the +class just described. They were written for the specific purpose of +giving exact information at the time. Of these the most noticeable are +the volumes entitled "South and West" and the account of Southern +California which goes under the name of "Our Italy." They are the +outcome of journeys made expressly with the intent of investigating and +reporting upon the actual situation and apparent prospects of the places +and regions described. As they were written to serve an immediate +purpose, much of the information contained in them tends to grow more and +more out of date as time goes on; and though of value to the student +of history, these volumes must necessarily become of steadily diminishing +interest to the ordinary reader. Yet it is to be said of them that while +the pill of useful information is there, it has at least been sugar- +coated. Nor can we afford to lose sight of the fact that the widely- +circulated articles, collected under the title of "South and West," by +the spirit pervading them as well as by the information they gave, had a +marked effect in bringing the various sections of the country into a +better understanding of one another, and in imparting to all a fuller +sense of the community they possessed in profit and loss, in honor and +dishonor. + +It is a somewhat singular fact that these sketches of travel led Warner +incidentally to enter into an entirely new field of literary exertion. +This was novel-writing. Something of this nature he had attempted in +conjunction with Mark Twain in the composition of "The Gilded Age," which +appeared in 1873. The result, however, was unsatisfactory to both the +collaborators. Each had humor, but the humor of each was fundamentally +different. But the magazine with which Warner had become connected was +desirous that he should prepare for it an account of some of the +principal watering-places and summer resorts of the country. Each was to +be visited in turn and its salient features were to be described. It was +finally suggested that this could be done most effectively by weaving +into a love story occurrences that might happen at a number of these +places which were made the subjects of description. The principal +characters were to take their tours under the personal conduct of the +novelist. They were to go to the particular spots selected North and +South, according to the varying seasons of the year. It was a somewhat +novel way of, visiting resorts of this nature; there are those to whom it +will seem altogether more agreeable than would be the visiting of them in +person. Hence appeared in 1886 the articles which were collected later +in the volume entitled "Their Pilgrimage." + +Warner executed the task which had been assigned him with his wonted +skill. The completed work met with success--with so much success indeed +that he was led later to try his fortune further in the same field and +bring out the trilogy of novels which go under the names respectively of +"A Little Journey in the World," "The Golden House," and "That Fortune." +Each of these is complete in itself, each can be read by itself; but the +effect of each and of the whole series can be best secured by reading +them in succession. In the first it is the story of how a great fortune +was made in the stock market; in the second, how it was fraudulently +diverted from the object for which it was intended; and in the third, how +it was most beneficially and satisfactorily lost. The scene of the last +novel was laid in part in Warner's early home in Charlemont. These works +were produced with considerable intervals of time between their +respective appearances, the first coming out in 1889 and the third ten +years later. This detracted to some extent from the popularity which +they would have attained had the different members followed one another +rapidly. Still, they met with distinct success, though it has always +been a question whether this success was due so much to the story as to +the shrewd observation and caustic wit which were brought to bear upon +what was essentially a serious study of one side of American social life. + +The work with which Warner himself was least satisfied was his life of +Captain John Smith, which came out in 18881. It was originally intended +to be one of a series of biographies of noted men, which were to give the +facts accurately but to treat them humorously. History and comedy, +however, have never been blended successfully, though desperate attempts +have occasionally been made to achieve that result. Warner had not long +been engaged in the task before he recognized its hopelessness. For its +preparation it required a special study of the man and the period, and +the more time he spent upon the preliminary work, the more the humorous +element tended to recede. Thus acted on by two impulses, one of a light +and one of a grave nature, he moved for a while in a sort of diagonal +between the two to nowhere in particular; but finally ended in treating +the subject seriously. + +In giving himself up to a biography in which he had no special interest, +Warner felt conscious that he could not interest others. His forebodings +were realized. The work, though made from a careful study of original +sources, did not please him, nor did it attract the public. The attempt +was all the more unfortunate because the time and toil he spent upon it +diverted him from carrying out a scheme which had then taken full +possession of his thoughts. This was the production of a series of +essays to be entitled "Conversations on Horseback." Had it been worked +up as he sketched it in his mind, it would have been the outdoor +counterpart of his "Backlog Studies." Though in a measure based upon a +horseback ride which he took in Pennsylvania in 1880, the incidents of +travel as he outlined its intended treatment would have barely furnished +the slightest of backgrounds. Captain John Smith, however, interfered +with a project specially suited to his abilities and congenial to his +tastes. That he did so possibly led the author of his life to exhibit a +somewhat hostile attitude towards his hero. When the biography was +finished, other engagements were pressing upon his attention. The +opportunity of taking up and completing the projected series of essays +never presented itself, though the subject lay in his mind for a long +time and he himself believed that it would have turned out one of the +best pieces of work he ever did. + +It was unfortunate. For to me--and very likely to many others if not to +most--Warner's strength lay above all in essay-writing. What he +accomplished in this line was almost invariably pervaded by that genial +grace which makes work of the kind attractive, and he exhibited +everywhere in it the delicate but sure touch which preserves the just +mean between saying too much and too little. The essay was in his +nature, and his occupation as a journalist had developed the tendency +towards this form of literary activity, as well as skill in its +manipulation. Whether he wrote sketches of travel, or whether he wrote +fiction, the scene depicted was from the point of view of the essayist +rather than from that of the tourist or of the novelist. It is this +characteristic which gives to his work in the former field its enduring +interest. Again in his novels, it was not so much the story that was in +his thoughts as the opportunity the varying scenes afforded for amusing +observations upon manners, for comments upon life, sometimes good- +natured, sometimes severe, but always entertaining, and above all, for +serious study of the social problems which present themselves on every +side for examination. This is distinctly the province of the essayist, +and in it Warner always displayed his fullest strength. + +We have seen that his first purely humorous publication of this nature +was the one which made him known to the general public. It was speedily +followed, however, by one of a somewhat graver character, which became at +the time and has since remained a special favorite of cultivated readers. +This is the volume entitled "Backlog Studies." The attractiveness of +this work is as much due to the suggestive social and literary +discussions with which it abounds as to the delicate and refined humor +with which the ideas are expressed. Something of the same +characteristics was displayed in the two little volumes of short pieces +dealing with social topics, which came out later under the respective +titles of "As We Were Saying," and "As We Go." But there was a deeper +and more serious side of his nature which found utterance in several of +his essays, particularly in some which were given in the form of +addresses delivered at various institutions of learning. They exhibit +the charm which belongs to all his writings; but his feelings were too +profoundly interested in the subjects considered to allow him to give +more than occasional play to his humor. Essays contained in such a +volume, for instance, as "The Relation of Literature to Life" will not +appeal to him whose main object in reading is amusement. Into them +Warner put his deepest and most earnest convictions. The subject from +which the book just mentioned derived its title lay near to his heart. +No one felt more strongly than he the importance of art of all kinds, but +especially of literary art, for the uplifting of a nation. No one saw +more distinctly the absolute necessity of its fullest recognition in a +moneymaking age and in a money-making land, if the spread of the dry rot +of moral deterioration were to be prevented. The ampler horizon it +presented, the loftier ideals it set up, the counteracting agency it +supplied to the sordidness of motive and act which, left unchecked, was +certain to overwhelm the national spirit--all these were enforced by him +again and again with clearness and effectiveness. His essays of this +kind will never be popular in the sense in which are his other writings. +But no thoughtful man will rise up from reading them without having +gained a vivid conception of the part which literature plays in the life +of even the humblest, and without a deeper conviction of its necessity to +any healthy development of the character of a people. + +During the early part of his purely literary career a large proportion of +Warner's collected writings, which then appeared, were first published in +the Atlantic Monthly. But about fourteen years before his death he +became closely connected with Harper's Magazine. From May, 1886, to +March, 1892, he conducted the Editor's Drawer of that periodical. The +month following this last date he succeeded William Dean Howells as the +contributor of the Editor's Study. This position he held until July, +1898. The scope of this department was largely expanded after the death +of George William Curtis in the summer of 1892, and the consequent +discontinuance of the Editor's Easy Chair. Comments upon other topics +than those to which his department was originally devoted, especially +upon social questions, were made a distinct feature. His editorial +connection with the magazine naturally led to his contributing to it +numerous articles besides those which were demanded by the requirements +of the position he held. Nearly all these, as well as those which +appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, are indicated in the bibliographical +notes prefixed to the separate works. + +There were, however, other literary enterprises in which he was +concerned; for the calls upon him were numerous, his own appetite for +work was insatiable, and his activity was indefatigable. In 1881 he +assumed the editorship of the American Men of Letters series. This he +opened with his own biography of Washington Irving, the resemblance +between whom and himself has been made the subject of frequent remark. +Later he became the editor-in-chief of the thirty odd volumes which make +up the collection entitled "The World's Best Literature." To this he +contributed several articles of his own and carefully allotted and +supervised the preparation of a large number of others. The labor he put +upon the editing of this collection occupied him a great deal of the time +from 1895 to 1898. + +But literature, though in it lay his chief interest, was but one of the +subjects which employed his many-sided activity. He was constantly +called upon for the discharge of civic duties. The confidence felt by +his fellow-citizens in his judgment and taste was almost equal to the +absolute trust reposed in his integrity. The man who establishes a +reputation for the possession of these qualities can never escape from +bearing the burdens which a good character always imposes. If any work +of art was ordered by the state, Warner was fairly certain to be chosen a +member of the commission selected to decide upon the person who was to do +it and upon the way it was to be done. By his fellow-townsmen he was +made a member of the Park Commission. Such were some of the duties +imposed; there were others voluntarily undertaken. During the latter +years of his life he became increasingly interested in social questions, +some of which partook of a semi-political character. One of the subjects +which engaged his attention was the best method to be adopted for +elevating the character and conduct of the negro population of the +country. He recognized the gravity of the problem with which the nation +had to deal and the difficulties attending its solution. One essay on +the subject was prepared for the meeting held at Washington in May, 1900, +of the American Social Science Association, of which he was president. +He was not able to be there in person. The disease which was ultimately +to strike him down had already made its preliminary attack. His address +was accordingly read for him. It was a subject of special regret that he +could not be present to set forth more fully his views; for the debate, +which followed the presentation of his paper, was by no means confined to +the meeting, but extended to the press of the whole country. Whether the +conclusions he reached were right or wrong, they were in no case adopted +hastily nor indeed without the fullest consideration. + +But a more special interest of his lay in prison reform. The subject had +engaged his attention long before he published anything in connection +with it. Later one of the earliest articles he wrote for Harper's +Magazine was devoted to it. It was in his thoughts just before his +death. He was a member of the Connecticut commission on prisons, of the +National Prison Association, and a vice-president of the New York +Association for Prison Reform. A strong advocate of the doctrine of the +indeterminate sentence, he had little patience with many of the judicial +outgivings on that subject. To him they seemed opinions inherited, not +formed, and in most cases were nothing more than the result of prejudice +working upon ignorance. This particular question was one which he +purposed to make the subject of his address as president of the Social +Science Association, at its annual meeting in 1901. He never lived to +complete what he had in mind. + +During his later years the rigor of the Northern winter had been too +severe for Warner's health. He had accordingly found it advisable to +spend as much of this season as he could in warmer regions. He visited +at various times parts of the South, Mexico, and California. He passed +the winter of 1892-93 at Florence; but he found the air of the valley of +the Arno no perceptible improvement upon that of the valley of the +Connecticut. In truth, neither disease nor death entertains a prejudice +against any particular locality. This fact he was to learn by personal +experience. In the spring of 1899, while at New Orleans, he was stricken +by pneumonia which nearly brought him to the grave. He recovered, but it +is probable that the strength of his system was permanently impaired, +and with it his power of resisting disease. Still his condition was not +such as to prevent him from going on with various projects he had been +contemplating or from forming new ones. The first distinct warning of +the approaching end was the facial paralysis which suddenly attacked him +in April, 1900, while on a visit to Norfolk, Va. Yet even from that he +seemed to be apparently on the full road to recovery during the following +summer. + +It was in the second week of October, 1900, that Warner paid me a visit +of two or three days. He was purposing to spend the winter in Southern +California, coming back to the East in ample time to attend the annual +meeting of the Social Science Association. His thoughts were even then +busy with the subject of the address which, as president, he was to +deliver on that occasion. It seemed to me that I had never seen him when +his mind was more active or more vigorous. I was not only struck by the +clearness of his views--some of which were distinctly novel, at least to +me--but by the felicity and effectiveness with which they were put. + +Never, too, had I been more impressed with the suavity, the +agreeableness, the general charm of his manner. He had determined during +the coming winter to learn to ride the wheel, and we then and there +planned to take a bicycle trip during the following summer, as we had +previously made excursions together on horseback. When we parted, it was +with the agreement that we should meet the next spring in Washington and +fix definitely upon the time and region of our intended ride. It was on +a Saturday morning that I bade him good-by, apparently in the best of +health and spirits. It was on the evening of the following Saturday-- +October 20th--that the condensed, passionless, relentless message which +the telegraph transmits, informed me that he had died that afternoon. + +That very day he had lunched at a friend's, where were gathered several +of his special associates who had chanced to come together at the same +house, and then had gone to the office of the Hartford Courant. There +was not the slightest indication apparent of the end that was so near. +After the company broke up, he started out to pay a visit to one of the +city parks, of which he was a commissioner. On his way thither, feeling +a certain faintness, he turned aside into a small house whose occupants +he knew, and asked to sit down for a brief rest, and then, as the +faintness increased, to lie undisturbed on the lounge for a few minutes. +The few minutes passed, and with them his life. In the strictest sense +of the words, he had fallen asleep. From one point of view it was an +ideal way to die. To the individual, death coming so gently, so +suddenly, is shorn of all its terrors. It is only those who live to +remember and to lament that the suffering comes which has been spared the +victim. Even to them, however, is the consolation that though they may +have been fully prepared for the coming of the inevitable event, it would +have been none the less painful when it actually came. + +Warner as a writer we all know. The various and varying opinions +entertained about the quality and value of his work do not require notice +here. Future times will assign him his exact position in the roll of +American authors, and we need not trouble ourselves to anticipate, as we +shall certainly not be able to influence, its verdict. But to only a +comparatively few of those who knew him as a writer was it given to know +him as a man; to still fewer to know him in that familiarity of intimacy +which reveals all that is fine or ignoble in a man's personality. Scanty +is the number of those who will come out of that severest of ordeals so +successfully as he. The same conclusion would be reached, whether we +were to consider him in his private relations or in his career as a man +of letters. Among the irritable race of authors no one was freer from +petty envy or jealousy. During many years of close intercourse, in which +he constantly gave utterance to his views both of men and things with +absolute unreserve, I recall no disparaging opinion ever expressed of any +writer with whom he had been compared either for praise or blame. He had +unquestionably definite and decided opinions. He would point out that +such or such a work was above or below its author's ordinary level; but +there was never any ill-nature in his comment, no depreciation for +depreciation's sake. Never in truth was any one more loyal to his +friends. If his literary conscience would not permit him to say anything +in favor of something which they had done, he usually contented himself +with saying nothing. Whatever failing there was on his critical side was +due to this somewhat uncritical attitude; for it is from his particular +friends that the writer is apt to get the most dispassionate +consideration and sometimes the coldest commendation. It was a part of +Warner's generous recognition of others that he was in all sincerity +disposed to attribute to those he admired and to whom he was attached an +ability of which some of them at least were much inclined to doubt their +own possession. + +Were I indeed compelled to select any one word which would best give the +impression, both social and literary, of Warner's personality, I should +be disposed to designate it as urbanity. That seems to indicate best the +one trait which most distinguished him either in conversation or writing. +Whatever it was, it was innate, not assumed. It was the genuine outcome +of the kindliness and broad-mindedness of his nature and led him to +sympathize with men of all positions in life and of all kinds of ability. +It manifested itself in his attitude towards every one with whom he came +in contact. It led him to treat with fullest consideration all who were +in the least degree under his direction, and converted in consequence the +toil of subordinates into a pleasure. It impelled him to do unsought +everything which lay in his power for the success of those in whom he +felt interest. Many a young writer will recall his words of +encouragement at some period in his own career when the quiet +appreciation of one meant more to him than did later the loud applause of +many. As it was in public, so it was in private life. The generosity of +his spirit, the geniality and high-bred courtesy of his manner, rendered +a visit to his home as much a social delight as his wide knowledge of +literature and his appreciation of what was best in it made it an +intellectual entertainment. + +THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY. + + + + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + + + +PRELIMINARY + +This paper was prepared and delivered at several of our universities as +introductory to a course of five lectures which insisted on the value of +literature in common life--some hearers thought with an exaggerated +emphasis--and attempted to maintain the thesis that all genuine, enduring +literature is the outcome of the time that produces it, is responsive to +the general sentiment of its time; that this close relation to human life +insures its welcome ever after as a true representation of human nature; +and that consequently the most remunerative method of studying a +literature is to study the people for whom it was produced. +Illustrations of this were drawn from the Greek, the French, and the +English literatures. This study always throws a flood of light upon the +meaning of the text of an old author, the same light that the reader +unconsciously has upon contemporary pages dealing with the life with +which he is familiar. The reader can test this by taking up his +Shakespeare after a thorough investigation of the customs, manners, and +popular life of the Elizabethan period. Of course the converse is true +that good literature is an open door into the life and mode of thought of +the time and place where it originated. + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + +I hade a vision once--you may all have had a like one--of the stream of +time flowing through a limitless land. Along its banks sprang up in +succession the generations of man. They did not move with the stream- +they lived their lives and sank away; and always below them new +generations appeared, to play their brief parts in what is called +history--the sequence of human actions. The stream flowed on, opening +for itself forever a way through the land. I saw that these successive +dwellers on the stream were busy in constructing and setting afloat +vessels of various size and form and rig--arks, galleys, galleons, +sloops, brigs, boats propelled by oars, by sails, by steam. I saw the +anxiety with which each builder launched his venture, and watched its +performance and progress. The anxiety was to invent and launch something +that should float on to the generations to come, and carry the name of +the builder and the fame of his generation. It was almost pathetic, +these puny efforts, because faith always sprang afresh in the success of +each new venture. Many of the vessels could scarcely be said to be +launched at all; they sank like lead, close to the shore. Others floated +out for a time, and then, struck by a flaw in the wind, heeled over and +disappeared. Some, not well put together, broke into fragments in the +bufleting of the waves. Others danced on the flood, taking the sun on +their sails, and went away with good promise of a long voyage. But only +a few floated for any length of time, and still fewer were ever seen by +the generation succeeding that which launched them. The shores of the +stream were strewn with wrecks; there lay bleaching in the sand the ribs +of many a once gallant craft. + +Innumerable were the devices of the builders to keep their inventions +afloat. Some paid great attention to the form of the hull, others to the +kind of cargo and the loading of it, while others--and these seemed the +majority--trusted more to some new sort of sail, or new fashion of +rudder, or new application of propelling power. And it was wonderful to +see what these new ingenuities did for a time, and how each generation +was deceived into the belief that its products would sail on forever. +But one fate practically came to the most of them. They were too heavy, +they were too light, they were built of old material, and they went to +the bottom, they went ashore, they broke up and floated in fragments. +And especially did the crafts built in imitation of something that had +floated down from a previous generation come to quick disaster. I saw +only here and there a vessel, beaten by weather and blackened by time +--so old, perhaps, that the name of the maker was no longer legible; or +some fragments of antique wood that had evidently come from far up the +stream. When such a vessel appeared there was sure to arise great +dispute about it, and from time to time expeditions were organized to +ascend the river and discover the place and circumstances of its origin. +Along the banks, at intervals, whole fleets of boats and fragments had +gone ashore, and were piled up in bays, like the driftwood of a subsided +freshet. Efforts were made to dislodge these from time to time and set +them afloat again, newly christened, with fresh paint and sails, as if +they stood a better chance of the voyage than any new ones. Indeed, I +saw that a large part of the commerce of this river was, in fact, the old +hulks and stranded wrecks that each generation had set afloat again. +As I saw it in this foolish vision, how pathetic this labor was from +generation to generation; so many vessels launched; so few making a +voyage even for a lifetime; so many builders confident of immortality; so +many lives outlasting this coveted reputation! And still the +generations, each with touching hopefulness, busied themselves with this +child's play on the banks of the stream; and still the river flowed on, +whelming and wrecking the most of that so confidently committed to it, +and bearing only here and there, on its swift, wide tide, a ship, a boat, +a shingle. + +These hosts of men whom I saw thus occupied since history began were +authors; these vessels were books; these heaps of refuse in the bays were +great libraries. The allegory admits of any amount of ingenious +parallelism. It is nevertheless misleading; it is the illusion of an +idle fancy. I have introduced it because it expresses, with some +whimsical exaggeration--not much more than that of "The Vision of Mirza" +--the popular notion about literature and its relation to human life. +In the popular conception, literature is as much a thing apart from life +as these boats on the stream of time were from the existence, the +struggle, the decay of the generations along the shore. I say in the +popular conception, for literature is wholly different from this, not +only in its effect upon individual lives, but upon the procession of +lives upon this earth; it is not only an integral part of all of them, +but, with its sister arts, it is the one unceasing continuity in history. +Literature and art are not only the records and monuments made by the +successive races of men, not only the local expressions of thought and +emotion, but they are, to change the figure, the streams that flow on, +enduring, amid the passing show of men, reviving, transforming, ennobling +the fleeting generations. Without this continuity of thought and +emotion, history would present us only a succession of meaningless +experiments. The experiments fail, the experiments succeed--at any rate, +they end--and what remains for transmission, for the sustenance of +succeeding peoples? Nothing but the thought and emotion evolved and +expressed. It is true that every era, each generation, seems to have its +peculiar work to do; it is to subdue the intractable earth, to repel or +to civilize the barbarians, to settle society in order, to build cities, +to amass wealth in centres, to make deserts bloom, to construct edifices +such as were never made before, to bring all men within speaking distance +of each other--lucky if they have anything to say when that is +accomplished--to extend the information of the few among the many, or to +multiply the means of easy and luxurious living. Age after age the world +labors for these things with the busy absorption of a colony of ants in +its castle of sand. And we must confess that the process, such, for +instance, as that now going on here--this onset of many peoples, which is +transforming the continent of America--is a spectacle to excite the +imagination in the highest degree. If there were any poet capable of +putting into an epic the spirit of this achievement, what an epic would +be his! Can it be that there is anything of more consequence in life +than the great business in hand, which absorbs the vitality and genius of +this age? Surely, we say, it is better to go by steam than to go afoot, +because we reach our destination sooner--getting there quickly being a +supreme object. It is well to force the soil to yield a hundred-fold, +to congregate men in masses so that all their energies shall be taxed to +bring food to themselves, to stimulate industries, drag coal and metal +from the bowels of the earth, cover its surface with rails for swift- +running carriages, to build ever larger palaces, warehouses, ships. +This gigantic achievement strikes the imagination. + +If the world in which you live happens to be the world of books, if your +pursuit is to know what has been done and said in the world, to the end +that your own conception of the value of life may be enlarged, and that +better things may be done and said hereafter, this world and this pursuit +assume supreme importance in your mind. But you can in a moment place +yourself in relations--you have not to go far, perhaps only to speak to +your next neighbor--where the very existence of your world is scarcely +recognized. All that has seemed to you of supreme importance is ignored. +You have entered a world that is called practical, where the things that +we have been speaking of are done; you have interest in it and sympathy +with it, because your scheme of life embraces the development of ideas +into actions; but these men of realities have only the smallest +conception of the world that seems to you of the highest importance; +and, further, they have no idea that they owe anything to it, that it has +ever influenced their lives or can add anything to them. And it may +chance that you have, for the moment, a sense of insignificance in the +small part you are playing in the drama going forward. Go out of your +library, out of the small circle of people who talk of books, who are +engaged in research, whose liveliest interest is in the progress of +ideas, in the expression of thought and emotion that is in literature; +go out of this atmosphere into a region where it does not exist, it may +be into a place given up to commerce and exchange, or to manufacturing, +or to the development of certain other industries, such as mining, or the +pursuit of office--which is sometimes called politics. You will speedily +be aware how completely apart from human life literature is held to be, +how few people regard it seriously as a necessary element in life, +as anything more than an amusement or a vexation. I have in mind a +mountain district, stripped, scarred, and blackened by the ruthless +lumbermen, ravished of its forest wealth; divested of its beauty, which +has recently become the field of vast coal-mining operations. Remote +from communication, it was yesterday an exhausted, wounded, deserted +country. Today audacious railways are entering it, crawling up its +mountain slopes, rounding its dizzy precipices, spanning its valleys on +iron cobwebs, piercing its hills with tunnels. Drifts are opened in its +coal seams, to which iron tracks shoot away from the main line; in the +woods is seen the gleam of the engineer's level, is heard the rattle of +heavily-laden wagons on the newly-made roads; tents are pitched, uncouth +shanties have sprung up, great stables, boarding-houses, stores, +workshops; the miner, the blacksmith, the mason, the carpenter have +arrived; households have been set up in temporary barracks, children are +already there who need a school, women who must have a church and +society; the stagnation has given place to excitement, money has flowed +in, and everywhere are the hum of industry and the swish of the goad of +American life. On this hillside, which in June was covered with oaks, +is already in October a town; the stately trees have been felled; streets +are laid out and graded and named; there are a hundred dwellings, there +are a store, a post-office, an inn; the telegraph has reached it, and the +telephone and the electric light; in a few weeks more it will be in size +a city, with thousands of people--a town made out of hand by drawing men +and women from other towns, civilized men and women, who have voluntarily +put themselves in a position where they must be civilized over again. + +This is a marvelous exhibition of what energy and capital can do. You +acknowledge as much to the creators of it. You remember that not far +back in history such a transformation as this could not have been wrought +in a hundred years. This is really life, this is doing something in the +world, and in the presence of it you can see why the creators of it +regard your world, which seemed to you so important, the world whose +business is the evolution and expression of thought and emotion, as +insignificant. Here is a material addition to the business and wealth of +the race, here employment for men who need it, here is industry replacing +stagnation, here is the pleasure of overcoming difficulties and +conquering obstacles. Why encounter these difficulties? In order that +more coal may be procured to operate more railway trains at higher speed, +to supply more factories, to add to the industrial stir of modern life. +The men who projected and are pushing on this enterprise, with an +executive ability that would maintain and manoeuvre an army in a +campaign, are not, however, consciously philanthropists, moved by the +charitable purpose of giving employment to men, or finding satisfaction +in making two blades of grass grow where one grew before. They enjoy no +doubt the sense of power in bringing things to pass, the feeling of +leadership and the consequence derived from its recognition; but they +embark in this enterprise in order that they may have the position and +the luxury that increased wealth will bring, the object being, in most +cases, simply material advantages--sumptuous houses, furnished with all +the luxuries which are the signs of wealth, including, of course, +libraries and pictures and statuary and curiosities, the most showy +equipages and troops of servants; the object being that their wives shall +dress magnificently, glitter in diamonds and velvets, and never need to +put their feet to the ground; that they may command the best stalls in +the church, the best pews in the theatre, the choicest rooms in the inn, +and--a consideration that Plato does not mention, because his world was +not our world--that they may impress and reduce to obsequious deference +the hotel clerk. + +This life--for this enterprise and its objects are types of a +considerable portion of life--is not without its ideal, its hero, its +highest expression, its consummate flower. It is expressed in a word +which I use without any sense of its personality, as the French use the +word Barnum--for our crude young nation has the distinction of adding a +verb to the French language, the verb to barnum--it is expressed in the +well-known name Croesus. This is a standard--impossible to be reached +perhaps, but a standard. If one may say so, the country is sown with +seeds of Croesus, and the crop is forward and promising. The interest +to us now in the observation of this phase of modern life is not in the +least for purposes of satire or of reform. We are inquiring how wholly +this conception of life is divorced from the desire to learn what has +been done and said to the end that better things may be done and said +hereafter, in order that we may understand the popular conception of the +insignificant value of literature in human affairs. But it is not aside +from our subject, rather right in its path, to take heed of what the +philosophers say of the effect in other respects of the pursuit of +wealth. + +One cause of the decay of the power of defense in a state, says the +Athenian Stranger in Plato's Laws--one cause is the love of wealth, which +wholly absorbs men and never for a moment allows them to think of +anything but their private possessions; on this the soul of every citizen +hangs suspended, and can attend to nothing but his daily gain; mankind +are ready to learn any branch of knowledge and to follow any pursuit +which tends to this end, and they laugh at any other; that is the reason +why a city will not be in earnest about war or any other good and +honorable pursuit. + +The accumulation of gold in the treasury of private individuals, says +Socrates, in the Republic, is the ruin of democracy. They invent illegal +modes of expenditure; and what do they or their wives care about the law? + +"And then one, seeing another's display, proposes to rival him, and thus +the whole body of citizens acquires a similar character. + +"After that they get on in a trade, and the more they think of making a +fortune, the less they think of virtue; for when riches and virtue are +placed together in the balance, the one always rises as the other falls. + +"And in proportion as riches and rich men are honored in the state, +virtue and the virtuous are dishonored. + +"And what is honored is cultivated, and that which has no honor is +neglected. + +"And so at last, instead of loving contention and glory, men become +lovers of trade and money, and they honor and reverence the rich man and +make a ruler of him, and dishonor the poor man. + +"They do so." + +The object of a reasonable statesman (it is Plato who is really speaking +in the Laws) is not that the state should be as great and rich as +possible, should possess gold and silver, and have the greatest empire by +sea and land. + +The citizen must, indeed, be happy and good, and the legislator will seek +to make him so; but very rich and very good at the same time he cannot +be; not at least in the sense in which many speak of riches. For they +describe by the term "rich" the few who have the most valuable +possessions, though the owner of them be a rogue. And if this is true, +I can never assent to the doctrine that the rich man will be happy: he +must be good as well as rich. And good in a high degree and rich in a +high degree at the same time he cannot be. Some one will ask, Why not? +And we shall answer, Because acquisitions which come from sources which +are just and unjust indifferently are more than double those which come +from just sources only; and the sums which are expended neither honorably +nor disgracefully are only half as great as those which are expended +honorably and on honorable purposes. Thus if one acquires double and +spends half, the other, who is in the opposite case and is a good man, +cannot possibly be wealthier than he. The first (I am speaking of the +saver, and not of the spender) is not always bad; he may indeed in some +cases be utterly bad, but as I was saying, a good man he never is. +For he who receives money unjustly as well as justly, and spends neither +justly nor unjustly, will be a rich man if he be also thrifty. On the +other hand, the utterly bad man is generally profligate, and therefore +poor; while he who spends on noble objects, and acquires wealth by just +means only, can hardly be remarkable for riches any more than he can be +very poor. The argument, then, is right in declaring that the very rich +are not good, and if they are not good they are not happy. + +And the conclusion of Plato is that we ought not to pursue any occupation +to the neglect of that for which riches exist--"I mean," he says, "soul +and body, which without gymnastics and without education will never be +worth anything; and therefore, as we have said not once but many times, +the care of riches should have the last place in our thoughts." + +Men cannot be happy unless they are good, and they cannot be good unless +the care of the soul occupies the first place in their thoughts. That is +the first interest of man; the interest in the body is midway; and last +of all, when rightly regarded, is the interest about money. + +The majority of mankind reverses this order of interests, and therefore +it sets literature to one side as of no practical account in human life. +More than this, it not only drops it out of mind, but it has no +conception of its influence and power in the very affairs from which it +seems to be excluded. It is my purpose to show not only the close +relation of literature to ordinary life, but its eminent position in +life, and its saving power in lives which do not suspect its influence +or value. Just as it is virtue that saves the state, if it be saved, +although the majority do not recognize it and attribute the salvation of +the state to energy, and to obedience to the laws of political economy, +and to discoveries in science, and to financial contrivances; so it is +that in the life of generations of men, considered from an ethical and +not from a religious point of view, the most potent and lasting influence +for a civilization that is worth anything, a civilization that does not +by its own nature work its decay, is that which I call literature. It is +time to define what we mean by literature. We may arrive at the meaning +by the definition of exclusion. We do not mean all books, but some +books; not all that is written and published, but only a small part of +it. We do not mean books of law, of theology, of politics, of science, +of medicine, and not necessarily books of travel, or adventure, or +biography, or fiction even. These may all be ephemeral in their nature. +The term belles-lettres does not fully express it, for it is too narrow. +In books of law, theology, politics, medicine, science, travel, +adventure, biography, philosophy, and fiction there may be passages that +possess, or the whole contents may possess, that quality which comes +within our meaning of literature. It must have in it something of the +enduring and the universal. When we use the term art, we do not mean the +arts; we are indicating a quality that may be in any of the arts. In art +and literature we require not only an expression of the facts in nature +and in human life, but of feeling, thought, emotion. There must be an +appeal to the universal in the race. It is, for example, impossible for +a Christian today to understand what the religious system of the +Egyptians of three thousand years ago was to the Egyptian mind, or to +grasp the idea conveyed to a Chinaman's thought in the phrase, "the +worship of the principle of heaven"; but the Christian of today +comprehends perfectly the letters of an Egyptian scribe in the time of +Thotmes III., who described the