A SUNDAY IN CHEYNE ROW 209 



well, and produce a cart-load of turnips from the 

 same; but it is better to appreciate and make the 

 most of the live Oliver himself. "A faculty is in 

 you for a sort of speech which is itself action, an 

 artistic sort. You tell us with piercing emphasis 

 that man's soul is great; show us a great soul of a 

 man, in some work symbolic of such; this is the 

 seal of such a message, and you will feel by and by 

 that you are called to do this. I long to see some 

 concrete Thing, some Event, Man's Hope, Ameri- 

 can Forest, or piece of Creation, which this Emer- 

 son loves and wonders at, well Emersonized, de- 

 picted by Emerson, filled with the life of Emerson 

 and cast forth from him, then to live by itself." 

 Again: "I will have all things condense themselves, 

 take shape and body, if they are to have my sym- 

 pathy; I have a body myself; in the brown leaf, 

 sport of the Autumn winds, I find what mocks all 

 prophesy ings, even Hebrew ones." "Alas, it is so 

 easy to screw one's self up into high and even 

 higher altitudes of Transcendentalism, and see no- 

 thing under one but the everlasting snows of Him- 

 malayah, the Earth shrinking to a Planet, and the 

 indigo firmament sowing itself with daylight stars; 

 easy for you, for me ; but whither does it lead ? I 

 dread always, to inanity and mere injuring of the 

 lungs ! " — with more of the same sort. 



On the other hand, Emerson evidently tires of 

 Carlyle's long-winded heroes. He would have him 

 give us the gist of the matter in a few sentences. 

 Cremate your heroes, he seems to say; get all this 



