This led to some conversation on novels and novel-writing, and I ventured to say: "How is it that not one of the English novelists has ever drawn any high or adequate character of the clergyman? Walter Scott never gave us anything beyond the respectable official. Goldsmith's Dr. Primrose is a good man, the best we have in your English fiction, but odd and amusing rather than otherwise. Then Dickens has given us Chadband and Stiggins, and you Charles Honeyman. Can you not conceive," I went on to say, "that a man, without any chance of worldly profit, for a bare stipend, giving his life to promote what you must know are the highest interests of mankind, is engaged in a noble calling, worthy of being nobly described? Or have you no examples in England to draw from?" [116] This last sentence touched him, and I meant it should.
With considerable excitement he said, "I delivered a lecture the other evening in your church in New York, for the Employment Society; would you let me read to you a passage from it?" Of course I said I should be very glad to hear it, and added, "I thank you for doing that."—"I don't know why you should thank me," he said; "it cost me but an hour's reading, and I got $1,500 for them. I thought I was the party obliged. But I did tell them they should have a dozen shirts made up for me, and they did it." He then went and brought his lecture, and read the passage, which told of a curate's taking him to visit a poor family in London, where he witnessed a scene of distress and of disinterestedness very striking and beautiful to see. It was a very touching description, and Thackeray nearly broke sown in reading it.
A part of the winter of 1856-57 I passed with my family at Charleston, S. C. I went to preach in Dr. Gilman's pulpit, and to lecture. I had been there the spring before, and made very agreeable acquaintance with the people. My reception, both in public and in private, was as kindly and hospitable as I could desire. I was much interested in society there, and strongly attached to it. But in August following, in an address under our Old Elm-tree in Sheffield,[117] I made some observations upon the threatened extension of the slave-system, that dashed nearly all my agreeable relations with Charleston. I am not a person to regard such a breach with indifference: it pained me deeply. My only comfort was, that what I said was honestly said; that no honorable man can desire to be respected or loved through ignorance of his character or opinions; and that the ground then recently taken at the South—that the institution of human slavery is intrinsically right, just, and good—seems to me to involve such a wrong to humanity, such evil to the South, and such peril to the Union of the States, that it was a proper occasion for speaking earnestly and decidedly.
I was altogether unprepared for the treatment I received. One year before, I had been in the great Charleston Club, when the question of the perpetuity of the slave-system was discussed; when, indeed, an elaborate essay was read by one of the members, in which the ground was taken, that the dark cloud would sink away to the southwest, to Central America perhaps, from whence the slave population would find an exodus across the water to Africa; and of twenty members present, seventeen agreed with the essayist.
And I take occasion here to say, that this position of the seventeen was mainly satisfactory to me. I would, indeed, have had the South go farther. I would have had it take in hand the business of putting an end to slavery, by laws [118] providing for its gradual abolition, and by preparing the slaves for it; but I did not believe then, and do not now, [FN: The date of this passage must be in or about 1868.-M. E. D.] that immediate emancipation was theoretically the best plan. It was forced upon us by the exigencies of the war. And, independently of that, such was the infatuation of the Southern mind on the subject that there seemed to be no prospect of its ever being brought to take that view of it which was prevailing through the civilized and Christian world. But if it had taken that view, and had gone about the business of preparing for emancipation, I think the general public sentiment would have been satisfied; and I believe the result would have been better for the slaves, and better for the country. To be sure, things are working better perhaps now than could have been expected, and it may turn out that instant emancipation was the best thing. But the results of great social changes do not immediately reveal themselves. We are feeling, for instance, the pressure and peril of the free system in government more than we did fifty years ago, and may have to feel and fear it more than we do now. The freedmen are, at present, upon their good behavior, and are acting under the influence of a previous condition. But when I look to the future, and see them rising to wealth, culture, and refinement, and, as human beings, entitled to consideration as much as any other, [119] and yet forbidden intermarriage with the whites, as they should be for physiological reasons,-when, in fine, they see that they have not any fair and just position in American society and government,—they may be sorry that they were not gradually emancipated, and colonized to their own native country; and for ourselves-for our own country—the seeds may be sowing, in the dark bosom of the future, which may spring up in civil wars more terrible than ever were seen before.
Such speculations and opinions, I am sensible, would meet with no favor among us now. The espousal of the slave-man's cause among our Northern people is so humane and hearty that they can stop nowhere, for any consideration of expediency, in doing him justice, after all his wrongs; and I honor their feeling, go to what lengths it will. Nevertheless, I put down these my thoughts, for my children to understand, regard them as they may.
But what it is in my style or manner of writing that has called forth such a hard feeling towards me, from extremists both North and South, upon this slavery question, I cannot understand. In every instance in which I have spoken of it, I have been drawn out by a sense of duty,-there certainly was no pleasure in it. I have never assailed the motives of any man or party; I have spoken in no feeling of unkindness to anybody; there can have been no bitterness in my speech. [120] And yet something, I suppose, there must have been in my way of expressing myself, to offend. It may have been a fault, it may have been a merit for aught I know; for truly I do not know what it was.
After all, how little does any man know of his own personality,—of his personality in action? He may study himself; he may find out what his faculties, what his traits of character are, in the abstract as it were; but what they are in action, in movement,—how they appear to others,—he cannot know. The eye that looks around upon a landscape sees everything but itself. It is just as a man may look in the glass and see himself there every day; but he sees only the framework, only the "still life" in his face; he does not see it in the free play of expression,—in the strong workings of thought and feeling. I was one day sitting with Robert Walsh in Paris, and there was a large mirror behind him. Suddenly he said, "Ah, what a vain fellow you are!"-"How so?" I asked.—"Why," said he, "you are not looking at me as you talk, but you are looking at yourself in the glass."—"It is a fact!" I exclaimed, "I never saw myself talking before,—never saw the play of my own features in conversation." Had the mind a glass thus to look in, it would see things, see wonders, it knows nothing of now. It might see worse things, it might see better things, than it expected. And yet I have been endeavoring in these pages [121] to give some account of myself, while, after all, I am obliged to say that it is little more than a post mortem examination. If I had been dealing with the living subject, I suppose I could not have dealt so freely with myself. The last thing which I ever thought of doing is this which I have now done. Autobiographies are often pleasant reading; but I confess that I have always had a kind of prejudice against them. They have seemed to me to imply something of vanity, or a want of dignified reserve. The apology lies, perhaps, in the writer's ignorance, after all, of his own and very self. He has only told the story of a life. He has not come much nearer to himself than statistics come to the life of a people.