comical miseries of his campaign with as +clear an appeal to universal human nature as Horace used in his 'Iter +Brundusium;' and the maxims of Confucius are as comprehensible as the +bitter-sweetness of Thomas a Kempis. De Quincey distinguishes between +the literature of knowledge and the literature of power. The definition +is not exact; but we may say that the one is a statement of what is +known, the other is an emanation from the man himself; or that one may +add to the sum of human knowledge, and the other addresses itself to a +higher want in human nature than the want of knowledge. We select and +set aside as literature that which is original, the product of what we +call genius. As I have said, the subject of a production does not always +determine the desired quality which makes it literature. A biography may +contain all the facts in regard to a man and his character, arranged in +an orderly and comprehensible manner, and yet not be literature; but it +may be so written, like Plutarch's Lives or Defoe's account of Robinson +Crusoe, that it is literature, and of imperishable value as a picture of +human life, as a satisfaction to the want of the human mind which is +higher than the want of knowledge. And this contribution, which I desire +to be understood to mean when I speak of literature, is precisely the +thing of most value in the lives of the majority of men, whether they are +aware of it or not. It may be weighty and profound; it may be light, as +light as the fall of a leaf or a bird's song on the shore; it may be the +thought of Plato when he discourses of the character necessary in a +perfect state, or of Socrates, who, out of the theorem of an absolute +beauty, goodness, greatness, and the like, deduces the immortality of the +soul; or it may be the lovesong of a Scotch plowman: but it has this one +quality of answering to a need in human nature higher than a need for +facts, for knowledge, for wealth. + +In noticing the remoteness in the popular conception of the relation of +literature to life, we must not neglect to take into account what may be +called the arrogance of culture, an arrogance that has been emphasized, +in these days of reaction from the old attitude of literary +obsequiousness, by harsh distinctions and hard words, which are paid back +by equally emphasized contempt. The apostles of light regard the rest of +mankind as barbarians and Philistines, and the world retorts that these +self-constituted apostles are idle word-mongers, without any sympathy +with humanity, critics and jeerers who do nothing to make the conditions +of life easier. It is natural that every man should magnify the circle +of the world in which he is active and imagine that all outside of it is +comparatively unimportant. Everybody who is not a drone has his +sufficient world. To the lawyer it is his cases and the body of law, +it is the legal relation of men that is of supreme importance; to the +merchant and manufacturer all the world consists in buying and selling, +in the production and exchange of products; to the physician all the +world is diseased and in need of remedies; to the clergyman speculation +and the discussion of dogmas and historical theology assume immense +importance; the politician has his world, the artist his also, and the +man of books and letters a realm still apart from all others. And to +each of these persons what is outside of his world seems of secondary +importance; he is absorbed in his own, which seems to him all-embracing. +To the lawyer everybody is or ought to be a litigant; to the grocer the +world is that which eats, and pays--with more or less regularity; to the +scholar the world is in books and ideas. One realizes how possessed he +is with his own little world only when by chance he changes his +profession or occupation and looks back upon the law, or politics, or +journalism, and sees in its true proportion what it was that once +absorbed him and seemed to him so large. When Socrates discusses with +Gorgias the value of rhetoric, the use of which, the latter asserts, +relates to the greatest and best of human things, Socrates says: I dare +say you have heard men singing--at feasts the old drinking-song, in which +the singers enumerate the goods of life-first, health; beauty next; +thirdly, wealth honestly acquired. The producers of these things--the +physician, the trainer, the money-maker--each in turn contends that his +art produces the greatest good. Surely, says the physician, health is +the greatest good; there is more good in my art, says the trainer, for my +business is to make men beautiful and strong in body; and consider, says +the money-maker, whether any one can produce a greater good than wealth. +But, insists Gorgias, the greatest good of men, of which I am the +creator, is that which gives men freedom in their persons, and the power +of ruling over others in their several states--that is, the word which +persuades the judge in the court, or the senators in the council, or the +citizens in the assembly: if you have the power of uttering this word, +you will have the physician your slave, and the trainer your slave, and +the moneymaker of whom you talk will be found to gather treasures, not +for himself, but for those who are able to speak and persuade the +multitude. + +What we call life is divided into occupations and interest, and the +horizons of mankind are bounded by them. It happens naturally enough, +therefore, that there should be a want of sympathy in regard to these +pursuits among men, the politician despising the scholar, and the scholar +looking down upon the politician, and the man of affairs, the man of +industries, not caring to conceal his contempt for both the others. +And still more reasonable does the division appear between all the world +which is devoted to material life, and the few who live in and for the +expression of thought and emotion. It is a pity that this should be so, +for it can be shown that life would not be worth living divorced from the +gracious and ennobling influence of literature, and that literature +suffers atrophy when it does not concern itself with the facts and +feelings of men. + +If the poet lives in a world apart from the vulgar, the most lenient +apprehension of him is that his is a sort of fool's paradise. One of the +most curious features in the relation of literature to life is this, that +while poetry, the production of the poet, is as necessary to universal +man as the atmosphere, and as acceptable, the poet is regarded with that +mingling of compassion and undervaluation, and perhaps awe, which once +attached to the weak-minded and insane, and which is sometimes expressed +by the term "inspired idiot." However the poet may have been petted and +crowned, however his name may have been diffused among peoples, I doubt +not that the popular estimate of him has always been substantially what +it is today. And we all know that it is true, true in our individual +consciousness, that if a man be known as a poet and nothing else, if his +character is sustained by no other achievement than the production of +poetry, he suffers in our opinion a loss of respect. And this is only +recovered for him after he is dead, and his poetry is left alone to speak +for his name. However fond my lord and lady were of the ballad, the +place of the minstrel was at the lower end of the hall. If we are pushed +to say why this is, why this happens to the poet and not to the producers +of anything else that excites the admiration of mankind, we are forced to +admit that there is something in the poet to sustain the popular judgment +of his in utility. In all the occupations and professions of life there +is a sign put up, invisible--but none the less real, and expressing an +almost universal feeling--"No poet need apply." And this is not because +there are so many poor poets; for there are poor lawyers, poor soldiers, +poor statesmen, incompetent business men; but none of the personal +disparagement attaches to them that is affixed to the poet. This popular +estimate of the poet extends also, possibly in less degree, to all the +producers of the literature that does not concern itself with knowledge. +It is not our care to inquire further why this is so, but to repeat that +it is strange that it should be so when poetry is, and has been at all +times, the universal solace of all peoples who have emerged out of +barbarism, the one thing not supernatural and yet akin to the +supernatural, that makes the world, in its hard and sordid conditions, +tolerable to the race. For poetry is not merely the comfort of the +refined and the delight of the educated; it is the alleviator of poverty, +the pleasure-ground of the ignorant, the bright spot in the most dreary +pilgrimage. We cannot conceive the abject animal condition of our race +were poetry abstracted; and we do not wonder that this should be so when +we reflect that it supplies a want higher than the need for food, for +raiment, or ease of living, and that the mind needs support as much as +the body. The majority of mankind live largely in the imagination, the +office or use of which is to lift them in spirit out of the bare physical +conditions in which the majority exist. There are races, which we may +call the poetical races, in which this is strikingly exemplified. It +would be difficult to find poverty more complete, physical wants less +gratified, the conditions of life more bare than among the Oriental +peoples from the Nile to the Ganges and from the Indian Ocean to the +steppes of Siberia. But there are perhaps none among the more favored +races who live so much in the world of imagination fed by poetry and +romance. Watch the throng seated about an Arab or Indian or Persian +story-teller and poet, men and women with all the marks of want, hungry, +almost naked, without any prospect in life of ever bettering their sordid +condition; see their eyes kindle, their breathing suspended, their tense +absorption; see their tears, hear their laughter, note their excitement +as the magician unfolds to them a realm of the imagination in which they +are free for the hour to wander, tasting a keen and deep enjoyment that +all the wealth of Croesus cannot purchase for his disciples. Measure, +if you can, what poetry is to them, what their lives would be without it. +To the millions and millions of men who are in this condition, the bard, +the story-teller, the creator of what we are considering as literature, +comes with the one thing that can lift them out of poverty, suffering-- +all the woe of which nature is so heedless. + +It is not alone of the poetical nations of the East that this is true, +nor is this desire for the higher enjoyment always wanting in the savage +tribes of the West. When the Jesuit Fathers in 1768 landed upon the +almost untouched and unexplored southern Pacific coast, they found in the +San Gabriel Valley in Lower California that the Indians had games and +feasts at which they decked themselves in flower garlands that reached to +their feet, and that at these games there were song contests which +sometimes lasted for three days. This contest of the poets was an old +custom with them. And we remember how the ignorant Icelanders, who had +never seen a written character, created the splendid Saga, and handed it +down from father to son. We shall scarcely find in Europe a peasantry +whose abject poverty is not in some measure alleviated by this power +which literature gives them to live outside it. Through our sacred +Scriptures, through the ancient storytellers, through the tradition which +in literature made, as I said, the chief continuity in the stream of +time, we all live a considerable, perhaps the better, portion of our +lives in the Orient. But I am not sure that the Scotch peasant, the +crofter in his Highland cabin, the operative in his squalid tenement- +house, in the hopelessness of poverty, in the grime of a life made twice +as hard as that of the Arab by an inimical climate, does not owe more to +literature than the man of culture, whose material surroundings are +heaven in the imagination of the poor. Think what his wretched life +would be, in its naked deformity, without the popular ballads, without +the romances of Scott, which have invested his land for him, as for us, +with enduring charm; and especially without the songs of Burns, which +keep alive in him the feeling that he is a man, which impart to his +blunted sensibility the delicious throb of spring-songs that enable him +to hear the birds, to see the bits of blue sky-songs that make him tender +of the wee bit daisy at his feet--songs that hearten him when his heart +is fit to break with misery. Perhaps the English peasant, the English +operative, is less susceptible to such influences than the Scotch or the +Irish; but over him, sordid as his conditions are, close kin as he is to +the clod, the light of poetry is diffused; there filters into his life, +also, something of that divine stream of which we have spoken, a dialect +poem that touches him, the leaf of a psalm, some bit of imagination, +some tale of pathos, set afloat by a poor writer so long ago that it has +become the common stock of human tradition-maybe from Palestine, maybe +from the Ganges, perhaps from Athens--some expression of real emotion, +some creation, we say, that makes for him a world, vague and dimly +apprehended, that is not at all the actual world in which he sins and +suffers. The poor woman, in a hut with an earth floor, a reeking roof, a +smoky chimney, barren of comfort, so indecent that a gentleman would not +stable his horse in it, sits and sews upon a coarse garment, while she +rocks the cradle of an infant about whom she cherishes no illusions that +his lot will be other than that of his father before him. As she sits +forlorn, it is not the wretched hovel that she sees, nor other hovels +like it--rows of tenements of hopeless poverty, the ale-house, the gin- +shop, the coal-pit, and the choking factory--but: + + "Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood + Stand dressed in living green" + +for her, thanks to the poet. But, alas for the poet there is not a +peasant nor a wretched operative of them all who will not shake his head +and tap his forehead with his forefinger when the poor poet chap passes +by. The peasant has the same opinion of him that the physician, the +trainer, and the money-lender had of the rhetorician. + +The hard conditions of the lonely New England life, with its religious +theories as sombre as its forests, its rigid notions of duty as difficult +to make bloom into sweetness and beauty as the stony soil, would have +been unendurable if they had not been touched with the ideal created by +the poet. There was in creed and purpose the virility that creates a +state, and, as Menander says, the country which is cultivated with +difficulty produces brave men; but we leave out an important element in +the lives of the Pilgrims if we overlook the means they had of living +above their barren circumstances. I do not speak only of the culture +which many of them brought from the universities, of the Greek and Roman +classics, and what unworldly literature they could glean from the +productive age of Elizabeth and James, but of another source, more +universally resorted to, and more powerful in exciting imagination and +emotion, and filling the want in human nature of which we have spoken. +They had the Bible, and it was more to them, much more, than a book of +religion, than a revelation of religious truth, a rule for the conduct of +life, or a guide to heaven. It supplied the place to them of the +Mahabharata to the Hindoo, of the story-teller to the Arab. It opened to +them a boundless realm of poetry and imagination. + +What is the Bible? It might have sufficed, accepted as a book of +revelation, for all the purposes of moral guidance, spiritual +consolation, and systematized authority, if it had been a collection of +precepts, a dry code of morals, an arsenal of judgments, and a treasury +of promises. We are accustomed to think of the Pilgrims as training +their intellectual faculties in the knottiest problems of human +responsibility and destiny, toughening their mental fibre in wrestling +with dogmas and the decrees of Providence, forgetting what else they drew +out of the Bible: what else it was to them in a degree it has been to few +peoples many age. For the Bible is the unequaled record of thought and +emotion, the reservoir of poetry, traditions, stories, parables, +exaltations, consolations, great imaginative adventure, for which the +spirit of man is always longing. It might have been, in warning examples +and commands, all-sufficient to enable men to make a decent pilgrimage on +earth and reach a better country; but it would have been a very different +book to mankind if it had been only a volume of statutes, and if it +lacked its wonderful literary quality. It might have enabled men to +reach a better country, but not, while on earth, to rise into and live in +that better country, or to live in a region above the sordidness of +actual life. For, apart from its religious intention and sacred +character, the book is so written that it has supremely in its history, +poetry, prophecies, promises, stories, that clear literary quality that +supplies, as certainly no other single book does, the want in the human +mind which is higher than the want of facts or knowledge. + +The Bible is the best illustration of the literature of power, for it +always concerns itself with life, it touches it at all points. And this +is the test of any piece of literature--its universal appeal to human +nature. When I consider the narrow limitations of the Pilgrim +households, the absence of luxury, the presence of danger and hardship, +the harsh laws--only less severe than the contemporary laws of England +and Virginia--the weary drudgery, the few pleasures, the curb upon the +expression of emotion and of tenderness, the ascetic repression of +worldly thought, the absence of poetry in the routine occupations and +conditions, I can feel what the Bible must have been to them. It was an +open door into a world where emotion is expressed, where imagination can +range, where love and longing find a language, where imagery is given to +every noble and suppressed passion of the soul, where every aspiration +finds wings. It was history, or, as Thucydides said, philosophy teaching +by example; it was the romance of real life; it was entertainment +unfailing; the wonder-book of childhood, the volume of sweet sentiment to +the shy maiden, the sword to the soldier, the inciter of the youth to +heroic enduring of hardness, it was the refuge of the aged in failing +activity. Perhaps we can nowhere find a better illustration of the true +relation of literature to life than in this example. + +Let us consider the comparative value of literature to mankind. +By comparative value I mean its worth to men in comparison with other +things of acknowledged importance, such as the creation of industries, +the government of States, the manipulation of the politics of an age, +the achievements in war and discovery, and the lives of admirable men. +It needs a certain perspective to judge of this aright, for the near and +the immediate always assume importance. The work that an age has on +hand, whether it be discovery, conquest, the wars that determine +boundaries or are fought for policies, the industries that develop a +country or affect the character of a people, the wielding of power, the +accumulation of fortunes, the various activities of any given +civilization or period, assume such enormous proportions to those engaged +in them that such a modest thing as the literary product seems +insignificant in comparison; and hence it is that the man of action +always holds in slight esteem the man of thought, and especially the +expresser of feeling and emotion, the poet and the humorist. It is only +when we look back over the ages, when civilizations have passed or +changed, over the rivalries of States, the ambitions and enmities of men, +the shining deeds and the base deeds that make up history, that we are +enabled to see what remains, what is permanent. Perhaps the chief result +left to the world out of a period of heroic exertion, of passion and +struggle and accumulation, is a sheaf of poems, or the record by a man of +letters of some admirable character. Spain filled a large place in the +world in the sixteenth century, and its influence upon history is by no +means spent yet; but we have inherited out of that period nothing, I dare +say, that is of more value than the romance of Don Quixote. It is true +that the best heritage of generation from generation is the character of +great men; but we always owe its transmission to the poet and the writer. +Without Plato there would be no Socrates. There is no influence +comparable in human life to the personality of a powerful man, so long as +he is present to his generation, or lives in the memory of those who felt +his influence. But after time has passed, will the world, will human +life, that is essentially the same in all changing conditions, be more +affected by what Bismarck did or by what Goethe said? + +We may without impropriety take for an illustration of the comparative +value of literature to human needs the career of a man now living. In +the opinion of many, Mr. Gladstone is the greatest Englishman of this +age. What would be the position of the British empire, what would be the +tendency of English politics and society without him, is a matter for +speculation. He has not played such a role for England and its neighbors +as Bismarck has played for Germany and the Continent, but he has been one +of the most powerful influences in molding English action. He is the +foremost teacher. Rarely in history has a nation depended more upon a +single man, at times, than the English upon Gladstone, upon his will, his +ability, and especially his character. In certain recent crises the +thought of losing him produced something like a panic in the English +mind, justifying in regard to him, the hyperbole of Choate upon the death +of Webster, that the sailor on the distant sea would feel less safe-- +as if a protecting providence had been withdrawn from the world. His +mastery of finance and of economic problems, his skill in debate, his +marvelous achievements in oratory, have extorted the admiration of his +enemies. There is scarcely a province in government, letters, art, or +research in which the mind can win triumphs that he has not invaded and +displayed his power in; scarcely a question in politics, reform, letters, +religion, archaeology, sociology, which he has not discussed with +ability. He is a scholar, critic, parliamentarian, orator, voluminous +writer. He seems equally at home in every field of human activity--a man +of prodigious capacity and enormous acquirements. He can take up, with a +turn of the hand, and always with vigor, the cause of the Greeks, Papal +power, education, theology, the influence of Egypt on Homer, the effect +of English legislation on King O'Brien, contributing something noteworthy +to all the discussions of the day. But I am not aware that he has ever +produced a single page of literature. Whatever space he has filled in +his own country, whatever and however enduring the impression he has made +upon English life and society, does it seem likely that the sum total of +his immense activity in so many fields, after the passage of so many +years, will be worth to the world as much as the simple story of Rab and +his Friends? Already in America I doubt if it is. The illustration +might have more weight with some minds if I contrasted the work of this +great man--as to its answering to a deep want in human nature--with a +novel like 'Henry Esmond' or a poem like 'In Memoriam'; but I think it is +sufficient to rest it upon so slight a performance as the sketch by +Dr. John Brown, of Edinburgh. For the truth is that a little page of +literature, nothing more than a sheet of paper with a poem written on it, +may have that vitality, that enduring quality, that adaptation to life, +that make it of more consequence to all who inherit it than every +material achievement of the age that produced it. It was nothing but a +sheet of paper with a poem on it, carried to the door of his London +patron, for which the poet received a guinea, and perhaps a seat at the +foot of my lord's table. What was that scrap compared to my lord's +business, his great establishment, his equipages in the Park, his +position in society, his weight in the House of Lords, his influence in +Europe? And yet that scrap of paper has gone the world over; it has been +sung in the camp, wept over in the lonely cottage; it has gone with the +marching regiments, with the explorers--with mankind, in short, on its +way down the ages, brightening, consoling, elevating life; and my lord, +who regarded as scarcely above a menial the poet to whom he tossed the +guinea--my lord, with all his pageantry and power, has utterly gone and +left no witness. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Relation of Literature to Life, by Warner + diff --git a/old/cwlal10.zip b/old/cwlal10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2fdd9df --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwlal10.zip diff --git a/old/cwlal11.txt b/old/cwlal11.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6914f11 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwlal11.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2052 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Relation of Literature to Life by Warner +#21 in our series by Charles Dudley Warner + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the laws for your country before redistributing these files!!!!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. + +Please do not remove this. + +This should be the first thing seen when anyone opens the book. +Do not change or edit it without written permission. 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Hart +and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.] +[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales +of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or +software or any other related product without express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.10/04/01*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + +By Charles Dudley Warner + + + +CONTENTS: + +BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH BY THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY. +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH + +The county of Franklin in Northwestern Massachusetts, if not rivaling in +certain ways the adjoining Berkshire, has still a romantic beauty of its +own. In the former half of the nineteenth century its population was +largely given up to the pursuit of agriculture, though not under +altogether favorable conditions. Manufactures had not yet invaded the +region either to add to its wealth or to defile its streams. The +villages were small, the roads pretty generally wretched save in summer, +and from many of the fields the most abundant crop that could be gathered +was that of stones. + +The character of the people conformed in many ways to that of the soil. +The houses which lined the opposite sides of the single street, of which +the petty places largely consisted, as well as the dwellings which dotted +the country, were the homes of men who possessed in fullness many of the +features, good and bad, that characterized the Puritan stock to which +they belonged. There was a good deal of religion in these rural +communities and occasionally some culture. Still, as a rule, it must be +confessed, there would be found in them much more of plain living than of +high thinking. Broad thinking could hardly be said to exist at all. +By the dwellers in that region Easter had scarcely even been heard of; +Christmas was tolerated after a fashion, but was nevertheless looked upon +with a good deal of suspicion as a Popish invention. In the beliefs of +these men several sins not mentioned in the decalogue took really, if +unconsciously, precedence of those which chanced to be found in that +list. Dancing was distinctly immoral; card-playing led directly to +gambling with all its attendant evils; theatre-going characterized the +conduct of the more disreputable denizens of great cities. Fiction was +not absolutely forbidden; but the most lenient regarded it as a great +waste of time, and the boy who desired its solace on any large scale was +under the frequent necessity of seeking the seclusion of the haymow. + +But however rigid and stern the beliefs of men might be, nature was there +always charming, not only in her summer beauty, but even in her wildest +winter moods. Narrow, too, as might be the views of the members of these +communities about the conduct of life, there was ever before the minds of +the best of them an ideal of devotion to duty, an earnest all-pervading +moral purpose which implanted the feeling that neither personal success +nor pleasure of any sort could ever afford even remotely compensation for +the neglect of the least obligation which their situation imposed. +It was no misfortune for any one, who was later to be transported to a +broader horizon and more genial air, to have struck the roots of his +being in a soil where men felt the full sense of moral responsibility for +everything said or done, and where the conscience was almost as sensitive +to the suggestion of sin as to its actual accomplishment. + +It was amidst such surroundings that Charles Dudley Warner was born on +the 12th of September, 1829. His birthplace was the hill town of +Plainfield, over two thousand feet above the level of the sea. +His father, a farmer, was a man of cultivation, though not college-bred. +He died when his eldest son had reached the age of five, leaving to his +widow the care of two children. Three years longer the family continued +to remain on the farm. But however delightful the scenery of the country +might be, its aesthetic attractions did not sufficiently counterbalance +its agricultural disadvantages. Furthermore, while the summers were +beautiful on this high table land, the winters were long and dreary in +the enforced solitude of a thinly settled region. In consequence, the +farm was sold after the death of the grandfather, and the home broken up. +The mother with her two children, went to the neighboring village of +Charlemont on the banks of the Deerfield. There the elder son took up +his residence with his guardian and relative, a man of position and +influence in the community, who was the owner of a large farm. With him +he stayed until he was twelve years old, enjoying all the pleasures and +doing all the miscellaneous jobs of the kind which fall to the lot of a +boy brought up in an agricultural community. + +The story of this particular period of his life was given by Warner in a +work which was published about forty years later. It is the volume +entitled "Being a Boy." Nowhere has there been drawn a truer or more +vivid picture of rural New England. Nowhere else can there be found such +a portrayal of the sights and sounds, the pains and pleasures of life on +a farm as seen from the point of view of a boy. Here we have them all +graphically represented: the daily "chores" that must be looked after; +the driving of cows to and from the pasture; the clearing up of fields +where vegetation struggled with difficulty against the prevailing stones; +the climbing of lofty trees and the swaying back and forth in the wind on +their topmost boughs; the hunting of woodchucks; the nutting excursions +of November days, culminating in the glories of Thanksgiving; the romance +of school life, over which vacations, far from being welcomed with +delight, cast a gloom as involving extra work; the cold days of winter +with its deep or drifting snows, the mercury of the thermometer clinging +with fondness to zero, even when the sun was shining brilliantly; the +long chilling nights in which the frost carved fantastic structures on +the window-panes; the eager watching for the time when the sap would +begin to run in the sugar-maples; the evenings given up to reading, with +the inevitable inward discontent at being sent to bed too early; the +longing for the mild days of spring to come, when the heavy cowhide boots +could be discarded, and the boy could rejoice at last in the covering for +his feet which the Lord had provided. These and scores of similar +descriptions fill up the picture of the life furnished here. It was +nature's own school wherein was to be gained the fullest intimacy with +her spirit. While there was much which she could not teach, there was +also much which she alone could teach. From his communion with her the +boy learned lessons which the streets of crowded cities could never have +imparted. + +At the age of twelve this portion of his education came to an end. +The family then moved to Cazenovia in Madison county in Central New York, +from which place Warner's mother had come, and where her immediate +relatives then resided. Until he went to college this was his home. +There he attended a preparatory school under the direction of the +Methodist Episcopal Church, which was styled the Oneida Conference +Seminary. It was at this institution that he fitted mainly for college; +for to college it had been his father's dying wish that he should go, +and the boy himself did not need the spur of this parting injunction. +A college near his home was the excellent one of Hamilton in the not +distant town of Clinton in the adjoining county of Oneida. Thither he +repaired in 1848, and as he had made the best use of his advantages, he +was enabled to enter the sophomore class. He was graduated in 1851. + +But while fond of study he had all these years been doing something +besides studying. The means of the family were limited, and to secure +the education he desired, not only was it necessary to husband the +resources he possessed, but to increase them in every possible way. +Warner had all the American boy's willingness to undertake any occupation +not in itself discreditable. Hence to him fell a full share of those +experiences which have diversified the early years of so many men who +have achieved success. He set up type in a printing office; he acted as +an assistant in a bookstore; he served as clerk in a post-office. He was +thus early brought into direct contact with persons of all classes and +conditions of life. + +The experience gave to his keenly observant mind an insight into the +nature of men which was to be of special service to him in later years. +Further, it imparted to him a familiarity with their opinions and hopes +and aspirations which enabled him to understand and sympathize with +feelings in which he did not always share. + +During the years which immediately followed his departure from college, +Warner led the somewhat desultory and apparently aimless life of many +American graduates whose future depends upon their own exertions and +whose choice of a career is mainly determined by circumstances. From the +very earliest period of his life he had been fond of reading. It was an +inherited taste. The few books he found in his childhood's home would +have been almost swept out of sight in the torrent, largely of trash, +which pours now in a steady stream into the humblest household. But the +books, though few, were of a high quality; and because they were few they +were read much, and their contents became an integral part of his +intellectual equipment. Furthermore, these works of the great masters, +with which he became familiar, set for him a standard by which to test +the value of whatever he read, and saved him even in his earliest years +from having his taste impaired and his judgment misled by the vogue of +meretricious productions which every now and then gain popularity for the +time. They gave him also a distinct bent towards making literature his +profession. But literature, however pleasant and occasionally profitable +as an avocation, was not to be thought of as a vocation. Few there are +at any period who have succeeded in finding it a substantial and +permanent support; at that time and in this country such a prospect was +practically hopeless for any one. It is no matter of surprise, +therefore, that Warner, though often deviating from the direct path, +steadily gravitated toward the profession of law. + +Still, even in those early days his natural inclination manifested +itself. The Knickerbocker Magazine was then the chosen organ to which +all young literary aspirants sent their productions. To it even in his +college days Warner contributed to some extent, though it would doubtless +be possible now to gather out of this collection but few pieces which, +lacking his own identification, could be assigned to him positively. +At a later period he contributed articles to Putnam's Magazine, which +began its existence in 1853. Warner himself at one time, in that period +of struggle and uncertainty, expected to become an editor of a monthly +which was to be started in Detroit. But before the magazine was actually +set on foot the inability of the person who projected it to supply the +necessary means for carrying it on prevented the failure which would +inevitably have befallen a venture of that sort, undertaken at that time +and in that place. Yet he showed in a way the native bent of his mind by +bringing out two years after his graduation from college a volume of +selections from English and American authors entitled "The Book of +Eloquence." This work a publisher many years afterward took advantage of +his later reputation to reprint. + +This unsettled period of his life lasted for several years. He was +resident for a while in various places. Part of the time he seems to +have been in Cazenovia; part of the time in New York; part of the time in +the West. One thing in particular there was which stood in the way of +fixing definitely his choice of a profession. This was the precarious +state of his health, far poorer then than it was in subsequent years. +Warner, however, was never at any period of his life what is called +robust. It was his exceeding temperance in all things which enabled him +to venture upon the assumption and succeed in the accomplishment of tasks +which men, physically far stronger than he, would have shrunk from under- +taking, even had they been possessed of the same abilities. But his +condition, part of that time, was such that it led him to take a course +of treatment at the sanatorium in Clifton Springs. It became apparent, +however, that life in the open air, for a while at least, was the one +thing essential. Under the pressure of this necessity he secured a +position as one of an engineering party engaged in the survey of a +railway in Missouri. In that occupation he spent a large part of 1853 +and 1854. He came back from this expedition restored to health. With +that result accomplished, the duty of settling definitely upon what he +was to do became more urgent. Among other things he did, while living +for a while with his uncle in Binghamton, N. Y., he studied law in the +office of Daniel S. Dickinson. + +In the Christmas season of 1854 he went with a friend on a visit to +Philadelphia and stayed at the house of Philip M. Price, a prominent +citizen of that place who was engaged, among other things, in the +conveyancing of real estate. It will not be surprising to any one who +knew the charm of his society in later life to be told that he became at +once a favorite with the older man. The latter was advanced in years, +he was anxious to retire from active business. Acting under his advice, +Warner was induced to come to Philadelphia in 1855 and join him, and to +form subsequently a partnership in legal conveyancing with another young +man who had been employed in Mr. Price's office. Thus came into being +the firm of Barton and Warner. Their headquarters were first in Spring +Garden Street and later in Walnut Street. The future soon became +sufficiently assured to justify Warner in marriage, and in October, 1856, +he was wedded to Susan Lee, daughter of William Elliott Lee of New York +City. + +But though in a business allied to the law, Warner was not yet a lawyer. +His occupation indeed was only in his eyes a temporary makeshift while he +was preparing himself for what was to be his real work in life. +Therefore, while supporting himself by carrying on the business of +conveyancing, he attended the courses of study at the law department of +the University of Pennsylvania, during the academic years of 1856-57 and +1857-58. From that institution he received the degree of bachelor of law +in 1858--often misstated 1856--and was ready to begin the practice of +his, profession. + +In those days every young man of ability and ambition was counseled to go +West and grow up with the country, and was not unfrequently disposed to +take that course of his own accord. Warner felt the general impulse. +He had contemplated entering, in fact had pretty definitely made up his +mind to enter, into a law partnership with a friend in one of the smaller +places in that region. But on a tour, somewhat of exploration, he +stopped at Chicago. There he met another friend, and after talking over +the situation with him he decided to take up his residence in that city. +So in 1858 the law-firm of Davenport and Warner came into being. +It lasted until 1860. It was not exactly a favorable time for young men +to enter upon the practice of this profession. The country was just +beginning to recover from the depression which had followed the +disastrous panic of 1857; but confidence was as yet far from being +restored. The new firm did a fairly good business; but while there was +sufficient work to do, there was but little money to pay for it. Still +Warner would doubtless have continued in the profession had he not +received an offer, the acceptance of which determined his future and +changed entirely his career. + +Hawley, now United States Senator from Connecticut, was Warner's senior +by a few years. He had preceded him as a student at the Oneida +Conference Seminary and at Hamilton College. Practicing law in Hartford, +he had started in 1857, in conjunction with other leading citizens, a +paper called the Evening Press. It was devoted to the advocacy of the +principles of the Republican party, which was at that time still in what +may be called the formative state of its existence. This was a period in +which for some years the dissolution had been going on of the two old +parties which had divided the country. Men were changing sides and were +aligning themselves anew according to their views on questions which were +every day assuming greater prominence in the minds of all. There was +really but one great subject talked about or thought about. It split +into opposing sections the whole land over which was lowering the grim, +though as yet unrecognizable, shadow of civil war. The Republican party +had been in existence but a very few years, but in that short time it had +attracted to its ranks the young and enthusiastic spirits of the North, +just as to the other side were impelled the members of the same class in +the South. The intellectual contest which preceded the physical was +stirring the hearts of all men. Hawley, who was well aware of Warner's +peculiar ability, was anxious to secure his co-operation and assistance. +He urged him to come East and join him in the conduct of the new +enterprise he had undertaken. + +Warner always considered that he derived great benefit from his +comparatively limited study and practice of law; and that the little time +he had given up to it had been far from being misspent. But the opening +which now presented itself introduced him to a field of activity much +more suited to his talents and his tastes. He liked the study of law +better than its practice; for his early training had not been of a kind +to reconcile him to standing up strongly for clients and causes that he +honestly believed to be in the wrong. Furthermore, his heart, as has +been said, had always been in literature; and though journalism could +hardly be called much more than a half-sister, the one could provide the +support which the other could never promise with certainty. So in 1860 +Warner removed to Hartford and joined his friend as associate editor of +the newspaper he had founded. The next year the war broke out. Hawley +at once entered the army and took part in the four years' struggle. His +departure left Warner in editorial charge of the paper, into the conduct +of which he threw himself with all the earnestness and energy of his +nature, and the ability, both political and literary, displayed in its +columns gave it at once a high position which it never lost. + +At this point it may be well to give briefly the few further salient +facts of Warner's connection with journalism proper. In 1867 the owners +of the Press