182 BIRDS AND POETS 
the world; he must transfer the point of view from 
which history is commonly read from Rome and 
Athens and London to himself, and not deny his 
conviction that he is the court, and, if England or 
Egypt have anything to say to him, he will try the 
case; if not, let them forever be silent.” In every 
essay that follows, there are the same great odds and 
the same electric call to the youth to face them. It 
is, indeed, as much a world of fable and romance, 
that Emerson introduces us to as we get in Homer 
or Herodotus. It is true, all true,— true as Arthur 
and his knights, or “ Pilgrim’s Progress,” and I pity 
the man who has not tasted its intoxication, or who 
can see nothing in it. 
The intuitions are the bright band, without armor 
or shield, that slay the mailed and bucklered giants 
of the understanding. Government, institutions, 
religions, fall before the glance of the hero’s eye. 
Art and literature, Shakespeare, Angelo, Auschylus, 
are humble suppliants before you, the king. The 
commonest fact is idealized, and the whole relation 
of man to the universe is thrown into a kind of 
gigantic perspective. It is not much to say there 
is exaggeration; the very start makes Mohammed’s 
attitude toward the mountain tame. The mountain 
shall come to Mohammed, and, in the eyes of all 
born readers of Emerson, the mountain does come, 
and comes with alacrity. 
Some shrewd judges apprehend that Emerson is 
not going to last; basing their opinion upon the fact, 
already alluded to, that we outgrow him, or pass 