All that I know is, that I have lived a life mainly happy in its experience, not merely according to the average, not merely as things go in this world, but far more than that; which I should be willing to live again for the happiness that has blessed it, yet more for the interests which have animated it, and which has always been growing happier from the beginning. I have lived a life mainly fortunate in its circumstances both of early nurture and active pursuit; marred by no vice,—I do not remember even ever to have told a lie,—stained by no dishonor; laborious, but enjoying labor, especially in the sphere to which my life has been devoted; suffering from no pressing want, though moderate in means, and successful in every way, as much as I had any [122] right or reason to expect. I have been happy (the word is weak to express it) in my domestic relations, happy in the dearest and holiest friendships, and happy in the respect of society. And I have had a happiness (I dread the appearance of profession in saying it) in things divinest, in religion, in God,-in associating with him all the beauty of nature and the blessedness of life, beyond all other possible joy. And, therefore, notwithstanding all that I have suffered, notwithstanding all the pain and weariness and anxiety and sorrow that necessarily enter into life, and the inward errings that are worse than all, I would end my record with a devout thanksgiving to the great Author of my being. For more and more am I unwilling to make my gratitude to him what is commonly called "a thanksgiving for mercies,"—for any benefits or blessings that are peculiar to myself, or my friends, or indeed to any man. Instead of this, I would have it to be gratitude for all that belongs to my life and being,—for joy and sorrow, for health and sickness, for success and disappointment, for virtue and for temptation, for life and death; because I believe that all is meant for good.
Something of what I here say seems to require another word or two to be added, and perhaps it is not unmeet for me to subjoin, as the conclusion of the whole matter, my theory and view and summing up of what life is; for on it, to my apprehension, the virtue and happiness of life [123] mainly repose. It revealed itself dimly in my earlier, it has become clearer to me in my later, years; and the best legacy, as I conceive, that I could leave to my children would be this view of life.
I know that we are not, all the while, thinking of any theory of life. So neither are we all the while thinking of the laws of nature; the attraction of gravitation, for instance. But unless there were some ultimate reference to laws, both material and moral, our minds would lose their balance and security. If I believed that the hill by my side, or the house I live in, were liable any moment to be unseated and hurled through the air by centrifugal force, I should be ill at ease. And if I believed that the world was made by a malignant Power, or that the fortunes of men were the sport of a doubtful conflict between good and evil deities or principles, my life, like that of the ancients, would be filled with superstitions and painful fears. The foundation of all rational human tranquillity, cheerfulness, and courage, whether we are distinctly conscious of it or not, lies in the ultimate conviction, that God is good,—that his providence, his order of things in the world, is good; and theology, in the largest sense of the term, is as vital to us as the air we breathe.
If, then, I thought that this world were a castoff, or a wrecked and ruined, world; if I thought that the human generations had come out from the dark eclipse of some pre-existent state, or [124] from the dark shadow of Adam's fall, broken, blighted, accursed, propense to all evil, and disabled for all good; and if, in consequence, I believed that unnumbered millions of ignorant heathens, and thousands around me,—children but a day old in their conscious moral probation, and men, untaught, nay, ill-taught, misled and blind,—were doomed, as the result of this life-experiment, to intense, to unending, to infinite pain and anguish,—most certainly I should be miserable in such a state, and nothing could make life tolerable to me. Most of all should I detest myself, if the idea that I was to escape that doom could assuage and soothe in my breast the bitter pain of all generous humanity and sympathy for the woes and horrors of such a widespread and overwhelming catastrophe.
What, then, do I say and think? I say, and I maintain, that the constitution of the world is good, and that the constitution of human nature is good; that the laws of nature and the laws of life are ordained for good. I believe that man was made and destined by his Creator ultimately to be an adoring, holy, and happy being; that his spiritual and physical constitution was designed to lead to that end; but that end, it is manifest from the very nature of the case, can be attained only by a free struggle; and this free struggle, with its mingled success and failure, is the very story of the world. A sublime story it is, therefore. The life of men and nations has not been [125] a floundering on through useless disorder and confusion, trial and strife, war and bloodshed; but it has been a struggling onward to an end.
This, I believe, has been the story of the world from the beginning. Before the Christian, before the Hebrew, system appeared, there was religion, worship, faith, morality, in the world, and however erring, yet always improving from age to age. Those systems are great steps in the human progress; but they are not the only steps. Moses is venerable to me. The name of Jesus is "above every name;" but my reverence for him does not require me to lose all interest in Confucius and Zoroaster, in Socrates and Plato.
In short, the world is a school; men are pupils in this school; God is its builder and ordainer. And he has raised up for its instruction sages and seers, teachers and guides; ay, martyred lives, and sacrificial toils and tears and blood, have been poured out for it. The greatest teaching, the greatest life, the most affecting, heart-regenerating sacrifice, was that of the Christ. From him I have a clearer guidance, and a more encouraging reliance upon the help and mercy of God, than from all else. I do not say the only reliance, but the greatest.
This school of life I regard as the infant-school of eternity. The pupils, I believe, will go on forever learning. There is solemn retribution in this system,—the future must forever answer for the past; I would not have it otherwise. I must fight [126] the battle, if I would win the prize; and for all failure, for all cowardice, for all turning aside after ease and indulgence in preference to virtue and sanctity, I must suffer; I would not have it otherwise. There is help divine offered to me, there is encouragement wise and gracious; I welcome it. There is a blessed hereafter opened to prayer and penitence and faith; I lift my hopes to that immortal life. This view of the system of things spreads for me a new light over the heavens and the earth. It is a foundation of peace and strength and happiness more to be valued, in my account, than the title-deed of all the world.
THE foregoing pages, selected from many written at intervals between 1857 and 1870, tell nearly all of their writer's story which it can be of interest to the public to know; and although I have been tempted here and there to add some explanatory remarks, I have thought it best on the whole to leave them in their original and sometimes abrupt simplicity. The author did not intend them for publication, but for his family alone; and in sharing a part with a larger audience than he contemplated, we count upon a measure of that responsive sympathy with which we ourselves read frequently between the Lines, and enter into his meaning without many words.
But there is one point I cannot leave untouched. There is one subject on which some of those who nevertheless honor him have scarcely understood his position.
Twenty-five years ago slavery was a question upon which feeling was not only strong, but roused, stung, and goaded to a height of passion [128] where all argument was swept away by the common emotion as futile, if not base. My father, thinking the system hateful in itself and productive of nearly unmingled evil, held nevertheless that, like all great and established wrongs, it must be met with wise and patient counsel; and that in the highest interest of the slave, of the white race, of the country, and of constitutional liberty, its abolition must be gradual. To the uncompromising Abolitionists such views were intolerable; and by some of those who demanded immediate emancipation, even at the cost of the Union and all that its destruction involved, it was said that he was influenced by a mean spirit of expediency and a base truckling to the rank and wealth which sustained this insult to humanity.
They little knew him. The man who at twenty-five had torn himself from the associations and friendships of his youth, and, moved solely by love of truth, had imperilled all his worldly hopes by joining himself to a small religious body, despised and hated as heretics by most of those whom he had been trained to love and respect, was not the man at fifty to blanch from the expression of any honest conviction; and, to sum up all in one word, he held his views upon this subject, as upon all others, bravely and honestly, and stated them clearly and positively, when he felt it his duty to speak, although evasion or silence would have been the more comfortable alternative. "I doubt," says Mr. Chadwick,[129] "if Garrison or Parker had a keener sense than his of the enormity of human slavery. Before the first Abolitionist Society had been organized, he was one of the organizers of a committee for the discussion and advancement of emancipation. I have read all of his principal writings upon slavery, and it would be hard to find more terrible indictments of its wickedness. He stated its defence in terms that Foote and Yancey might have made their own, only to sweep it all away with the blazing ubiquity that the negro was a man and an immortal soul. Yet when the miserable days of fugitive-slave rendition were upon us, he was with Gannett in the sad conviction that the law must be obeyed. We could not see it then; but we can see to-day that it was possible for men as good and true as any men alive to take this stand. And nothing else brings out the nobleness of Dewey into such bold relief as the fact, that the immeasurable torrent of abuse that greeted his expressed opinion did not in any least degree avail to make him one of the pro-slavery faction. The concession of 1850 was one which he would not have made, and it must be the last. Welcome to him the iron flail of war, whose tribulation saved the immortal wheat of justice and purged away the chaff of wrong to perish in unquenchable fire!"
