364 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 



of Labor and Eeform " from 1838 to 1887 ; the fourth contains 

 "Personal Poems " from 1834 to 1886, " Occasional Poems " from 

 1852 to 1888, and reprints of "The Tent on the Beach," origi- 

 nally published in 1867, and of his last volume, "At Sundown," 

 which originally appeared shortly after his death. In an Appen- 

 dix are youthful poems as early as 1825. The prose works are 

 classified in a similarly confusing way. There is a volume of 

 "Tales and Sketches," including his essay in historical fiction, 

 "Margaret Smith's Journal in the Province of Massachusetts 

 Bay, 1678-79"; a volume of "Old Portraits and Modern 

 Sketches," "Personal Sketches and Tributes," and "Historical 

 Papers " ; and a volume of papers concerning " The Conflict 

 with Slavery," "Eeform and Politics," "The Inner Life," and 

 "Criticism." 



This bewildering arrangement of the work of sixty-seven years 

 is characteristic. By far the longest article in any of the seven 

 volumes is "Margaret Smith's Journal," which covers one hun- 

 dred and eighty-six pages. By far the greater part of all the 

 work consists of verses or papers which could easily have been 

 written at a short sitting. Uncertain health, the early practice 

 of journalism, and the lack of that higher education which 

 demands prolonged intellectual effort in a single direction, seem 

 to have combined to deprive him of the power of sustained 

 literary labor. As he writes of himself, 



" His good was mainly an intent, 

 His evil not of forethought done ; 

 The work he wrought was rarely meant, 

 Or finished as begun. 



• •••••• 



"The words he spake, the thoughts he penned, 

 Are mortal as his hand and brain, 

 But, if they served the Master's end, 

 He has not lived in vain ! " * 



That last stanza is unduly modest. There are passages in 

 Whittier's works which have strength and merit of a kind that 

 ought to survive. But of his works as wholes it is true. There 

 is hardly one in which the vital passages are not half buried in 

 irrelevance, redundance, or commonplace. And, as I have said, 

 the very confusion in which he finally presented his writings to 



* " My Namesake," Poetical Works, Vol. II. pp. 118, 121. 