purchased the Courant, the well-known morning paper which +had been founded more than a century before, and consolidated the Press +with it. Of this journal, Hawley and Warner, now in part proprietors, +were the editorial writers. The former, who had been mustered out of the +army with the rank of brevet Major-General, was soon diverted from +journalism by other employments. He was elected Governor, he became a +member of Congress, serving successively in both branches. The main +editorial responsibility for the conduct of the paper devolved in +consequence upon Warner, and to it he gave up for years nearly all his +thought and attention. Once only during that early period was his labor +interrupted for any considerable length of time. In May, 1868, he set +out on the first of his five trips across the Atlantic. He was absent +nearly a year. Yet even then he cannot be said to have neglected his +special work. Articles were sent weekly from the other side, describing +what he saw and experienced abroad. His active connection with the paper +he never gave up absolutely, nor did his interest in it ever cease. +But after he became connected with the editorial staff of Harpers +Magazine the contributions he made to his journal were only occasional +and what may be called accidental. + +When 1870 came, forty years of Warner's life had gone by, and nearly +twenty years since he had left college. During the latter ten years of +this period he had been a most effective and forcible leader-writer on +political and social questions, never more so than during the storm and +stress of the Civil War. Outside of these topics he had devoted a great +deal of attention to matters connected with literature and art. His +varied abilities were fully recognized by the readers of the journal he +edited. + +But as yet there was little or no recognition outside. It is no easy +matter to tell what are the influences, what the circumstances, which +determine the success of a particular writer or of a particular work. +Hitherto Warner's repute was mainly confined to the inhabitants of a +provincial capital and its outlying and dependent towns. However +cultivated the class to which his writings appealed--and as a class it +was distinctly cultivated--their number was necessarily not great. To +the country at large what he did or what he was capable of doing was not +known at all. Some slight efforts he had occasionally put forth to +secure the publication of matter he had prepared. He experienced the +usual fate of authors who seek to introduce into the market literary +wares of a new and better sort. His productions did not follow +conventional lines. Publishers were ready to examine what he offered, +and were just as ready to declare that these new wares were of a nature +in which they were not inclined to deal. + +But during 1870 a series of humorous articles appeared in the Hartford +Courant, detailing his experiences in the cultivation of a garden. +Warner had become the owner of a small place then almost on the outskirts +of the city. With the dwelling-house went the possession of three acres +of land. The opportunity thus presented itself of turning into a +blessing the primeval curse of tilling the soil, in this instance not +with a hoe, but with a pen. These articles detailing his experiences +excited so much amusement and so much admiration that a general desire +was manifested that they should receive a more permanent life than that +accorded to articles appearing in the columns of newspapers, and should +reach a circle larger than that to be found in the society of the +Connecticut capital. Warner's previous experience had not disposed him +to try his fortunes with the members of the publishing fraternity. +In fact he did not lay so much stress upon the articles as did his +readers and friends. He always insisted that he had previously written +other articles which in his eyes certainly were just as good as they, if +not better. + +It so chanced that about this time Henry Ward Beecher came to Hartford to +visit his sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe. Warner was invited to meet him. +In the course of the conversation the articles just mentioned were +referred to by some one of those present. Beecher's curiosity was +aroused and he expressed a desire to see them. To him they were +accordingly sent for perusal. No sooner had he run through them than he +recognized in them the presence of a rare and delicate humor which struck +a distinctly new note in American literature. It was something he felt +which should not be confined to the knowledge of any limited circle. +He wrote at once to the publisher James T. Fields, urging the production +of these articles in book form. Beecher's recommendation in those days +was sufficient to insure the acceptance of any book by any publisher. +Mr. Fields agreed to bring out the work, provided the great preacher +would prefix an introduction. This he promised to do and did; though in +place of the somewhat more formal piece he was asked to write, he sent +what he called an introductory letter. + +The series of papers published under the title of "My Summer in a Garden" +came out at the very end of 1870, with the date of 1871 on the title- +page. The volume met with instantaneous success. It was the subject of +comment and conversation everywhere and passed rapidly through several +editions. There was a general feeling that a new writer had suddenly +appeared, with a wit and wisdom peculiarly his own, precisely like which +nothing had previously existed in our literature. To the later editions +of the work was added an account of a cat which had been presented to the +author by the Stowes. For that reason it was given from the Christian +name of the husband of the novelist the title of Calvin. To this John +was sometimes prefixed, as betokening from the purely animal point of +view a certain resemblance to the imputed grimness and earnestness of the +great reformer. There was nothing in the least exaggerated in the +account which Warner gave of the character and conduct of this really +remarkable member of the feline race. No biography was ever truer; no +appreciation was ever more sympathetic; and in the long line of cats none +was ever more worthy to have his story truly and sympathetically told. +All who had the fortune to see Calvin in the flesh will recognize the +accuracy with which his portrait was drawn. All who read the account of +him, though not having seen him, will find it one of the most charming of +descriptions. It has the fullest right to be termed a cat classic. + +With the publication of "My Summer in a Garden" Warner was launched upon +a career of authorship which lasted without cessation during the thirty +years that remained of his life. It covered a wide field. His interests +were varied and his activity was unremitting. Literature, art, and that +vast diversity of topics which are loosely embraced under the general +name of social science--upon all these he had something fresh to say, and +he said it invariably with attractiveness and effect. It mattered little +what he set out to talk about, the talk was sure to be full both of +instruction and entertainment. No sooner had the unequivocal success of +his first published work brought his name before the public than he was +besieged for contributions by conductors of periodicals of all sorts; and +as he had ideas of his own upon all sorts of subjects, he was constantly +furnishing matter of the most diverse kind for the most diverse +audiences. + +As a result, the volumes here gathered together represent but a limited +portion of the work he accomplished. All his life, indeed, Warner was +not only an omnivorous consumer of the writings of others, but a constant +producer. The manifestation of it took place in ways frequently known to +but few. It was not merely the fact that as an editor of a daily paper +he wrote regularly articles on topics of current interest to which he +never expected to pay any further attention; but after his name became +widely known and his services were in request everywhere, he produced +scores of articles, some long, some short, some signed, some unsigned, +of which he made no account whatever. One looking through the pages of +contemporary periodical literature is apt at any moment to light upon +pieces, and sometimes upon series of them, which the author never took +the trouble to collect. Many of those to which his name was not attached +can no longer be identified with any approach to certainty. About the +preservation of much that he did--and some of it belonged distinctly to +his best and most characteristic work--he was singularly careless, or it +may be better to say, singularly indifferent. + +If I may be permitted to indulge in the recital of a personal experience, +there is one incident I recall which will bring out this trait in a +marked manner. Once on a visit to him I accompanied him to the office of +his paper. While waiting for him to discharge certain duties there, and +employing myself in looking over the exchanges, I chanced to light upon a +leading article on the editorial page of one of the most prominent of the +New York dailies. It was devoted to the consideration of some recent +utterances of a noted orator who, after the actual mission of his life +had been accomplished, was employing the decline of it in the +exploitation of every political and economic vagary which it had entered +into the addled brains of men to evolve. The article struck me as one of +the most brilliant and entertaining of its kind I had ever read; it was +not long indeed before it appeared that the same view of it was taken by +many others throughout the country. The peculiar wit of the comment, the +keenness of the satire made so much of an impression upon me that I +called Warner away from his work to look at it. At my request he hastily +glanced over it, but somewhat to my chagrin failed to evince any +enthusiasm about it. On our way home I again spoke of it and was a good +deal nettled at the indifference towards it which he manifested. +It seemed to imply that my critical judgment was of little value; and +however true might be his conclusion on that point, one does not enjoy +having the fact thrust too forcibly upon the attention in the familiarity +of conversation. Resenting therefore the tone he had assumed, I took +occasion not only to reiterate my previously expressed opinion somewhat +more aggressively, but also went on to insinuate that he was himself +distinctly lacking in any real appreciation of what was excellent. He +bore with me patiently for a while. "Well, sonny," he said at last, +"since you seem to take the matter so much to heart, I will tell you in +confidence that I wrote the piece myself." I found that this was not +only true in the case just specified, but that while engaged in preparing +articles for his own paper he occasionally prepared them for other +journals. No one besides himself and those immediately concerned, ever +knew anything about the matter. He never asserted any right to these +pieces, he never sought to collect them, though some of them exhibited +his happiest vein of humor. Unclaimed, unidentified, they are swept into +that wallet of oblivion in which time stows the best as well as the worst +of newspaper production. + +The next volume of Warner's writings that made its appearance was +entitled "Saunterings." It was the first and, though good of its kind, +was by no means the best of a class of productions in which he was to +exhibit signal excellence. It will be observed that of the various works +comprised in this collective edition, no small number consist of what by +a wide extension of the phrase may be termed books of travel. There are +two or three which fall strictly under that designation. Most of them, +however, can be more properly called records of personal experience and +adventure in different places and regions, with the comments on life and +character to which they gave rise. + +Books of travel, if they are expected to live, are peculiarly hard to +write. If they come out at a period when curiosity about the region +described is predominant, they are fairly certain, no matter how +wretched, to achieve temporary success. But there is no kind of literary +production to which, by the very law of its being, it is more difficult +to impart vitality. Paradoxical as it may seem, it is perfectly true +that the greatest hinderance to their permanent interest is the +information they furnish. The more full, specific and even accurate that +is, the more rapidly does the work containing it lose its value. The +fresher knowledge conveyed by a new, and it may be much inferior book, +crowds out of circulation those which have gone before. The changed or +changing conditions in the region traversed renders the information +previously furnished out of date and even misleading. Hence the older +works come in time to have only an antiquarian interest. Their pages are +consulted only by that very limited number of persons who are anxious to +learn what has been and view with stolid indifference what actually is. +Something of this transitory nature belongs to all sketches of travel. +It is the one great reason why so very few of the countless number of +such works, written, and sometimes written by men of highest ability, are +hardly heard of a few years after publication. Travels form a species of +literary production in which great classics are exceedingly rare. + +From this fatal characteristic, threatening the enduring life of such +works, most of Warner's writings of this sort were saved by the method of +procedure he followed. He made it his main object not to give facts but +impressions. All details of exact information, everything calculated to +gratify the statistical mind or to quench the thirst of the seeker for +purely useful information, he was careful, whether consciously or +unconsciously, to banish from those volumes of his in which he followed +his own bent and felt himself under no obligation to say anything but +what he chose. Hence these books are mainly a record of views of men and +manners made by an acute observer on the spot, and put down at the moment +when the impression created was most vivid, not deferred till familiarity +had dulled the sense of it or custom had caused it to be disregarded. +Take as an illustration the little book entitled "Baddeck," one of the +slightest of his productions in this field. It purports to be and is +nothing more than an account of a two weeks' tour made to a Cape Breton +locality in company with the delightful companion to whom it was +dedicated. You take it up with the notion that you are going to acquire +information about the whole country journeyed over, you are beguiled at +times with the fancy that you are getting it. In the best sense it may +be said that you do get it; for it is the general impression of the +various scenes through which the expedition leads the travelers that is +left upon the mind, not those accurate details of a single one of them +which the lapse of a year might render inaccurate. It is to the credit +of the work therefore than one gains from it little specific knowledge. +In its place are the reflections both wise and witty upon life, upon the +characters of the men that are met, upon the nature of the sights that +are seen. + +This is what constitutes the enduring charm of the best of these pictures +of travel which Warner produced. It is perhaps misleading to assert that +they do not furnish a good deal of information. Still it is not the sort +of information which the ordinary tourist gives and which the cultivated +reader resents and is careful not to remember. Their dominant note is +rather the quiet humor of a delightful story-teller, who cannot fail to +say something of interest because he has seen so much; and who out of his +wide and varied observation selects for recital certain sights he has +witnessed, certain experiences he has gone through, and so relates them +that the way the thing is told is even more interesting than the thing +told. The chief value of these works does not accordingly depend upon +the accidental, which passes. Inns change and become better or worse. +Facilities for transportation increase or decrease. Scenery itself +alters to some extent under the operation of agencies brought to bear +upon it for its own improvement or for the improvement of something else. +But man's nature remains a constant quantity. Traits seen here and now +are sure to be met with somewhere else, and even in ages to come. Hence +works of this nature, embodying descriptions of men and manners, always +retain something of the freshness which characterized them on the day of +their appearance. + +Of these productions in which the personal element predominates, and +where the necessity of intruding information is not felt as a burden, +those of Warner's works which deal with the Orient take the first rank. +The two--"My Winter on the Nile" and "In the Levant"--constitute the +record of a visit to the East during the years 1875 and 1876. + +They would naturally have of themselves the most permanent value, +inasmuch as the countries described have for most educated men an abiding +interest. The lifelike representation and graphic characterization which +Warner was apt to display in his traveling sketches were here seen at +their best, because nowhere else did he find the task of description more +congenial. Alike the gorgeousness and the squalor of the Orient appealed +to his artistic sympathies. Egypt in particular had for him always a +special fascination. Twice he visited it--at the time just mentioned and +again in the winter of 1881-82. He rejoiced in every effort made to +dispel the obscurity which hung over its early history. No one, outside +of the men most immediately concerned, took a deeper interest than he in +the work of the Egyptian Exploration Society, of which he was one of the +American vice-presidents. To promoting its success he gave no small +share of time and attention. Everything connected with either the past +or the present of the country had for him an attraction. A civilization +which had been flourishing for centuries, when the founder of Israel was +a wandering sheik on the Syrian plains or in the hill-country of Canaan; +the slow unraveling of records of dynasties of forgotten kings; the +memorials of Egypt's vanished greatness and the vision of her future +prosperity these and things similar to these made this country, so +peculiarly the gift of the Nile, of fascinating interest to the modern +traveler who saw the same sights which had met the eyes of Herodotus +nearly twenty-five hundred years before. + +To the general public the volume which followed--"In the Levant"--was +perhaps of even deeper interest. At all events it dealt with scenes and +memories with which every reader, educated or uneducated, had +associations. The region through which the founder of Christianity +wandered, the places he visited, the words he said in them, the acts he +did, have never lost their hold over the hearts of men, not even during +the periods when the precepts of Christianity have had the least +influence over the conduct of those who professed to it their allegiance. +In the Levant, too, were seen the beginnings of commerce, of art, of +letters, in the forms in which the modern world best knows them. These, +therefore, have always made the lands about the eastern Mediterranean an +attraction to cultivated men and the interest of the subject accordingly +reinforced the skill of the writer. + +There are two or three of these works which can not be included in the +class just described. They were written for the specific purpose of +giving exact information at the time. Of these the most noticeable are +the volumes entitled "South and West" and the account of Southern +California which goes under the name of "Our Italy." They are the +outcome of journeys made expressly with the intent of investigating and +reporting upon the actual situation and apparent prospects of the places +and regions described. As they were written to serve an immediate +purpose, much of the information contained in them tends to grow more and +more out of date as time goes on; and though of value to the student +of history, these volumes must necessarily become of steadily diminishing +interest to the ordinary reader. Yet it is to be said of them that while +the pill of useful information is there, it has at least been sugar- +coated. Nor can we afford to lose sight of the fact that the widely- +circulated articles, collected under the title of "South and West," by +the spirit pervading them as well as by the information they gave, had a +marked effect in bringing the various sections of the country into a +better understanding of one another, and in imparting to all a fuller +sense of the community they possessed in profit and loss, in honor and +dishonor. + +It is a somewhat singular fact that these sketches of travel led Warner +incidentally to enter into an entirely new field of literary exertion. +This was novel-writing. Something of this nature he had attempted in +conjunction with Mark Twain in the composition of "The Gilded Age," which +appeared in 1873. The result, however, was unsatisfactory to both the +collaborators. Each had humor, but the humor of each was fundamentally +different. But the magazine with which Warner had become connected was +desirous that he should prepare for it an account of some of the +principal watering-places and summer resorts of the country. Each was to +be visited in turn and its salient features were to be described. It was +finally suggested that this could be done most effectively by weaving +into a love story occurrences that might happen at a number of these +places which were made the subjects of description. The principal +characters were to take their tours under the personal conduct of the +novelist. They were to go to the particular spots selected North and +South, according to the varying seasons of the year. It was a somewhat +novel way of, visiting resorts of this nature; there are those to whom it +will seem altogether more agreeable than would be the visiting of them in +person. Hence appeared in 1886 the articles which were collected later +in the volume entitled "Their Pilgrimage." + +Warner executed the task which had been assigned him with his wonted +skill. The completed work met with success--with so much success indeed +that he was led later to try