His feelings retained their early sensitiveness
[FN The Rev. John W. Chadwick, of Brooklyn, N. Y., In a sermon preached after Dr. Dewey's death.]
[130] in a somewhat remarkable degree. In a letter written when he was near seventy he says, "I do believe there never was a man into whose manhood and later life so much of his foolish boyhood flowed as into mine. I am as anxious to go home, I shall be all the way to-morrow as eager and restless, and all the while thinking of the end of my journey, as if I were a boy going from school, or a young lover six weeks after his wedding-day. Shall I ever learn to be an old man?"
But it was this very simplicity and tenderness that gave such a charm to his personal intercourse. His emotions, like his thoughts, had a plain directness about them which assured you of their honesty. With a profound love of justice, he had an eminently judicial mind, and could not be content without viewing a subject from every side, and casting light upon all its points. The light was simple sunshine, untinged by artificial mixtures; the views were direct and straightforward, with no subtle slants of odd or recondite position; and in his feelings, also, there was the same large and natural simplicity. You felt the ground-swell of humanity in them, and it was this breadth and genuineness which laid the foundation of his power as a preacher, making him strike unerringly those master chords that are common and universal in every audience. Gifts of oratory he had, both natural and acquired,—a full, melodious voice, so sympathetic in modulation and so attuned to [131] reverence that I have heard more than one person say that his first few words in the pulpit did more towards lifting them to a truly religious frame of mind than the whole service from any other lips,—a fine dramatic power, enough to have given him distinction as an actor, had that been the profession of his choice,—a striking dignity of presence, and an easy and appropriate gesticulation. But these, as well as his strong common sense, that balance-wheel of character, were brought into the service of his earnest convictions. What he had to say, he put into the simplest form; and if his love of art and beauty, and his imaginative faculty, gave wealth and ornament to his style, he never sacrificed a particle of direct force for any rhetorical advantage. His function in life—he felt it to his inmost soul—was to present to human hearts and minds the essential verities of their existence in such a manner that they could not choose but believe in them. His strength was in his reverent perception of the majesty of Right as accordant with the Divine and Eternal Will; his power over men was in the sublimity of his appeal to an answering faith in themselves.
He was greatest as a preacher, and it is as a preacher that he will be best remembered by the public. The printed page, though far inferior to the fervid eloquence of the same words when spoken, will corroborate by its beauty, its pathos, and its logical force, the traditions that still linger [132] of his deep impressiveness in the pulpit. In making the following selections from his letters, I have been influenced by the desire to let them show him in his daily and familiar life, with the easy gayety and love of humor which was as natural to him as the deep and solemn meditations which absorbed the larger part of his mind. They are very far from elaborate compositions, being rather relaxations from labor, and he thought very slightly of them himself; yet I think they will present the real man as nothing but such careless and conversational writing can.
No letters of his boyhood have been preserved, and very few of his youth. This, to Dr. Channing, was probably written at Plymouth, while there on an exchange of pulpits, soon after his ordination at New Bedford:—
To Rev. William Ellery Charming, D.D.
PLYMOUTH, Dec. 27, 1823.
DEAR SIR,—I was scarcely disappointed at your not coming to my ordination, and indeed I have felt all along that, if you could not preach, I had much rather see you at a more quiet and leisurely time. I thank you for the hope you have given me of this in the suggestion you made to Mr. Tuckerman. When the warm season comes, I pray you to give Mrs. Dewey and me the pleasure of trying what we can do to promote your comfort and health, and of enjoying your society for a week. [133] Our ordination was indeed very pleasant, and our prospects are becoming every day more encouraging. The services of that occasion were attended with the most gratifying and useful impression. Our friend, Mr. Tuckerman, preached more powerfully, and produced a neater effect, than I had supposed he ever did. I must remind you, however, that his sermon, like every good sermon, had its day when it was delivered. We cannot print the pathos, nor you read the fervor, with which it was spoken.
I have had no opportunity to express to you the very peculiar and high gratification with which I have received the late expression of the liberality and kindness of your society, nor can it be necessary. I cannot fail to add, however, that the pleasure is greatly enhanced by the knowledge that I owe the occasion of it to your suggestion.
I hope to visit Boston this winter, or early in the spring. I often feel as if I had a burden of questions which I wish to propose to you for conversation. The want of this resource and satisfaction is one of the principal reasons that make me regret my distance from Boston. I shall always remember the weeks I spent with you, two years ago, with more interest than I shall ever feel it proper to express to you. It is one of my most joyful hopes of heaven, that such intercourse shall be renewed, and exalted and perpetuated forever.
To the Same.
NEW BEDFORD, Sept. 21, 1824.
DEAR SIR,—I thank you for your letter and invitation [See p. 50] . . . . The result of your going to Boston is what I [134] feared, and it seems too nearly settled that nothing will give you health, but a different mind, or a different mode of life.
