XII 



ANOTHER WORD ON EMERSON 



"TN one respect many of us feel toward Emerson as 

 -*- a wife feels toward her husband; we like to 

 find fault with him ourselves, but it hurts us to 

 have others do the same. He was a friend of our 

 youth. 



Though we may in a measure have outgrown him, 

 and now find his paradoxes, his daring affirmations, 

 his trick of overstatement and understatement less 

 novel and stimulating than we once did, yet we 

 cherish him in our heart of hearts. 



The process of maturing, with the spirit as with 

 the body, with man as with the various organic 

 growths, is more or less a hardening and toughening 

 process, — a hardening for strength and endurance. 

 Emerson belongs to the earlier period, before the 

 hardening has progressed far, while the grain of our 

 thoughts is yet in the milk. He appeals to us most 

 strongly in youth or early manhood, when we are 

 not too critical and while we are yet full of brave 

 and generous impulses. A little callow we may be, 

 but buoyant and optimistic. As we grow older some- 

 thing seems to evaporate from him, and one returns 

 to his pages in middle or later life as to the scene of 