his fortune further in the same field and +bring out the trilogy of novels which go under the names respectively of +"A Little Journey in the World," "The Golden House," and "That Fortune." +Each of these is complete in itself, each can be read by itself; but the +effect of each and of the whole series can be best secured by reading +them in succession. In the first it is the story of how a great fortune +was made in the stock market; in the second, how it was fraudulently +diverted from the object for which it was intended; and in the third, how +it was most beneficially and satisfactorily lost. The scene of the last +novel was laid in part in Warner's early home in Charlemont. These works +were produced with considerable intervals of time between their +respective appearances, the first coming out in 1889 and the third ten +years later. This detracted to some extent from the popularity which +they would have attained had the different members followed one another +rapidly. Still, they met with distinct success, though it has always +been a question whether this success was due so much to the story as to +the shrewd observation and caustic wit which were brought to bear upon +what was essentially a serious study of one side of American social life. + +The work with which Warner himself was least satisfied was his life of +Captain John Smith, which came out in 18881. It was originally intended +to be one of a series of biographies of noted men, which were to give the +facts accurately but to treat them humorously. History and comedy, +however, have never been blended successfully, though desperate attempts +have occasionally been made to achieve that result. Warner had not long +been engaged in the task before he recognized its hopelessness. For its +preparation it required a special study of the man and the period, and +the more time he spent upon the preliminary work, the more the humorous +element tended to recede. Thus acted on by two impulses, one of a light +and one of a grave nature, he moved for a while in a sort of diagonal +between the two to nowhere in particular; but finally ended in treating +the subject seriously. + +In giving himself up to a biography in which he had no special interest, +Warner felt conscious that he could not interest others. His forebodings +were realized. The work, though made from a careful study of original +sources, did not please him, nor did it attract the public. The attempt +was all the more unfortunate because the time and toil he spent upon it +diverted him from carrying out a scheme which had then taken full +possession of his thoughts. This was the production of a series of +essays to be entitled "Conversations on Horseback." Had it been worked +up as he sketched it in his mind, it would have been the outdoor +counterpart of his "Backlog Studies." Though in a measure based upon a +horseback ride which he took in Pennsylvania in 1880, the incidents of +travel as he outlined its intended treatment would have barely furnished +the slightest of backgrounds. Captain John Smith, however, interfered +with a project specially suited to his abilities and congenial to his +tastes. That he did so possibly led the author of his life to exhibit a +somewhat hostile attitude towards his hero. When the biography was +finished, other engagements were pressing upon his attention. The +opportunity of taking up and completing the projected series of essays +never presented itself, though the subject lay in his mind for a long +time and he himself believed that it would have turned out one of the +best pieces of work he ever did. + +It was unfortunate. For to me--and very likely to many others if not to +most--Warner's strength lay above all in essay-writing. What he +accomplished in this line was almost invariably pervaded by that genial +grace which makes work of the kind attractive, and he exhibited +everywhere in it the delicate but sure touch which preserves the just +mean between saying too much and too little. The essay was in his +nature, and his occupation as a journalist had developed the tendency +towards this form of literary activity, as well as skill in its +manipulation. Whether he wrote sketches of travel, or whether he wrote +fiction, the scene depicted was from the point of view of the essayist +rather than from that of the tourist or of the novelist. It is this +characteristic which gives to his work in the former field its enduring +interest. Again in his novels, it was not so much the story that was in +his thoughts as the opportunity the varying scenes afforded for amusing +observations upon manners, for comments upon life, sometimes good- +natured, sometimes severe, but always entertaining, and above all, for +serious study of the social problems which present themselves on every +side for examination. This is distinctly the province of the essayist, +and in it Warner always displayed his fullest strength. + +We have seen that his first purely humorous publication of this nature +was the one which made him known to the general public. It was speedily +followed, however, by one of a somewhat graver character, which became at +the time and has since remained a special favorite of cultivated readers. +This is the volume entitled "Backlog Studies." The attractiveness of +this work is as much due to the suggestive social and literary +discussions with which it abounds as to the delicate and refined humor +with which the ideas are expressed. Something of the same +characteristics was displayed in the two little volumes of short pieces +dealing with social topics, which came out later under the respective +titles of "As We Were Saying," and "As We Go." But there was a deeper +and more serious side of his nature which found utterance in several of +his essays, particularly in some which were given in the form of +addresses delivered at various institutions of learning. They exhibit +the charm which belongs to all his writings; but his feelings were too +profoundly interested in the subjects considered to allow him to give +more than occasional play to his humor. Essays contained in such a +volume, for instance, as "The Relation of Literature to Life" will not +appeal to him whose main object in reading is amusement. Into them +Warner put his deepest and most earnest convictions. The subject from +which the book just mentioned derived its title lay near to his heart. +No one felt more strongly than he the importance of art of all kinds, but +especially of literary art, for the uplifting of a nation. No one saw +more distinctly the absolute necessity of its fullest recognition in a +moneymaking age and in a money-making land, if the spread of the dry rot +of moral deterioration were to be prevented. The ampler horizon it +presented, the loftier ideals it set up, the counteracting agency it +supplied to the sordidness of motive and act which, left unchecked, was +certain to overwhelm the national spirit--all these were enforced by him +again and again with clearness and effectiveness. His essays of this +kind will never be popular in the sense in which are his other writings. +But no thoughtful man will rise up from reading them without having +gained a vivid conception of the part which literature plays in the life +of even the humblest, and without a deeper conviction of its necessity to +any healthy development of the character of a people. + +During the early part of his purely literary career a large proportion of +Warner's collected writings, which then appeared, were first published in +the Atlantic Monthly. But about fourteen years before his death he +became closely connected with Harper's Magazine. From May, 1886, to +March, 1892, he conducted the Editor's Drawer of that periodical. The +month following this last date he succeeded William Dean Howells as the +contributor of the Editor's Study. This position he held until July, +1898. The scope of this department was largely expanded after the death +of George William Curtis in the summer of 1892, and the consequent +discontinuance of the Editor's Easy Chair. Comments upon other topics +than those to which his department was originally devoted, especially +upon social questions, were made a distinct feature. His editorial +connection with the magazine naturally led to his contributing to it +numerous articles besides those which were demanded by the requirements +of the position he held. Nearly all these, as well as those which +appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, are indicated in the bibliographical +notes prefixed to the separate works. + +There were, however, other literary enterprises in which he was +concerned; for the calls upon him were numerous, his own appetite for +work was insatiable, and his activity was indefatigable. In 1881 he +assumed the editorship of the American Men of Letters series. This he +opened with his own biography of Washington Irving, the resemblance +between whom and himself has been made the subject of frequent remark. +Later he became the editor-in-chief of the thirty odd volumes which make +up the collection entitled "The World's Best Literature." To this he +contributed several articles of his own and carefully allotted and +supervised the preparation of a large number of others. The labor he put +upon the editing of this collection occupied him a great deal of the time +from 1895 to 1898. + +But literature, though in it lay his chief interest, was but one of the +subjects which employed his many-sided activity. He was constantly +called upon for the discharge of civic duties. The confidence felt by +his fellow-citizens in his judgment and taste was almost equal to the +absolute trust reposed in his integrity. The man who establishes a +reputation for the possession of these qualities can never escape from +bearing the burdens which a good character always imposes. If any work +of art was ordered by the state, Warner was fairly certain to be chosen a +member of the commission selected to decide upon the person who was to do +it and upon the way it was to be done. By his fellow-townsmen he was +made a member of the Park Commission. Such were some of the duties +imposed; there were others voluntarily undertaken. During the latter +years of his life he became increasingly interested in social questions, +some of which partook of a semi-political character. One of the subjects +which engaged his attention was the best method to be adopted for +elevating the character and conduct of the negro population of the +country. He recognized the gravity of the problem with which the nation +had to deal and the difficulties attending its solution. One essay on +the subject was prepared for the meeting held at Washington in May, 1900, +of the American Social Science Association, of which he was president. +He was not able to be there in person. The disease which was ultimately +to strike him down had already made its preliminary attack. His address +was accordingly read for him. It was a subject of special regret that he +could not be present to set forth more fully his views; for the debate, +which followed the presentation of his paper, was by no means confined to +the meeting, but extended to the press of the whole country. Whether the +conclusions he reached were right or wrong, they were in no case adopted +hastily nor indeed without the fullest consideration. + +But a more special interest of his lay in prison reform. The subject had +engaged his attention long before he published anything in connection +with it. Later one of the earliest articles he wrote for Harper's +Magazine was devoted to it. It was in his thoughts just before his +death. He was a member of the Connecticut commission on prisons, of the +National Prison Association, and a vice-president of the New York +Association for Prison Reform. A strong advocate of the doctrine of the +indeterminate sentence, he had little patience with many of the judicial +outgivings on that subject. To him they seemed opinions inherited, not +formed, and in most cases were nothing more than the result of prejudice +working upon ignorance. This particular question was one which he +purposed to make the subject of his address as president of the Social +Science Association, at its annual meeting in 1901. He never lived to +complete what he had in mind. + +During his later years the rigor of the Northern winter had been too +severe for Warner's health. He had accordingly found it advisable to +spend as much of this season as he could in warmer regions. He visited +at various times parts of the South, Mexico, and California. He passed +the winter of 1892-93 at Florence; but he found the air of the valley of +the Arno no perceptible improvement upon that of the valley of the +Connecticut. In truth, neither disease nor death entertains a prejudice +against any particular locality. This fact he was to learn by personal +experience. In the spring of 1899, while at New Orleans, he was stricken +by pneumonia which nearly brought him to the grave. He recovered, but it +is probable that the strength of his system was permanently impaired, +and with it his power of resisting disease. Still his condition was not +such as to prevent him from going on with various projects he had been +contemplating or from forming new ones. The first distinct warning of +the approaching end was the facial paralysis which suddenly attacked him +in April, 1900, while on a visit to Norfolk, Va. Yet even from that he +seemed to be apparently on the full road to recovery during the following +summer. + +It was in the second week of October, 1900, that Warner paid me a visit +of two or three days. He was purposing to spend the winter in Southern +California, coming back to the East in ample time to attend the annual +meeting of the Social Science Association. His thoughts were even then +busy with the subject of the address which, as president, he was to +deliver on that occasion. It seemed to me that I had never seen him when +his mind was more active or more vigorous. I was not only struck by the +clearness of his views--some of which were distinctly novel, at least to +me--but by the felicity and effectiveness with which they were put. + +Never, too, had I been more impressed with the suavity, the +agreeableness, the general charm of his manner. He had determined during +the coming winter to learn to ride the wheel, and we then and there +planned to take a bicycle trip during the following summer, as we had +previously made excursions together on horseback. When we parted, it was +with the agreement that we should meet the next spring in Washington and +fix definitely upon the time and region of our intended ride. It was on +a Saturday morning that I bade him good-by, apparently in the best of +health and spirits. It was on the evening of the following Saturday-- +October 20th--that the condensed, passionless, relentless message which +the telegraph transmits, informed me that he had died that afternoon. + +That very day he had lunched at a friend's, where were gathered several +of his special associates who had chanced to come together at the same +house, and then had gone to the office of the Hartford Courant. There +was not the slightest indication apparent of the end that was so near. +After the company broke up, he started out to pay a visit to one of the +city parks, of which he was a commissioner. On his way thither, feeling +a certain faintness, he turned aside into a small house whose occupants +he knew, and asked to sit down for a brief rest, and then, as the +faintness increased, to lie undisturbed on the lounge for a few minutes. +The few minutes passed, and with them his life. In the strictest sense +of the words, he had fallen asleep. From one point of view it was an +ideal way to die. To the individual, death coming so gently, so +suddenly, is shorn of all its terrors. It is only those who live to +remember and to lament that the suffering comes which has been spared the +victim. Even to them, however, is the consolation that though they may +have been fully prepared for the coming of the inevitable event, it would +have been none the less painful when it actually came. + +Warner as a writer we all know. The various and varying opinions +entertained about the quality and value of his work do not require notice +here. Future times will assign him his exact position in the roll of +American authors, and we need not trouble ourselves to anticipate, as we +shall certainly not be able to influence, its verdict. But to only a +comparatively few of those who knew him as a writer was it given to know +him as a man; to still fewer to know him in that familiarity of intimacy +which reveals all that is fine or ignoble in a man's personality. Scanty +is the number of those who will come out of that severest of ordeals so +successfully as he. The same conclusion would be reached, whether we +were to consider him in his private relations or in his career as a man +of letters. Among the irritable race of authors no one was freer from +petty envy or jealousy. During many years of close intercourse, in which +he constantly gave utterance to his views both of men and things with +absolute unreserve, I recall no disparaging opinion ever expressed of any +writer with whom he had been compared either for praise or blame. He had +unquestionably definite and decided opinions. He would point out that +such or such a work was above or below its author's ordinary level; but +there was never any ill-nature in his comment, no depreciation for +depreciation's sake. Never in truth was any one more loyal to his +friends. If his literary conscience would not permit him to say anything +in favor of something which they had done, he usually contented himself +with saying nothing. Whatever failing there was on his critical side was +due to this somewhat uncritical attitude; for it is from his particular +friends that the writer is apt to get the most dispassionate +consideration and sometimes the coldest commendation. It was a part of +Warner's generous recognition of others that he was in all sincerity +disposed to attribute to those he admired and to whom he was attached an +ability of which some of them at least were much inclined to doubt their +own possession. + +Were I indeed compelled to select any one word which would best give the +impression, both social and literary, of Warner's personality, I should +be disposed to designate it as urbanity. That seems to indicate best the +one trait which most distinguished him either in conversation or writing. +Whatever it was, it was innate, not assumed. It was the genuine outcome +of the kindliness and broad-mindedness of his nature and led him to +sympathize with men of all positions in life and of all kinds of ability. +It manifested itself in his attitude towards every one with whom he came +in contact. It led him to treat with fullest consideration all who were +in the least degree under his direction, and converted in consequence the +toil of subordinates into a pleasure. It impelled him to do unsought +everything which lay in his power for the success of those in whom he +felt interest. Many a young writer will recall his words of +encouragement at some period in his own career when the quiet +appreciation of one meant more to him than did later the loud applause of +many. As it was in public, so it was in private life. The generosity of +his spirit, the geniality and high-bred courtesy of his manner, rendered +a visit to his home as much a social delight as his wide knowledge of +literature and his appreciation of what was best in it made it an +intellectual entertainment. + +THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY. + + + + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + + + +PRELIMINARY + +This paper was prepared and delivered at several of our universities as +introductory to a course of five lectures which insisted on the value of +literature in common life--some hearers thought with an exaggerated +emphasis--and attempted to maintain the thesis that all genuine, enduring +literature is the outcome of the time that produces it, is responsive to +the general sentiment of its time; that this close relation to human life +insures its welcome ever after as a true representation of human nature; +and that consequently the most remunerative method of studying a +literature is to study the people for whom it was produced. +Illustrations of this were drawn from the Greek, the French, and the +English literatures. This study always throws a flood of light upon the +meaning of the text of an old author, the same light that the reader +unconsciously has upon contemporary pages dealing with the life with +which he is familiar. The reader can test this by taking up his +Shakespeare after a thorough investigation of the customs, manners, and +popular life of the Elizabethan period. Of course the converse is true +that good literature is an open door into the life and mode of thought of +the time and place where it originated. + + + + +THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO LIFE + +I hade a vision once--you may all have had a like one--of the stream of +time flowing through a limitless land. Along its banks sprang up in +succession the generations of man. They did not move with the stream- +they lived their lives and sank away; and always below them new +generations appeared, to play their brief parts in what is called +history--the sequence of human actions. The stream flowed on, opening +for itself forever a way through the land. I saw that these successive +dwellers on the stream were busy in constructing and setting afloat +vessels of various size and form and rig--arks, galleys, galleons, +sloops, brigs, boats propelled by oars, by sails, by steam. I saw the +anxiety with which each builder launched his venture, and watched its +performance and progress. The anxiety was to invent and launch something +that should float on to the generations to come, and carry the name of +the builder and the fame of his generation. It was almost pathetic, +these puny efforts, because faith always sprang afresh in the success of +each new venture. Many of the vessels could scarcely be said to be +launched at all; they sank like lead, close to the shore. Others floated +out for a time, and then, struck by a flaw in the wind, heeled over and +disappeared. Some, not well put together, broke into fragments in the +bufleting of the waves. Others danced on the flood, taking the sun on +their sails, and went away with good promise of a long voyage. But only +a few