Quintilian advises the orator to retire before he is spent, and says that he can still advance the object of his more active and laborious pursuits by conversing, by publishing, and by teaching others, youths, to follow in his steps. I do not quote this advice to recommend it, if it were proper for me to recommend anything. But I have often revolved the courses that might preserve your life, and make it at once happy to yourself and useful to us, for many years to come. I cannot admit any plan that would dismiss you altogether from the pulpit, nor do I believe that any such could favor your happiness or your health. But could you not limit yourself to preaching, say ten times in a year (provided one of them be in New Bedford)? and will you permit me to ask, nor question my modesty in doing so, if you could not spend a part of the year in a leisurely preparation of something for the press? I fear that your MSS., and I mean your sermons now, would suffer by any other revisal and publication than your own. With regard to the last suggestion of Quintilian's, I have supposed that it has been fairly before you; but perhaps I have already said more than becomes me. If so, I am confident at least that I deserve your pardon for my good intentions; and with these, I am, dear sir, most truly as well as
Respectfully your friend,
I am tempted to introduce here a sketch of my father as he appeared in those early days, writ-en by Rev. W. H. Channing, for "the London Enquirer" of April 13, 1882:
[135] "It so happened then to me, while a youth of twelve or fifteen years in training at the Boston Latin School for Harvard University, that Dr. Dewey became a familiar guest in my mother's hospitable house. He was at this period the temporary minister of Federal Street Church, while Dr. Channing was seeking to renew his wasted energies, for better work, in Europe. And on Mondays—after his exhausting outpourings of Sunday—he was wont to 'drop in, while passing,' to talk over the themes of his discourse, or for friendly interchange of thought and sympathy. A special attraction was that the Misses Cabot, the elder of whom became a few years later Mrs. Charles Follen (both of whom will be remembered by English friends), made a common home with my mother; and the radiant intelligence, glowing enthusiasm, hearty affectionateness, and genial merriment of these bright-witted sisters charmed him. Sometimes they probed with penetrating questions the mystical metaphysics of the preceding day's sermon. Then, deeply stirred, and all on fire with truths dawning on his vision, he would rise from his chair and slowly pace the room, in a half soliloquy, half rejoinder. At these times of high-wrought emotion his aspect was commanding. His head was rounded like a dome, and he bore it erect, as if its weight was a burden; his eyes, blue-gray in tint, were gentle, while gleaming with inner light; the nostrils were outspread, as if breathing in mountain-top air; and the mobile lips, the lower of which protruded, apparently measured his deliberately accented words as if they were coins stamped in the mint. It was intense delight for a boy to listen to these luminous self-unfoldings, embodied in rhythmic speech. They moved me more profoundly even than the suppressed feeling of his awe-struck prayers, [136] or the fluent fervor of his pulpit addresses; for they raised the veil, and admitted one into his Holy of holies. At other times, literary or artistic themes, the newest poem, novel, picture, concert, came up for discussion; and as these ladies were verse-writers, essayists, critics, and lovers of beauty in all forms, the conversations called out the rich genius and complex tendencies and aptitudes of Dr. Dewey in stimulating suggestions, which were refreshing as spring breezes. His mind gave hospitable welcome to each new fact disclosed by science, to all generous hopes for human refinement and ennobling ideals, while his discernment was keen to detect false sentiment or flashy sophisms. Again, some startling event would bring conventional customs and maxims to the judgment-bar of pure Christian ethics, when his moral indignation blazed forth with impartial equity against all degrading views of human nature, debasing prejudices, and distrust of national progress,—sparing no tyrant, however wealthy or high in station; pleading for the downcast, however lowly; hoping for the fallen, however scorned. Thanks to this clear-sighted moralist, he gave me, in his own example, a standard of generous Optimism too sun-bright ever to be eclipsed. Let it not be inferred from these hasty outlines, however, that Dr. Dewey was habitually grave, or intent on serious topics solely, in social intercourse So far from this, he continually startled one by his swift transitions from solemn discourse to humorous descriptions of persons, places, experiences. And as the Misses Cabot and my mother alike regarded healthful laughter, cheery sallies, and childlike gayety as a wise relief for overwrought brains or high-strung sensibilities, our fireside sparkled with brilliant repartees and scintillating mirth. It is [137] pleasantly remembered that, in such by-play, Dr. Dewey, while often satirical, and prone to good-tempered banter, was never cynical, and was intolerant of personal gossip or he intrusion of mean slander. And to close the chapter of boyhood's acquaintance, it is gratefully recalled how cordially sympathetic this earnest apostle was with my youthful studies, trials, aspirations. All recollections, indeed, of my uncle's curate—whom, as is well-known, le wished to become his colleague—are charming; and before my matriculation at Harvard, one of my most trusted religious guides was Orville Dewey." The Wares, both Henry and William, were among my father's dearest friends at this time, and the intimacy was interrupted only by death.
To Rev. Henry Ware.
NEW BEDFORD, Feb. 2, 1824. MY DEAR FRIEND,
There is a great cause committed to us,—not that of a party, but that of principles. A contest as important as that of the Reformation is to pass here, and I trust,-though with trembling,—I trust in God that it is to be maintained with a better spirit. I cannot help feeling that generations as boundless as shall spread from the Atlantic to the Pacific shores wait for the result. The importance of everything that is doing for the improvement of this country is fast swelling to infinitude. These, dear sir, are some of my dreams, I fear I must call them, rather than waking thoughts. It seems to me not a little to know the age and country we live in. I think, and think, and think that something must be done, and often [138] I feel, and feel, and feel that I do nothing. What can we do to make ourselves and others aware of our Christian duties and of the signs of this time?
There is one comfort,—Unitarianism will succeed just as far as it is worthy of it,—and there are some forms of practical Unitarianism that ought not to meet with any favor in the world. If the whole mass becomes of this character, let it go down, till another wave of providence shall bring it up again.
But enough of this preaching: you think of all these things, and a thousand more, better than I can say them. I turn to your letter. Elder H., for whom you ask, is a very good man,-very friendly to me; but le is a terrible fanatic. He has Unitarian revivals that might match with any of them. It is a curious fact that the Christians, as they call themselves, Unitarian as they ire, form the most extravagant, fiery, fanatical sect in this country.
Mrs. Dewey desires very friendly regards to Mrs. Ware, of whose continued illness we are concerned to lean Let my kind remembrance be joined with my wife's, and believe me very truly,
Your friend and brother,
To the Same.
NEW BEDFORD, Feb. 14, 1824.
MY DEAR FRIEND,—I cannot repress the inclination to offer you my sympathy. I have often thought with [FN: Mrs. Ware died in the interval between those two letters she was the daughter of Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, of Cambridge, Mass. In 1827 Mr. Ware was again married to Miss Mary Lovell Pickard.] [139] pain of what was coming upon you; and I fear, though long threatening, it has come at last with a weight which you could hardly have anticipated. May God sustain and comfort you! You are supported, I well know, while you are afflicted, in every recollection of what you lave lost. Surely the greatness of your trial argues the Kindness of Heaven, for it proves the greatness of the blessing you have enjoyed.
But, my dear sir, I will not urge upon you words which are but words, and touch not the terrible reality that occupies your mind. You want not the poor and old sayings of one who knows not—who cannot know—what you suffer. You need not the aids of reflection from me. But you need what, in common with your hands, I would invoke for you,—the aid, the consolation that is divine. God grant it to you,—all that affection can ask,—all that affliction can need,—prays
Your friend and brother,
To Dr. Channing.
NEW BEDFORD, Oct. 16, 1827.
MY DEAR AND REVERED FRIEND,—Excuse me for calling you so; may the formalities and the English reserves excuse me too.
I have had two letters from New York, one from Mr. Sewall, and the other from Mr. Ware, which are so pressing as really to give me some trouble. Do say something to me on this subject, if you have anything to say. There certainly are many reasons, and strong as numerous, why I should not at present leave New Bedford,-why I should not take such a post. I cannot say I am made to doubt what I ought to do; but I have a fear lest [140] I should not do right, lest I should love my ease too well, lest it should be said to me in the other world, "A great opportunity, a glorious field was opened to you, and you did not improve it,"—lest, in other words, I should not act upon considerations sufficiently high, comprehensive, and disinterested,—fit, in short, for contemplation from the future world as well as from the present.
I do not write asking you to reply; for I do not suppose you have anything to say which you would not have suggested when I was with you. Indeed, I believe I write, as much as for anything, because I want to communicate with you about something, and this is uppermost in my mind.
Present my affectionate regards to Mrs. Channing and the children, and to Miss Gibbs.
Yours most affectionately,
O. DEWEY. To Rev. Henry Ware.
NEW BEDFORD, March 29, 1829.
MY DEAR FRIEND,—I cannot let you go off without my blessing. I did not know of your purpose till last evening, or I should not have left myself to write to you in the haste of a few minutes snatched on Sunday evening, to say nothing of the aching nerves' and the misled hand that usually come along with it. By the by, I have a good mind to desire you to propose a year's exchange [for me] to somebody in England. If you meet with a man who is neither too good nor too bad, suppose you suggest it to him,—not as from me, however.
