154 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



in*' copies of the book to some distinguished literary men abroad, and 

 of making researches for inaterials for his next projected work. Who 

 ever failed to serve himself in serving Mr. Prescott ? I find by one of 

 bis letters, dated exactly twenty years ago, that he thanks me for seek- 

 infT in Rome to engage that accomplished scholar, the Marquis Capponi, 

 to undertake an Italian translation of his work, and that he manifests 

 an intense ardor in the pursuit of his favorite studies. 



" That projected work he completed, and others too ; and yet another, 

 in its midway course, he has left. But our regret for his arrested labor 

 on a great theme must not reflect back on his own life, as if that, too, 

 were incomplete, except as the exquisitely polished shaft lifted on its 

 base is incomplete till it receives its acanthus wreath. Every human 

 life is incomplete ; and the noblest, the most useful, the best devoted 

 lives are the least complete, because the highest purpose of them is the 

 least finished in its result. But neither to reason nor to Mth is there 

 a surer testimony to a life up and yonder, than an incomplete earthly 

 life when it has been pure and good, devoted, faithful, benedictive to 

 others. 



" That library, the larger brain of him Avho was its grace and glory 

 to our eyes, we shall never enter again without a feeling of dreariness 

 and vacancy. Its fulness will express its emptiness. We shall seem 

 to hear in it the solemn apostrophe, so solemn, with which Sir Walter 

 Raleigh closes his History of the World, beginning, ' Eloquent, Just, 

 and INIighty Death ! ' Among those gathered trophies of the world's 

 genius, with the choice gifts and mementos from all lands and many 

 hearts, he lay in death till the earth claimed her own. We believe 

 that Heaven had already had the better share in the spoil, — had 

 claimed the treasure and left the casket. I would offer to the Acad- 

 emy the following resolutions : — 



" Resolved, That, as Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and 

 Sciences, while we bow in submission to that sovereign decree which 

 has closed the earthly life of our honored and cherished associate, Wil- 

 liam Hickling Prescott, we would join, with all our hearts deeply and 

 gratefully engaged in the tribute, in bearing our testimony alike to the 

 winning manners, the pure, unsullied life, the fine genius, the distin- 

 guished attainments, and the noble works in one of the highest depart- 

 ments of literature, which won to him such honors and such fame, at 

 home and abroad, during his allotted time of existence. 