floated for any length of time, and still fewer were ever seen by +the generation succeeding that which launched them. The shores of the +stream were strewn with wrecks; there lay bleaching in the sand the ribs +of many a once gallant craft. + +Innumerable were the devices of the builders to keep their inventions +afloat. Some paid great attention to the form of the hull, others to the +kind of cargo and the loading of it, while others--and these seemed the +majority--trusted more to some new sort of sail, or new fashion of +rudder, or new application of propelling power. And it was wonderful to +see what these new ingenuities did for a time, and how each generation +was deceived into the belief that its products would sail on forever. +But one fate practically came to the most of them. They were too heavy, +they were too light, they were built of old material, and they went to +the bottom, they went ashore, they broke up and floated in fragments. +And especially did the crafts built in imitation of something that had +floated down from a previous generation come to quick disaster. I saw +only here and there a vessel, beaten by weather and blackened by time +--so old, perhaps, that the name of the maker was no longer legible; or +some fragments of antique wood that had evidently come from far up the +stream. When such a vessel appeared there was sure to arise great +dispute about it, and from time to time expeditions were organized to +ascend the river and discover the place and circumstances of its origin. +Along the banks, at intervals, whole fleets of boats and fragments had +gone ashore, and were piled up in bays, like the driftwood of a subsided +freshet. Efforts were made to dislodge these from time to time and set +them afloat again, newly christened, with fresh paint and sails, as if +they stood a better chance of the voyage than any new ones. Indeed, I +saw that a large part of the commerce of this river was, in fact, the old +hulks and stranded wrecks that each generation had set afloat again. +As I saw it in this foolish vision, how pathetic this labor was from +generation to generation; so many vessels launched; so few making a +voyage even for a lifetime; so many builders confident of immortality; so +many lives outlasting this coveted reputation! And still the +generations, each with touching hopefulness, busied themselves with this +child's play on the banks of the stream; and still the river flowed on, +whelming and wrecking the most of that so confidently committed to it, +and bearing only here and there, on its swift, wide tide, a ship, a boat, +a shingle. + +These hosts of men whom I saw thus occupied since history began were +authors; these vessels were books; these heaps of refuse in the bays were +great libraries. The allegory admits of any amount of ingenious +parallelism. It is nevertheless misleading; it is the illusion of an +idle fancy. I have introduced it because it expresses, with some +whimsical exaggeration--not much more than that of "The Vision of Mirza" +--the popular notion about literature and its relation to human life. +In the popular conception, literature is as much a thing apart from life +as these boats on the stream of time were from the existence, the +struggle, the decay of the generations along the shore. I say in the +popular conception, for literature is wholly different from this, not +only in its effect upon individual lives, but upon the procession of +lives upon this earth; it is not only an integral part of all of them, +but, with its sister arts, it is the one unceasing continuity in history. +Literature and art are not only the records and monuments made by the +successive races of men, not only the local expressions of thought and +emotion, but they are, to change the figure, the streams that flow on, +enduring, amid the passing show of men, reviving, transforming, ennobling +the fleeting generations. Without this continuity of thought and +emotion, history would present us only a succession of meaningless +experiments. The experiments fail, the experiments succeed--at any rate, +they end--and what remains for transmission, for the sustenance of +succeeding peoples? Nothing but the thought and emotion evolved and +expressed. It is true that every era, each generation, seems to have its +peculiar work to do; it is to subdue the intractable earth, to repel or +to civilize the barbarians, to settle society in order, to build cities, +to amass wealth in centres, to make deserts bloom, to construct edifices +such as were never made before, to bring all men within speaking distance +of each other--lucky if they have anything to say when that is +accomplished--to extend the information of the few among the many, or to +multiply the means of easy and luxurious living. Age after age the world +labors for these things with the busy absorption of a colony of ants in +its castle of sand. And we must confess that the process, such, for +instance, as that now going on here--this onset of many peoples, which is +transforming the continent of America--is a spectacle to excite the +imagination in the highest degree. If there were any poet capable of +putting into an epic the spirit of this achievement, what an epic would +be his! Can it be that there is anything of more consequence in life +than the great business in hand, which absorbs the vitality and genius of +this age? Surely, we say, it is better to go by steam than to go afoot, +because we reach our destination sooner--getting there quickly being a +supreme object. It is well to force the soil to yield a hundred-fold, +to congregate men in masses so that all their energies shall be taxed to +bring food to themselves, to stimulate industries, drag coal and metal +from the bowels of the earth, cover its surface with rails for swift- +running carriages, to build ever larger palaces, warehouses, ships. +This gigantic achievement strikes the imagination. + +If the world in which you live happens to be the world of books, if your +pursuit is to know what has been done and said in the world, to the end +that your own conception of the value of life may be enlarged, and that +better things may be done and said hereafter, this world and this pursuit +assume supreme importance in your mind. But you can in a moment place +yourself in relations--you have not to go far, perhaps only to speak to +your next neighbor--where the very existence of your world is scarcely +recognized. All that has seemed to you of supreme importance is ignored. +You have entered a world that is called practical, where the things that +we have been speaking of are done; you have interest in it and sympathy +with it, because your scheme of life embraces the development of ideas +into actions; but these men of realities have only the smallest +conception of the world that seems to you of the highest importance; +and, further, they have no idea that they owe anything to it, that it has +ever influenced their lives or can add anything to them. And it may +chance that you have, for the moment, a sense of insignificance in the +small part you are playing in the drama going forward. Go out of your +library, out of the small circle of people who talk of books, who are +engaged in research, whose liveliest interest is in the progress of +ideas, in the expression of thought and emotion that is in literature; +go out of this atmosphere into a region where it does not exist, it may +be into a place given up to commerce and exchange, or to manufacturing, +or to the development of certain other industries, such as mining, or the +pursuit of office--which is sometimes called politics. You will speedily +be aware how completely apart from human life literature is held to be, +how few people regard it seriously as a necessary element in life, +as anything more than an amusement or a vexation. I have in mind a +mountain district, stripped, scarred, and blackened by the ruthless +lumbermen, ravished of its forest wealth; divested of its beauty, which +has recently become the field of vast coal-mining operations. Remote +from communication, it was yesterday an exhausted, wounded, deserted +country. Today audacious railways are entering it, crawling up its +mountain slopes, rounding its dizzy precipices, spanning its valleys on +iron cobwebs, piercing its hills with tunnels. Drifts are opened in its +coal seams, to which iron tracks shoot away from the main line; in the +woods is seen the gleam of the engineer's level, is heard the rattle of +heavily-laden wagons on the newly-made roads; tents are pitched, uncouth +shanties have sprung up, great stables, boarding-houses, stores, +workshops; the miner, the blacksmith, the mason, the carpenter have +arrived; households have been set up in temporary barracks, children are +already there who need a school, women who must have a church and +society; the stagnation has given place to excitement, money has flowed +in, and everywhere are the hum of industry and the swish of the goad of +American life. On this hillside, which in June was covered with oaks, +is already in October a town; the stately trees have been felled; streets +are laid out and graded and named; there are a hundred dwellings, there +are a store, a post-office, an inn; the telegraph has reached it, and the +telephone and the electric light; in a few weeks more it will be in size +a city, with thousands of people--a town made out of hand by drawing men +and women from other towns, civilized men and women, who have voluntarily +put themselves in a position where they must be civilized over again. + +This is a marvelous exhibition of what energy and capital can do. You +acknowledge as much to the creators of it. You remember that not far +back in history such a transformation as this could not have been wrought +in a hundred years. This is really life, this is doing something in the +world, and in the presence of it you can see why the creators of it +regard your world, which seemed to you so important, the world whose +business is the evolution and expression of thought and emotion, as +insignificant. Here is a material addition to the business and wealth of +the race, here employment for men who need it, here is industry replacing +stagnation, here is the pleasure of overcoming difficulties and +conquering obstacles. Why encounter these difficulties? In order that +more coal may be procured to operate more railway trains at higher speed, +to supply more factories, to add to the industrial stir of modern life. +The men who projected and are pushing on this enterprise, with an +executive ability that would maintain and manoeuvre an army in a +campaign, are not, however, consciously philanthropists, moved by the +charitable purpose of giving employment to men, or finding satisfaction +in making two blades of grass grow where one grew before. They enjoy no +doubt the sense of power in bringing things to pass, the feeling of +leadership and the consequence derived from its recognition; but they +embark in this enterprise in order that they may have the position and +the luxury that increased wealth will bring, the object being, in most +cases, simply material advantages--sumptuous houses, furnished with all +the luxuries which are the signs of wealth, including, of course, +libraries and pictures and statuary and curiosities, the most showy +equipages and troops of servants; the object being that their wives shall +dress magnificently, glitter in diamonds and velvets, and never need to +put their feet to the ground; that they may command the best stalls in +the church, the best pews in the theatre, the choicest rooms in the inn, +and--a consideration that Plato does not mention, because his world was +not our world--that they may impress and reduce to obsequious deference +the hotel clerk. + +This life--for this enterprise and its objects are types of a +considerable portion of life--is not without its ideal, its hero, its +highest expression, its consummate flower. It is expressed in a word +which I use without any sense of its personality, as the French use the +word Barnum--for our crude young nation has the distinction of adding a +verb to the French language, the verb to barnum--it is expressed in the +well-known name Croesus. This is a standard--impossible to be reached +perhaps, but a standard. If one may say so, the country is sown with +seeds of Croesus, and the crop is forward and promising. The interest +to us now in the observation of this phase of modern life is not in the +least for purposes of satire or of reform. We are inquiring how wholly +this conception of life is divorced from the desire to learn what has +been done and said to the end that better things may be done and said +hereafter, in order that we may understand the popular conception of the +insignificant value of literature in human affairs. But it is not aside +from our subject, rather right in its path, to take heed of what the +philosophers say of the effect in other respects of the pursuit of +wealth. + +One cause of the decay of the power of defense in a state, says the +Athenian Stranger in Plato's Laws--one cause is the love of wealth, which +wholly absorbs men and never for a moment allows them to think of +anything but their private possessions; on this the soul of every citizen +hangs suspended, and can attend to nothing but his daily gain; mankind +are ready to learn any branch of knowledge and to follow any pursuit +which tends to this end, and they laugh at any other; that is the reason +why a city will not be in earnest about war or any other good and +honorable pursuit. + +The accumulation of gold in the treasury of private individuals, says +Socrates, in the Republic, is the ruin of democracy. They invent illegal +modes of expenditure; and what do they or their wives care about the law? + +"And then one, seeing another's display, proposes to rival him, and thus +the whole body of citizens acquires a similar character. + +"After that they get on in a trade, and the more they think of making a +fortune, the less they think of virtue; for when riches and virtue are +placed together in the balance, the one always rises as the other falls. + +"And in proportion as riches and rich men are honored in the state, +virtue and the virtuous are dishonored. + +"And what is honored is cultivated, and that which has no honor is +neglected. + +"And so at last, instead of loving contention and glory, men become +lovers of trade and money, and they honor and reverence the rich man and +make a ruler of him, and dishonor the poor man. + +"They do so." + +The object of a reasonable statesman (it is Plato who is really speaking +in the Laws) is not that the state should be as great and rich as +possible, should possess gold and silver, and have the greatest empire by +sea and land. + +The citizen must, indeed, be happy and good, and the legislator will seek +to make him so; but very rich and very good at the same time he cannot +be; not at least in the sense in which many speak of riches. For they +describe by the term "rich" the few who have the most valuable +possessions, though the owner of them be a rogue. And if this is true, +I can never assent to the doctrine that the rich man will be happy: he +must be good as well as rich. And good in a high degree and rich in a +high degree at the same time he cannot be. Some one will ask, Why not? +And we shall answer, Because acquisitions which come from sources which +are just and unjust indifferently are more than double those which come +from just sources only; and the sums which are expended neither honorably +nor disgracefully are only half as great as those which are expended +honorably and on honorable purposes. Thus if one acquires double and +spends half, the other, who is in the opposite case and is a good man, +cannot possibly be wealthier than he. The first (I am speaking of the +saver, and not of the spender) is not always bad; he may indeed in some +cases be utterly bad, but as I was saying, a good man he never is. +For he who receives money unjustly as well as justly, and spends neither +justly nor unjustly, will be a rich man if he be also thrifty. On the +other hand, the utterly bad man is generally profligate, and therefore +poor; while he who spends on noble objects, and acquires wealth by just +means only, can hardly be remarkable for riches any more than he can be +very poor. The argument, then, is right in declaring that the very rich +are not good, and if they are not good they are not happy. + +And the conclusion of Plato is that we ought not to pursue any occupation +to the neglect of that for which riches exist--"I mean," he says, "soul +and body, which without gymnastics and without education will never be +worth anything; and therefore, as we have said not once but many times, +the care of riches should have the last place in our thoughts." + +Men cannot be happy unless they are good, and they cannot be good unless +the care of the soul occupies the first place in their thoughts. That is +the first interest of man; the interest in the body is midway; and last +of all, when rightly regarded, is the interest about money. + +The majority of mankind reverses this order of interests, and therefore +it sets literature to one side as of no practical account in human life. +More than this, it not only drops it out of mind, but it has no +conception of its influence and power in the very affairs from which it +seems to be excluded. It is my purpose to show not only the close +relation of literature to ordinary life, but its eminent position in +life, and its saving power in lives which do not suspect its influence +or value. Just as it is virtue that saves the state, if it be saved, +although the majority do not recognize it and attribute the salvation of +the state to energy, and to obedience to the laws of political economy, +and to discoveries in science, and to financial contrivances; so it is +that in the life of generations of men, considered from an ethical and +not from a religious point of view, the most potent and lasting influence +for a civilization that is worth anything, a civilization that does not +by its own nature work its decay, is that which I call literature. It is +time to define what we mean by literature. We may arrive at the meaning +by the definition of exclusion. We do not mean all books, but some +books; not all that is written and published, but only a small part of +it. We do not mean books of law, of theology, of politics, of science, +of medicine, and not necessarily books of travel, or adventure, or +biography, or fiction even. These may all be ephemeral in their nature. +The term belles-lettres does not fully express it, for it is too narrow. +In books of law, theology, politics, medicine, science, travel, +adventure, biography, philosophy, and fiction there may be passages that +possess, or the whole contents may possess, that quality which comes +within our meaning of literature. It must have in it something of the +enduring and the universal. When we use the term art, we do not mean the +arts; we are indicating a quality that may be in any of the arts. In art +and literature we require not only an expression of the facts in nature +and in human life, but of feeling, thought, emotion. There must be an +appeal to the universal in the race. It is, for example, impossible for +a Christian today to understand what the religious system of the +Egyptians of three thousand years ago was to the Egyptian mind, or to +grasp the idea conveyed to a Chinaman's thought in the phrase, "the +worship of the principle of heaven"; but the Christian of today +comprehends perfectly the letters of an Egyptian scribe in the time of +Thotmes III., who described the comical miseries of his campaign with as +clear an appeal to universal human nature as Horace used in his 'Iter +Brundusium;' and the maxims of Confucius are as comprehensible as the +bitter-sweetness of Thomas a Kempis. De Quincey distinguishes between +the literature of knowledge and the literature of power. The definition +is not exact; but we may say that the one is a statement of what is +known, the other is an emanation from the man himself; or that one may +add to the sum of human knowledge, and the other addresses itself to a +higher want in human nature than the want of knowledge. We select and +set aside as literature that which is original, the product of what we +call genius. As I have said, the subject of a production does not always +determine the desired quality which makes it literature. A biography may +contain all the facts in regard to a man and his character, arranged in +an orderly and comprehensible manner, and yet not be literature; but it +may be so written, like Plutarch's Lives or Defoe's account of Robinson +Crusoe, that it is literature, and of imperishable value as a picture of +human life, as a satisfaction to the want of the human mind which is +higher than the want of knowledge. And this contribution, which I desire +to be understood to mean when I speak of literature, is precisely the +thing of most value in the lives of the majority of men, whether they are +aware of it or not. It may be weighty and profound; it may be light, as +light as the fall of a leaf or a bird's song on the shore; it may be the +thought of Plato when he discourses of the character necessary in a +perfect state, or of Socrates, who, out of the theorem of an absolute +beauty, goodness, greatness, and the like, deduces the immortality of the +soul; or it may be the lovesong of a Scotch plowman: but it has this one +quality of answering to a need in human nature higher than a need for +facts, for knowledge, for wealth. + +In noticing the remoteness in the popular conception of the relation of +literature to life, we must not neglect to take into account what may be +called the arrogance of culture, an arrogance that has been emphasized, +in these days of reaction from the old attitude of literary +obsequiousness, by harsh distinctions and hard words, which are paid back +by equally emphasized contempt. The apostles of light regard the rest of +mankind as barbarians and Philistines, and the world retorts that these +self-constituted apostles are idle word-mongers, without any sympathy +with humanity, critics and jeerers who do nothing to make the conditions +of life easier. It is natural that every man should magnify the circle +of the world in which he is active and imagine that all outside of it is +comparatively unimportant. Everybody who is not a drone has his +sufficient world. To the lawyer it is his