I should think that a man, in going to England, would feel the evil of belonging to a sect, unless that sect [141] embraced all the good and wise and gifted,—which can be said of no sect. The sectarianism of sects, however, is the bad thing. These are necessary; that is not necessary, but to human weakness. But fie upon discoursing to a man who is just stepping on shipboard! May it bear you safely! May it tread the mountain wave "as a steed that knows its rider," and is conscious of what it bears from us! My heart will go with you in a double sense; for I want to see England,—I want to see Italy, and the Alps, and the south of France. I don't know whether you intend to do all this; and I am very certain not to do any of it. I know that yours will not be a travelled heart, any more than Goldsmith's. Let me lay in my claim for as many of its kind thoughts as belong to me. But yet more, let me assure you, as the exigency demands, that for every one you have thus to render, I have five to give in return.
I believe you will not be sorry, at this time, that my lines and words are few and far between; for your leisure cannot serve to read many.
Mrs. D. desires her best wishes to you. We do not know whether Mrs. Ware goes with you, but hope she does.
I took my pen feeling as if I had not a word to say, but—God bless you! and that I say with all my heart. Write me from abroad if you can, but make no exertion to do so.
Yours as ever,
To the Same.
NEW BEDFORD, Sep. 14, 1830,
DEAR WARE,—I write down the good old compellation here, not because I have anything in particular to say [142] to you, but just to assure myself in the agreeable conviction that you are again within sixty miles of me. When you get a little quiet, when matters have taken some form with you, when you have seen some hundreds of people, and answered some thousands of questions, then take your pen for the space of ten minutes, and tell me of your "whereabouts," and how your strength and spirits hold out, and what is the prospect.
I hope you will not disappoint me of the visit this autumn, for I want to talk the sun down and the stars up with you. I suppose you have tales enough for "a thousand and one nights." You have made friends here, moreover, even in Rome,—some by hearsay, and others who will be here probably in a fortnight or three weeks. Kind Mrs. Ware has admirers here. Think of that, sir! That while Mr. W. is spoken of only with a kind of reverence, the lady carries off all the charms and fascinations of epithet. But alas! Such is the hard fate of us of the wiser sex. There are other senses than Saint Paul's in which we may say, "Where I am weak, there am I strong."
Pray excuse the levity (specific) of this letter, on two rounds,—first, that I am very heavy, and should sink in any other vessel; and, secondly, that I cannot take in any of the weighty matters, because I have no room for them.
Mrs. Dewey joins me in the regards to you and Mrs. Ware, with which I am,
Most truly yours,
In less than three years from this time the nervous suffering from overwork became so intense that Mr. Dewey was advised to go abroad [143] to obtain the absolute rest from labor that was impossible here.
To Miss Catherine M. Sedgwick.
SHEFFIELD, May 2, 1833.
My DEAR FRIEND,—I am about to go abroad. I have made up my mind to that huge, half pleasurable, half painful undertaking; or shall I say, rather, that both the pleasure and the pain come by wholes, and not by halves? The latter I feel as a domestic man, for I must go alone; the former I feel as a civilized man. Civilized, I say, for who that has the lowest measure of educated intelligence and sensibility can expect to tread all the classic lands of the world, Greece only excepted, without a thrill of delight?
If you should think that I had written thus much as claiming your sympathy in what so much interests me, and if you should think this without accusing me of presumption, I should be tempted, were I assured of the fact, to stop here, and to leave the matter on a footing so gratifying to my feelings. But I must not venture to take so considerable a risk, and must therefore hasten to tell you that what I have said is only a vestibule to something further.
Nor is the vestibule at all too large or imposing for the object, as I conceive it, to which it is to open the way; for I am about to ask through you, if you will consent and condescend to be the medium, a very considerable favor of a very distinguished man. Among many letters of introduction which I have received, it so happens, as they say in Parliament, that I can obtain none to certain persons that I want to see quite as much as any others [144] in Europe. None of our Boston gentlemen that I can find are acquainted with Professor Wilson, or Miss Ferrier, the author of "Inheritance," or Thomas Moore, or Campbell, or Bulwer. The "Noctes Ambrosianx," with other things, have made me a great admirer of Wilson; and Miss Ferriers (I don't know whether her name ends with s or not) I had rather see than any woman in Europe. She comes nearer to Sir Walter, I think, than any writer of fiction abroad, and in depth of religious sentiment goes very far beyond him. Now, I presume that Washington Irving is acquainted with all these individuals; and what I venture to ask is, whether, through your intervention, letters can be obtained from him to any of them, and especially to the two first.
Now I must make you comprehend how little I wish you to go out of your way, or to put any constraint on yourself in the matter. I have none of the passion for seeing celebrated men, merely as such. Those whose writings have interested me, I do, of course, wish to see; but I am to be too hasty a traveller to make it a great object to see them, or to go very much out of my way for it. Above all, if you have the least reluctance to ask this of Mr. Irving, you must allow me to impose it as a condition of my request that you will not do it; or if Mr. Irving is reluctant to give the letters, do not undertake to tell me so with any circumlocution, for I understand all about the delicacy of these Transatlantic connections. I only fear that the very length of this letter will convey to you an undue impression of the importance which I give to the subject of it. Pray construe it not so, but set it down as one of the involuntary consequences of the pleasure I have in conversing with you.
Very truly your friend,
[145] The letters, and every other advantage that the kindness of friends could provide, were given him, and the mingled anticipations with which he entered on his year of solitary exile were all fulfilled. His enjoyment in the wonders of nature and of art, in society, and in the charm of historical and romantic association which is the peculiar pleasure to an American of travel in the Old World, was very great, and the relief to his brain from the weekly pressure of original production gave him ease for the present and hope for the future. But the year was darkened for him by the death of his youngest sister, who had been married the previous summer to Mr. Andrew L. Russell, of Plymouth, and of his wife's brother, John Hay Farnham, of Indiana; and when he returned home, three months' work convinced him that arduous and prolonged mental labor was henceforth impossible for him. With deep disappointment and sorrow, he resigned his charge at New Bedford, and left the place and people which had been and always remained very dear to him.
Few are left of those who heard his first preaching there. One of his sisters says: "To me, brought up on the Orthodoxy of Berkshire, it was like a revelation, and I think it was much the same to the Quakers. Those views of life and human nature and its responsibilities that are common now, were new then, and the effect produced upon us all was most thrilling and solemn; and [146] when, service over, we passed out of the church, I remember there were very few words spoken,-a contrast to the custom nowadays of chatting and laughing at the door." I have heard others speak of the overwhelming pathos of his manner, and I asked the Rev. Dr. Morison, who came to New Bedford as a young man during the last years of our stay there, to put some of his personal remembrances on paper. In a note from him, dated Toth January, 1883, he says: "I have not forgotten my promise to send you some little account of your father's preaching in New Bedford. He was so great a man, uttering himself in his preaching, the sources of his power lay so deep, his words came to us so vitally connected with the most subtle and effective forces of the moral and spiritual universe, that I can no more describe him than I could a June day, in all its glory and beauty and its boundless resources of joy and life, to one who had never known it."
