ARNOLD'S VIEW OF EMEESON AND CAELYLE 155 



way, because lie is of no special and peculiar service 

 to us as men and moral beings; he is not dear to 

 any man, but generously beloved by all men. He 

 is in the midst of the great currents of life and 

 nature. 'T is the universal air, the universal water, 

 we get here. But Emerson stands apart. 



We go to him as we go to a fountain to drink, 

 and to a fountain of peculiar virtues, a fountain that 

 contains iron, or sulphur, or some other medicinal 

 property. Hence, while to criticisru Emerson is 

 less than Gray or Milton, to us who need his moral 

 and spiritual tonics he is more, vastly more. "We 

 live in a sick age, and he has saved the lives of 

 many of us. So precious has his service been, so 

 far beyond the reach of mere literature, that we are 

 irritated, I say, when we hear the regular literary 

 men placed above him. When I think of Emerson, 

 I think of him as a man, not as an author; it was 

 his rare and charming personality that healed us 

 and kindled our love. When he died, it was not 

 as a sweet singer, like Longfellow, who had gone 

 silent; but something precious and paternal had 

 departed out of nature ; a voice of hope and courage, 

 and inspiration to all noble endeavor, hard ceased to 

 speak. 



As a prose-writer, there is one note in Emerson 

 which we get with the same emphasis and clearness 

 in no other writer. I mean the heroic note, the 

 note of manhood rising above the accidents of for- 

 tune and the tyranny of circumstances, the inspira- 

 tion of courage and self-reliance. It is in Carlyle, 