cases and the body of law, +it is the legal relation of men that is of supreme importance; to the +merchant and manufacturer all the world consists in buying and selling, +in the production and exchange of products; to the physician all the +world is diseased and in need of remedies; to the clergyman speculation +and the discussion of dogmas and historical theology assume immense +importance; the politician has his world, the artist his also, and the +man of books and letters a realm still apart from all others. And to +each of these persons what is outside of his world seems of secondary +importance; he is absorbed in his own, which seems to him all-embracing. +To the lawyer everybody is or ought to be a litigant; to the grocer the +world is that which eats, and pays--with more or less regularity; to the +scholar the world is in books and ideas. One realizes how possessed he +is with his own little world only when by chance he changes his +profession or occupation and looks back upon the law, or politics, or +journalism, and sees in its true proportion what it was that once +absorbed him and seemed to him so large. When Socrates discusses with +Gorgias the value of rhetoric, the use of which, the latter asserts, +relates to the greatest and best of human things, Socrates says: I dare +say you have heard men singing--at feasts the old drinking-song, in which +the singers enumerate the goods of life-first, health; beauty next; +thirdly, wealth honestly acquired. The producers of these things--the +physician, the trainer, the money-maker--each in turn contends that his +art produces the greatest good. Surely, says the physician, health is +the greatest good; there is more good in my art, says the trainer, for my +business is to make men beautiful and strong in body; and consider, says +the money-maker, whether any one can produce a greater good than wealth. +But, insists Gorgias, the greatest good of men, of which I am the +creator, is that which gives men freedom in their persons, and the power +of ruling over others in their several states--that is, the word which +persuades the judge in the court, or the senators in the council, or the +citizens in the assembly: if you have the power of uttering this word, +you will have the physician your slave, and the trainer your slave, and +the moneymaker of whom you talk will be found to gather treasures, not +for himself, but for those who are able to speak and persuade the +multitude. + +What we call life is divided into occupations and interest, and the +horizons of mankind are bounded by them. It happens naturally enough, +therefore, that there should be a want of sympathy in regard to these +pursuits among men, the politician despising the scholar, and the scholar +looking down upon the politician, and the man of affairs, the man of +industries, not caring to conceal his contempt for both the others. +And still more reasonable does the division appear between all the world +which is devoted to material life, and the few who live in and for the +expression of thought and emotion. It is a pity that this should be so, +for it can be shown that life would not be worth living divorced from the +gracious and ennobling influence of literature, and that literature +suffers atrophy when it does not concern itself with the facts and +feelings of men. + +If the poet lives in a world apart from the vulgar, the most lenient +apprehension of him is that his is a sort of fool's paradise. One of the +most curious features in the relation of literature to life is this, that +while poetry, the production of the poet, is as necessary to universal +man as the atmosphere, and as acceptable, the poet is regarded with that +mingling of compassion and undervaluation, and perhaps awe, which once +attached to the weak-minded and insane, and which is sometimes expressed +by the term "inspired idiot." However the poet may have been petted and +crowned, however his name may have been diffused among peoples, I doubt +not that the popular estimate of him has always been substantially what +it is today. And we all know that it is true, true in our individual +consciousness, that if a man be known as a poet and nothing else, if his +character is sustained by no other achievement than the production of +poetry, he suffers in our opinion a loss of respect. And this is only +recovered for him after he is dead, and his poetry is left alone to speak +for his name. However fond my lord and lady were of the ballad, the +place of the minstrel was at the lower end of the hall. If we are pushed +to say why this is, why this happens to the poet and not to the producers +of anything else that excites the admiration of mankind, we are forced to +admit that there is something in the poet to sustain the popular judgment +of his in utility. In all the occupations and professions of life there +is a sign put up, invisible--but none the less real, and expressing an +almost universal feeling--"No poet need apply." And this is not because +there are so many poor poets; for there are poor lawyers, poor soldiers, +poor statesmen, incompetent business men; but none of the personal +disparagement attaches to them that is affixed to the poet. This popular +estimate of the poet extends also, possibly in less degree, to all the +producers of the literature that does not concern itself with knowledge. +It is not our care to inquire further why this is so, but to repeat that +it is strange that it should be so when poetry is, and has been at all +times, the universal solace of all peoples who have emerged out of +barbarism, the one thing not supernatural and yet akin to the +supernatural, that makes the world, in its hard and sordid conditions, +tolerable to the race. For poetry is not merely the comfort of the +refined and the delight of the educated; it is the alleviator of poverty, +the pleasure-ground of the ignorant, the bright spot in the most dreary +pilgrimage. We cannot conceive the abject animal condition of our race +were poetry abstracted; and we do not wonder that this should be so when +we reflect that it supplies a want higher than the need for food, for +raiment, or ease of living, and that the mind needs support as much as +the body. The majority of mankind live largely in the imagination, the +office or use of which is to lift them in spirit out of the bare physical +conditions in which the majority exist. There are races, which we may +call the poetical races, in which this is strikingly exemplified. It +would be difficult to find poverty more complete, physical wants less +gratified, the conditions of life more bare than among the Oriental +peoples from the Nile to the Ganges and from the Indian Ocean to the +steppes of Siberia. But there are perhaps none among the more favored +races who live so much in the world of imagination fed by poetry and +romance. Watch the throng seated about an Arab or Indian or Persian +story-teller and poet, men and women with all the marks of want, hungry, +almost naked, without any prospect in life of ever bettering their sordid +condition; see their eyes kindle, their breathing suspended, their tense +absorption; see their tears, hear their laughter, note their excitement +as the magician unfolds to them a realm of the imagination in which they +are free for the hour to wander, tasting a keen and deep enjoyment that +all the wealth of Croesus cannot purchase for his disciples. Measure, +if you can, what poetry is to them, what their lives would be without it. +To the millions and millions of men who are in this condition, the bard, +the story-teller, the creator of what we are considering as literature, +comes with the one thing that can lift them out of poverty, suffering-- +all the woe of which nature is so heedless. + +It is not alone of the poetical nations of the East that this is true, +nor is this desire for the higher enjoyment always wanting in the savage +tribes of the West. When the Jesuit Fathers in 1768 landed upon the +almost untouched and unexplored southern Pacific coast, they found in the +San Gabriel Valley in Lower California that the Indians had games and +feasts at which they decked themselves in flower garlands that reached to +their feet, and that at these games there were song contests which +sometimes lasted for three days. This contest of the poets was an old +custom with them. And we remember how the ignorant Icelanders, who had +never seen a written character, created the splendid Saga, and handed it +down from father to son. We shall scarcely find in Europe a peasantry +whose abject poverty is not in some measure alleviated by this power +which literature gives them to live outside it. Through our sacred +Scriptures, through the ancient storytellers, through the tradition which +in literature made, as I said, the chief continuity in the stream of +time, we all live a considerable, perhaps the better, portion of our +lives in the Orient. But I am not sure that the Scotch peasant, the +crofter in his Highland cabin, the operative in his squalid tenement- +house, in the hopelessness of poverty, in the grime of a life made twice +as hard as that of the Arab by an inimical climate, does not owe more to +literature than the man of culture, whose material surroundings are +heaven in the imagination of the poor. Think what his wretched life +would be, in its naked deformity, without the popular ballads, without +the romances of Scott, which have invested his land for him, as for us, +with enduring charm; and especially without the songs of Burns, which +keep alive in him the feeling that he is a man, which impart to his +blunted sensibility the delicious throb of spring-songs that enable him +to hear the birds, to see the bits of blue sky-songs that make him tender +of the wee bit daisy at his feet--songs that hearten him when his heart +is fit to break with misery. Perhaps the English peasant, the English +operative, is less susceptible to such influences than the Scotch or the +Irish; but over him, sordid as his conditions are, close kin as he is to +the clod, the light of poetry is diffused; there filters into his life, +also, something of that divine stream of which we have spoken, a dialect +poem that touches him, the leaf of a psalm, some bit of imagination, +some tale of pathos, set afloat by a poor writer so long ago that it has +become the common stock of human tradition-maybe from Palestine, maybe +from the Ganges, perhaps from Athens--some expression of real emotion, +some creation, we say, that makes for him a world, vague and dimly +apprehended, that is not at all the actual world in which he sins and +suffers. The poor woman, in a hut with an earth floor, a reeking roof, a +smoky chimney, barren of comfort, so indecent that a gentleman would not +stable his horse in it, sits and sews upon a coarse garment, while she +rocks the cradle of an infant about whom she cherishes no illusions that +his lot will be other than that of his father before him. As she sits +forlorn, it is not the wretched hovel that she sees, nor other hovels +like it--rows of tenements of hopeless poverty, the ale-house, the gin- +shop, the coal-pit, and the choking factory--but: + + "Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood + Stand dressed in living green" + +for her, thanks to the poet. But, alas for the poet there is not a +peasant nor a wretched operative of them all who will not shake his head +and tap his forehead with his forefinger when the poor poet chap passes +by. The peasant has the same opinion of him that the physician, the +trainer, and the money-lender had of the rhetorician. + +The hard conditions of the lonely New England life, with its religious +theories as sombre as its forests, its rigid notions of duty as difficult +to make bloom into sweetness and beauty as the stony soil, would have +been unendurable if they had not been touched with the ideal created by +the poet. There was in creed and purpose the virility that creates a +state, and, as Menander says, the country which is cultivated with +difficulty produces brave men; but we leave out an important element in +the lives of the Pilgrims if we overlook the means they had of living +above their barren circumstances. I do not speak only of the culture +which many of them brought from the universities, of the Greek and Roman +classics, and what unworldly literature they could glean from the +productive age of Elizabeth and James, but of another source, more +universally resorted to, and more powerful in exciting imagination and +emotion, and filling the want in human nature of which we have spoken. +They had the Bible, and it was more to them, much more, than a book of +religion, than a revelation of religious truth, a rule for the conduct of +life, or a guide to heaven. It supplied the place to them of the +Mahabharata to the Hindoo, of the story-teller to the Arab. It opened to +them a boundless realm of poetry and imagination. + +What is the Bible? It might have sufficed, accepted as a book of +revelation, for all the purposes of moral guidance, spiritual +consolation, and systematized authority, if it had been a collection of +precepts, a dry code of morals, an arsenal of judgments, and a treasury +of promises. We are accustomed to think of the Pilgrims as training +their intellectual faculties in the knottiest problems of human +responsibility and destiny, toughening their mental fibre in wrestling +with dogmas and the decrees of Providence, forgetting what else they drew +out of the Bible: what else it was to them in a degree it has been to few +peoples many age. For the Bible is the unequaled record of thought and +emotion, the reservoir of poetry, traditions, stories, parables, +exaltations, consolations, great imaginative adventure, for which the +spirit of man is always longing. It might have been, in warning examples +and commands, all-sufficient to enable men to make a decent pilgrimage on +earth and reach a better country; but it would have been a very different +book to mankind if it had been only a volume of statutes, and if it +lacked its wonderful literary quality. It might have enabled men to +reach a better country, but not, while on earth, to rise into and live in +that better country, or to live in a region above the sordidness of +actual life. For, apart from its religious intention and sacred +character, the book is so written that it has supremely in its history, +poetry, prophecies, promises, stories, that clear literary quality that +supplies, as certainly no other single book does, the want in the human +mind which is higher than the want of facts or knowledge. + +The Bible is the best illustration of the literature of power, for it +always concerns itself with life, it touches it at all points. And this +is the test of any piece of literature--its universal appeal to human +nature. When I consider the narrow limitations of the Pilgrim +households, the absence of luxury, the presence of danger and hardship, +the harsh laws--only less severe than the contemporary laws of England +and Virginia--the weary drudgery, the few pleasures, the curb upon the +expression of emotion and of tenderness, the ascetic repression of +worldly thought, the absence of poetry in the routine occupations and +conditions, I can feel what the Bible must have been to them. It was an +open door into a world where emotion is expressed, where imagination can +range, where love and longing find a language, where imagery is given to +every noble and suppressed passion of the soul, where every aspiration +finds wings. It was history, or, as Thucydides said, philosophy teaching +by example; it was the romance of real life; it was entertainment +unfailing; the wonder-book of childhood, the volume of sweet sentiment to +the shy maiden, the sword to the soldier, the inciter of the youth to +heroic enduring of hardness, it was the refuge of the aged in failing +activity. Perhaps we can nowhere find a better illustration of the true +relation of literature to life than in this example. + +Let us consider the comparative value of literature to mankind. +By comparative value I mean its worth to men in comparison with other +things of acknowledged importance, such as the creation of industries, +the government of States, the manipulation of the politics of an age, +the achievements in war and discovery, and the lives of admirable men. +It needs a certain perspective to judge of this aright, for the near and +the immediate always assume importance. The work that an age has on +hand, whether it be discovery, conquest, the wars that determine +boundaries or are fought for policies, the industries that develop a +country or affect the character of a people, the wielding of power, the +accumulation of fortunes, the various activities of any given +civilization or period, assume such enormous proportions to those engaged +in them that such a modest thing as the literary product seems +insignificant in comparison; and hence it is that the man of action +always holds in slight esteem the man of thought, and especially the +expresser of feeling and emotion, the poet and the humorist. It is only +when we look back over the ages, when civilizations have passed or +changed, over the rivalries of States, the ambitions and enmities of men, +the shining deeds and the base deeds that make up history, that we are +enabled to see what remains, what is permanent. Perhaps the chief result +left to the world out of a period of heroic exertion, of passion and +struggle and accumulation, is a sheaf of poems, or the record by a man of +letters of some admirable character. Spain filled a large place in the +world in the sixteenth century, and its influence upon history is by no +means spent yet; but we have inherited out of that period nothing, I dare +say, that is of more value than the romance of Don Quixote. It is true +that the best heritage of generation from generation is the character of +great men; but we always owe its transmission to the poet and the writer. +Without Plato there would be no Socrates. There is no influence +comparable in human life to the personality of a powerful man, so long as +he is present to his generation, or lives in the memory of those who felt +his influence. But after time has passed, will the world, will human +life, that is essentially the same in all changing conditions, be more +affected by what Bismarck did or by what Goethe said? + +We may without impropriety take for an illustration of the comparative +value of literature to human needs the career of a man now living. In +the opinion of many, Mr. Gladstone is the greatest Englishman of this +age. What would be the position of the British empire, what would be the +tendency of English politics and society without him, is a matter for +speculation. He has not played such a role for England and its neighbors +as Bismarck has played for Germany and the Continent, but he has been one +of the most powerful influences in molding English action. He is the +foremost teacher. Rarely in history has a nation depended more upon a +single man, at times, than the English upon Gladstone, upon his will, his +ability, and especially his character. In certain recent crises the +thought of losing him produced something like a panic in the English +mind, justifying in regard to him, the hyperbole of Choate upon the death +of Webster, that the sailor on the distant sea would feel less safe-- +as if a protecting providence had been withdrawn from the world. His +mastery of finance and of economic problems, his skill in debate, his +marvelous achievements in oratory, have extorted the admiration of his +enemies. There is scarcely a province in government, letters, art, or +research in which the mind can win triumphs that he has not invaded and +displayed his power in; scarcely a question in politics, reform, letters, +religion, archaeology, sociology, which he has not discussed with +ability. He is a scholar, critic, parliamentarian, orator, voluminous +writer. He seems equally at home in every field of human activity--a man +of prodigious capacity and enormous acquirements. He can take up, with a +turn of the hand, and always with vigor, the cause of the Greeks, Papal +power, education, theology, the influence of Egypt on Homer, the effect +of English legislation on King O'Brien, contributing something noteworthy +to all the discussions of the day. But I am not aware that he has ever +produced a single page of literature. Whatever space he has filled in +his own country, whatever and however enduring the impression he has made +upon English life and society, does it seem likely that the sum total of +his immense activity in so many fields, after the passage of so many +years, will be worth to the world as much as the simple story of Rab and +his Friends? Already in America I doubt if it is. The illustration +might have more weight with some minds if I contrasted the work of this +great man--as to its answering to a deep want in human nature--with a +novel like 'Henry Esmond' or a poem like 'In Memoriam'; but I think it is +sufficient to rest it upon so slight a performance as the sketch by +Dr. John Brown, of Edinburgh. For the truth is that a little page of +literature, nothing more than a sheet of paper with a poem written on it, +may have that vitality, that enduring quality, that adaptation to life, +that make it of more consequence to all who inherit it than every +material achievement of the age that produced it. It was nothing but a +sheet of paper with a poem on it, carried to the door of his London +patron, for which the poet received a guinea, and perhaps a seat at the +foot of my lord's table. What was that scrap compared to my lord's +business, his great establishment, his equipages in the Park, his +position in society, his weight in the House of Lords, his influence in +Europe? And yet that scrap of paper has gone the world over; it has been +sung in the camp, wept over in the lonely cottage; it has gone with the +marching regiments, with the explorers--with mankind, in short, on its +way down the ages, brightening, consoling, elevating life; and my lord, +who regarded as scarcely above a menial the poet to whom he tossed the +guinea--my lord, with all his pageantry and power, has utterly gone and +left no witness. + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Relation of Literature To Life +by Charles Dudley Warner + diff --git a/old/cwlal11.zip b/old/cwlal11.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f4fb502 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cwlal11.zip |