The following pages, which Dr. Morison was nevertheless kind enough to send, have touching value and beauty:
"More than half a century ago, in March, 1832, I went to New Bedford, and, for nearly a year, was a constant attendant at Mr. Dewey's church. During that year he preached most of the sermons contained in the first volume that he published. As we read them, they are among the ablest and most impressive sermons in the language. But when read now they give only a slight idea of what they were as they came to us then, all [147] glowing and alive with the emotions of the preacher. When he walked through the church to the pulpit, his head swaying backward and forward as if too heavily freighted, his whole bearing was that of one weighed down by the thoughts in which he was absorbed and the solemn message which he had come to deliver. The old prophetic 'burden of the Lord' had evidently been laid upon him. Some hymn marked by its depth of religious feeling was read. This was followed by a prayer, which was not the spontaneous, easy outflowing of calmly reverential feelings, but the labored utterance of a soul overawed and overburdened by emotions too strong for utterance. There was sometimes an appearance almost of distress in this exercise, so utterly inadequate, as it seemed to him, were any words of his to express what lay deepest in his mind, when thus brought face to face with God. 'I do not shrink,' he said, 'from speaking to man.' But, except in his rarest and best moments, he was oppressed by a sense of the poverty of any language of thanksgiving or supplication that he could use in his intercourse with God."
"His manner in preaching was marked by great depth and strength of feeling, but always subdued. He spoke on great subjects. He entered profoundly into them, and treated them with extraordinary intellectual ability and clearness. They who were seeking for light found it in his preaching. But more than any intellectual precision or clearness of thought was to be gained from him in his treatment of the momentous questions which present themselves, sooner or later, to every thoughtful mind. Behind these questions, more important than any one or all of them intellectually considered, was the realm of thought, emotion, aspiration, out of which [148] religious ideas are formed, and in which the highest faculties of our nature are to find their appropriate nourishment and exercise. He spoke to us as one who belonged to this higher world. The realm in which he lived, and which seemed never absent from his mind, impressed itself as he spoke, and gave a deeper solemnity and attractiveness to his words than could be given by any specific and clearly-defined ideas. A sense of mystery and awe pervaded his teachings, and infused into his utterances a sentiment of divine sacredness and authority. He preached as I never, before or since, have heard any one else, on human nature, on retribution, on the power of kindness, on life and death, in their relations to man and to what is divine. He stood before us compassed about by a religious atmosphere which penetrated his inmost nature, and gave its tone and coloring to all he said. For he spoke as one who saw rising visibly before him the issues of life and of death."
"He was gifted with a rare dramatic talent. But it was a gift, not an art, and showed itself in voice and gesture as by the natural impulse of a great nature profoundly moved, and in its extremest manifestations so subdued as to leave the impression of a vast underlying reserved force. His action, so full of meaning and so effective, was no studied or superficial movement of hand and voice, but the action of the whole man, body and soul, all powerfully quickened and moved from within by the living thoughts and emotions to which he was giving utterance."
"I have heard many of the greatest orators of our time. But, with the exception of Daniel Webster and Dr. Channing in their highest moments, Mr. Dewey was the most [149] eloquent man among them all, and that not once or twice, on great occasions, but Sunday after Sunday, forenoon and afternoon, for months together."
"Some allowance should perhaps be made for the state of mind and the period of life in which I heard him. I had just come from college, where the intellect had been cultivated in advance of the moral and religious faculties. The equilibrium which belongs to a perfectly healthy and harmonious nature was disturbed, and, as a necessary consequence of this unbalanced and distempered condition, there was a deep inward unrest, and a craving for something,—the greatest of all,—which had not yet been attained. Mr. Dewey's preaching came in just at this critical time, and it was to me the opening into a new world. The hymn, the prayer, the Scripture reading, usually brought me into a reverent and plastic state of mind, ready to receive and be moulded by the deepest and loftiest Christian truths. From the beginning to the end of the sermon I was under the spell which he had thrown over me, and unconscious of everything else. Very seldom during my life, and then only for a few minutes at a time, has any one, by his eloquence, exercised this absorbing and commanding influence over me. Once or twice in hearing Dr. Channing I felt as I suppose the prophet may have felt when he heard 'the still small voice,' at which 'he wrapped his face in his mantle,' and listened as to the voice of God. A few such experiences I have had with other men; but with Mr. Dewey more than with all others. And when the benediction was pronounced, I wished to go away and be by myself in the new world of spiritual ideas and emotions into which I had been drawn. Those were to me great experiences, [150] inwrought into the inmost fibres of my nature, and always associated in my mind with Mr. Dewey's preaching."
"Nor were these experiences peculiar to any one person. The audience as a whole were affected in a similar manner. A deep solemnity pervaded the place. There was not merely silence, but the spell of absorbed attention that makes itself felt, and spreads itself as by a general sympathy through a congregation profoundly moved by great thoughts filled out and made alive by deep and uplifting emotions. The exercises in the church were often followed by lasting convictions. The Sunday's sermon was the topic, not of curious discussion or indiscriminate eulogy, but of serious conversation among the young, who looked forward to the coming Sunday as offering privileges which it would be a misfortune to lose. The services of the church were remembered and anticipated as the most interesting and important event of the week."
"I shall never cease to think with gratitude of Mr. Dewey's preaching. In common with other great preachers of our denomination,—Dr. Channing, for example, Dr. Nichols, and Dr. Walker,—he spoke as one standing within the all-encompassing and divine presence. He awakened in us a sense of that august and indefinable influence from which all that is holiest and best must come. He brought us into communication with that Light of life. He showed us how our lives, our thoughts, and even our every-day acts, may be sanctified and inspired by it, as every plant and tree is not only illuminated by the sun but vitally associated with it."
"If, in the light of later experience, I were to criticise [151] the preaching I then heard, I should say that it was too intense. The writing and the delivery of such sermons subjected the preacher to too severe a strain both of body and mind. No man could go on preaching in that way, from month to month, without breaking down in health. And it may be questioned whether a mind acting under so high a pressure is in the best condition to take just views, to preserve its proper equipoise, or to impart wise and healthful instruction. The stimulus given may be too strong for the best activity of those who receive it. They whose sensitive natures are most deeply affected by such an example may, under its influence, unconsciously form an ideal of intellectual attainments too exacting, and therefore to them a source of weakness rather than of strength."
"The danger lies in these directions. But Mr. Dewey's breadth of apprehension, his steadfast loyalty and devotion to the truth, the judicial impartiality with which he examined the whole field before making up his mind, saved him from one-sided or ill-balanced conclusions. And the intense action of all the faculties not only enables a man of extraordinary intellectual powers to impress his thought on others and infuse his very soul into theirs; but it also, as we see in the best work of Channing, Dewey, and Emerson, opens to them realms of thought which otherwise might never have been reached, and gives to them glimpses of a divine love and splendor never granted to a less earnest and passionate devotion."
In the autumn of 1835 Mr. Dewey was settled over the Second Unitarian Church in New York, trusting to his stock of already written discourses [152] to save him from a stress of intellectual labor too severe for his suffering brain, which was never again to allow him uninterrupted activity in study. When his life-work is viewed, it should always be remembered under what difficulties it was carried on. It was work that taxed every faculty to the uttermost, while the physical organ of thought had been so strained by over-exertion at the beginning of his professional career, owing to a general ignorance of the bodily laws even greater then than it is now, that the use of it during the rest of his life was like that which a man has of a sprained foot; causing pain in the present exercise, and threatening far worse consequences, if the effort is continued. Fortunately, his health in all other respects was excellent, and his spirits and courage seldom flagged. I remember him as lying much on the sofa in those days, and liking to have his head "scratched" by the hour together, with a sharp-pointed comb, to relieve by external irritation the distressing sensation's, which he compared to those made, sometimes by a tightening ring, sometimes by a leaden cap, and sometimes (but this was in later life) by a dull boring instrument. Yet he was the centre of the family life, and of its merriment as well; and his strong social instincts and lively animal spirits made him full of animation and vivacity in society, although he was soon tired, and with a nervous restlessness undoubtedly the effect of disease, never wanted to stay long in any company. [153] He preached a sermon after the great fire in New York, in December, 1835, which drew forth the following letter from Mr. Henry Ware:—
CAMBRIDGE, Jan. 15, 1836.
DEAR FRIEND,—I must acknowledge your sermon,-you made me most happy by it. It was so true, so right, so strongly and movingly put; it was the word that ought to be said, the word in season. My feeling was: God Almighty be praised for sending that man there to speak to that great and mighty city, and to interpret to it his providence. You cannot but feel gratitude in being appointed to be such an instrument; and I trust that you are to be used much and long, and for great good. Keep yourself well and strong; look on yourself as having a message and a mission, and live for nothing else but to perform it.
I happen to have found out, very accidentally, what is always the most secret of undiscoverable secrets,—that you are asked to preach the Dudleian Lecture. Do not let anything hinder you. We want you: you must come; do not hesitate; and, mind, I speak first, to have you come and house it with me while you are in Cambridge. Pray, deny me not.
Shall I tell you? Your sermon made me cry so that I could not finish reading it, but was obliged to lay it down. Not from its pathos,—but from a stronger, higher, deeper, holier something which it stirred up. I am almost afraid for you when I think what a responsibility lies on you for the use of such powers. May He that gave them give you grace with them! Love to you and yours, and all peace be with you. Yours ever,
[154] In the same year he addressed a letter to Emerson, who, as a cousin of his wife, was well known to him from the first. The familiarity of the opening recalls what he said in writing of him many years after: "Waldo, we always called him in those days, though now all adjuncts have dropped away from the shining name of Emerson."
To Ralph Waldo Emerson.
BOSTON, May 13, 1836.
DEAR WALDO,—I felt much disappointed when, on going to Hancock Place the third time, I found that you had gone to Concord; for I was drawn to you as by a kind of spell. I wanted to see you, though it seemed to me that I could not speak to you one word. I can do no more now,—I am dumb with amazement and sorrow; [FN] and yet I must write to you, were it only to drop a tear on the page I send. Your poor mother! I did not know she had come with you. Miss Hoar 2 I do not know, and will intrude no message; but I think of her more than many messages could express. My dear friend, I am as much concerned for you as for any one. God give you strength to comfort others! Alas! we all make too much of death. Like a vase of crystal that fair form was shattered,—in a moment shattered! Can such an event be the catastrophe we make it?
[FN: This letter was called forth by the sudden death of Charles Chauncey Emerson, a younger brother of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and one of the noblest young men of America.]
[FN: Miss Hoar was betrothed to Charles Emerson.]
[155] I preached to-day at Chauncey Place [FN 1]. I will copy a passage. (I have not space to give the connection.)
"There stood once where now I stand, a father,—I knew him not, but to some of you he was known,—who, ere his children were twined up for life, was called to leave them, but whose fair example and fervent prayer visited them, and dwelt among them, and helped, with much kindly nurture, to form them to learning, virtue, honor, and to present them to the world a goodly band of brothers. And say not, because one and another has fallen on the threshold of life,—fallen amidst the brightest visions and most brilliant promises of youth,—that it is all in vain; that parental toils and cares and prayers are all in vain. There is another life, where every exalted power trained here shall find expansion, improvement, and felicity. [Those sons of the morning, who stand for a moment upon the verge of this earthly horizon amidst the first splendors of day, and then vanish away into heaven, as if translated, not deceased, seem to teach us, almost by a sensible manifestation, how short is the step and how natural is the passage from earth to heaven.][FN 2] They almost open heaven to us, and they help our languid efforts to reach it, by the most powerful of all earthly aids,—the memory of admired and loved virtues. Yes, the mingled sorrow and affection which have swelled many hearts among us within the last week, tell me that the excellence we have lost has not lived in vain. Precious memory of early [156] virtue and piety! and such memories, and more than one such, there are among you. Hold these bright companions ever dear, my young friends; embalm their memory in the fragrant breath of your love; follow them with the generous emulation of virtue; let the seal which death has set upon excellence stamp it with a character of new sanctity and authority; let not virtue die and friendship mourn in vain!"
[FN 1: The church formerly ministered to by the Rev. William Emerson, the father of these rare sons.]
[FN 2: This letter is taken from a copy, not the original; and the meaning of the brackets is uncertain. Probably, however, the passage which they enclose is a quotation.]
Remember me with most affectionate sympathy to your mother, and AuntMary, and to Dr. Ripley.
With my kind regards to your wife, I am, dear Waldo, in love and prayer, yours,
Everybody mourns with you. Dr. Channing said yesterday, "I think Massachusetts could not have met with a greater loss than of that young man."
Mr. Emerson's letter in reply is beautiful in itself, and has the added interest attaching now to every word of his:—
CONCORD, May 23, 1836,
MY DEAR SIR,—I received the last week your kind letter, and the copy of your affectionate notice of Charles A Chauncey Place. I remember how little while ago you consoled us by your sympathy at Edward's departure,—a kind, elevating letter, which I have never acknowledged. I feel as if it was kind, even compassionate, to remember me now that these my claims of remembrance are gone.
Charles's mind was healthy, and had opened steadily with a growth that never ceased from month to month [157] under favorable circumstances. His critical eye was so acute, his rest on himself so absolute, and his power of illustrating his thought by an endless procession of fine images so excellent, that his conversation came to be depended on at home as daily bread, and made a very large part of the value of life to me. His standard of action was heroic,—I believe he never had even temptations to anything mean or gross. With great value for the opinion of plain men, whose habits of life precluded compliment and made their verdict unquestionable, he held perhaps at too low a rate the praise of fashionable people,—so that he steadily withdrew from display, and I felt as if nobody knew my treasure. Meantime, like Aaron, "he could speak well." He had every gift for public debate, and I thought we had an orator in training for the necessities of the country, who should deserve the name and the rewards of eloquence. But it has pleased God not to use him here. The Commonwealth, if it be a loser, knows it not; but I feel as if bereaved of so much of my sight and hearing.
His judgment of men, his views of society, of politics, of religion, of books, of manners, were so original and wise and progressive, that I feel—of course nobody can think as I do—as if an oracle were silent.
I am very sorry that I cannot see you,—did not when we were both in Boston. My mother and brother rejoice in your success in New York, and I with them. They have had their part in the benefit. I hear nothing of the aching head, and hope it does not ache. . . . Cannot I see you in Concord during some of your Boston visits? I will lay by every curious book or letter that I can think might interest you. My cousin Louisa, I know, would be glad to see this old town, and the old [158] man at the parsonage whilst he is yet alive. My mother joins me in sending love to her.
Yours affectionately,
Mr. Dewey's mind was too logical in its methods for entire intellectual sympathy with Mr. Emerson; but that he thoroughly appreciated his spiritual insight is shown by the following passage from a manuscript sermon on Law, preached 13th August, 1868, on the occasion of the earthquake of that year in South America: "But the law [of retribution] does stand fast. Nothing ever did, ever shall, ever can escape it. Take any essence-drop or particle of evil into your heart and life, and you shall pay for it in the loss, if not of gold or of honor, yet of the finest sense and the finest enjoyment of all things divinest, most beautiful and most blessed in your being. I know of no writer among us who has emphasized this fact, this law, more sharply than Waldo Emerson, and I commend his pages to you in this view. Freed from all conventionalism, whether religious or Scriptural, though he has left the ranks of our faith, yet he has gone, better than any of us, to the very depth of things in this matter."
To Rev. William Ware.
NEW YORK, Nov. 7, 1836.
MY DEAR WARE,—Shall I brood over my regrets in secret, or shall I tell you of them? I sometimes do not care whether any human being knows what is passing in [159] me; and then again my feelings are all up in arms for sympathy, as if they would take it by storm. I declare I have a good deal of liking for that other,—that sullenness, or sadness, or what you will; it is calmer and more independent. So I shall say nothing, only that I miss you even more than I expected.' Never, in all this great city, will a face come through my door that I shall like to see better than yours,—I doubt if so well.
The next nearest thing to you is Furness's book. Have you got it? Is it not charming? It is a book of beauty and life. Spots there are upon it,—they say there are upon the sun. Certes, there are tendencies to naturalism in Furness's mind which I do not like,—do not think the true philosophy; but it is full of beauty, and hath much wisdom in it too.
I write on the gallop. My dinner is coming in three minutes, and a wagon is coming after that to carry me to Berkshire, that is, by steamboat to Hudson as usual. But I am going to send this, though it be worth nothing but to get a letter from you.
If letters, like dreams, came from the multitude of business, I should write of nothing but that tragedy extempore,-for I am sure it was got up in a minute,-the argument whereof was your running away. It positively is the staple of conversation. And I think it is rather hard upon me, too. I am here; but that seems to go for nothing. All their talk is of your going away,—running away, I say,—desertion,—and help yourself if you can. . . .
My love to Henry Ware, and the love of me and mine to you and yours.
Yours ever,
[See p. 86.]
[160] To the Same.
NEW YORK, Dec. 1, 1836.
MY DEAR SIR WILLIAM,—For a prince you are in letter-writing, and you can call me Lord Orville, for I have a birthright claim to that title.' Excuse this capricole of my pen; it has been drawing hard enough at a sermon all the morning, and can't help cutting a caper when it is let out. You won't get the due return for your good long letter this time, nor ever, I think. I am taking comfort in the good long letters that are going with mine, and of whose sending by this conveyance I am the cause.
This conveyance is Miss Searle; and if you and Mrs. Ware don't cultivate her, or let her cultivate you, your folly will be inconceivable.
Mrs. Jameson I have missed two or three chances of seeing,—very bright sometimes, and very foolish others; but who shall resist such intoxicating draughts as have for some years been offered to her! She set off for Canada yesterday, going for her husband, since he could n't or would n't come for her.
Ingham has just finished one of the most exquisite portraits of MissSedgwick that eye ever saw. Did you see anything of it before you went?
Furness ['s book] is selling much, and I hear nothing but admiration, save the usual quaver in the song about the part on miracles. Apropos, . . . I think that the explication of the miracles must be a moot and not a test point, and I would not break with the [161] "Christian Examiner" upon it; and yet I think the heterodox opinions of Ripley should have come into it in the shape of a letter, and not of a review. It is rather absurd to say "We" with such confidence, and that for opinions in conflict with the whole course of the "Examiner" and the known opinions of almost all its supporters. . . .
[FN He was named after Lord Orville, the hero of Miss Burney's "Evelina," which his mother had read with delight shortly before his birth.]
Yours forever and a day,
To the Same.
NEW YORK, May. 2, 1837.
. . . A WEEK ago to-day I sat down at my desk, spread before me a sheet of paper, grasped my pen energetically, and had almost committed myself for a letter to you, when suddenly it occurred to me that Mrs. Schuyler was in Boston, and would have told you just what it was my special design to write; that is, all about the congregation of the faithful in Chambers Street. Well, I suppose she has; but I shall have my say. The congregation has certainly not improved, as you seem, in your preposterous modesty, to suppose, but suffered by your leaving it. The attendance, I should think, is about the same. . . . But I am afraid that the society is gradually losing strength.
I have been preaching some Sunday-evening sermons to the merchants. Have n't you heard of them? And if you have n't, do you pretend that Brookline is a place? Take my word, Sir, that it is not to be found on the map of the world,—not known either to the ancients or the moderns. You are not in existence, Sir, take my word [162] for it, if you have not heard of these crowded, listening, etc. assemblies at the Mercer Street Church. Well, really, I have seen a packed audience there, and even the galleries pretty well filled. I have thoughts of publishing the discourses (only three, more than an hour long, however), and if I could only write three more, I would; but my brain got into a pretty bad condition by the third week, and I don't know whether I can go On at present.
To the Same.
NEW YORK, March 27, 1837.
MY DEAR WARE,—I should like to know what you mean by not letting me hear from you these three months. Do you not know that you are in my debt for a letter at least twenty lines long, which it took me three minutes to write? And three minutes and twenty lines, in this Babel, are equal to one hour and two sheets in Brookline. Do you not know that everybody is saying, "When have you heard from Mr. Ware?" Do you not know that ugly and choking weeds will spring up on the desolation you have made here if you do not scatter some flower-seeds upon it? Consider and tremble. Or, respect this and repent, as the Chinese say.
Well, Dr. Follen is to be here for a twelvemonth, and we shall not get you back again,—oh me!
Dr. Follen has quite filled the church at some evening lectures on Unitarianism. Good! and everything about him is good, but that he comes after you. [163]
To the Same.
NEW YORK, July 10, 1837.
MY DEAR WARE,—I can scarcely moderate my expressions to the tone of wisdom in telling you how much pleasure I have had in reading your book,—how much I am delighted with you and for you. There is no person to whom I would more gladly have had the honor fall of writing the "Letters from Palmyra." And it is a distinction that places your name among the highest in our—good-for-nothing—literature, as the Martineau considers it. By the bye, you need n't think you are a-going to stand at the head of everything, as she will have it. Have not I written a book too, to say nothing of the names less known of Channing, Irving, Bryant, etc.? And, by the bye, again, speaking of the Martineau, she is a woman of one idea,—takes one view, that is, and knows nothing of qualification,—and hence is opinionated and confident to a degree that I think I never saw equalled. Julia, Fausta, nay, Zenobia, for me, rather. How beautifully have you shown them up! And Gracchus and Longinus as nobly. What things is literature doing to gratify ambition,—things beyond its proudest hope! How little thought Zenobia that her character, two thousand years after she lived, would be illustrated by the genius of a clime that she dreamed not of!