Essays By Ralph Waldo Emerson Part 13

[Footnote 58: The hoe and the spade. "In spite of Emerson's habit of introducing the names of agricultural objects into his writing ('Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood' is a line from one of his poems), his familiarity therewith is evidently not so great as he would lead one to imagine. 'Take care, papa,' cried his little son, seeing him at work with a spade, 'you will dig your leg.'"]

[Footnote 59: John Flamsteed (1646-1719). An eminent English astronomer. He appears to have been the first to understand the theory of the equation of time. He pa.s.sed his life in patient observation and determined the position of 2884 stars.]

[Footnote 60: Sir William Herschel (1738-1822). One of the greatest astronomers that any age or nation has produced. Brought up to the profession of music, it was not until he was thirty years old that he turned his attention to astronomy. By rigid economy he obtained a telescope, and in 1781 discovered the planet Ura.n.u.s. This great discovery gave him great fame and other substantial advantages. He was made private astronomer to the king and received a pension. His discoveries were so far in advance of his time, they had so little relation with those of his predecessors, that he may almost be said to have created a new science by revealing the immensity of the scale on which the universe is constructed.]

[Footnote 61: Nebulous. In astronomy a nebula is a luminous patch in the heavens far beyond the solar system, composed of a ma.s.s of stars or condensed gases.]

[Footnote 62: Fetich. The word seems to have been applied by Portuguese sailors and traders on the west coast of Africa to objects worshiped by the natives, which were regarded as charms or talismans.

Of course the word here means an object of blind admiration and devotion.]

[Footnote 63: Cry up, to praise, extol.]

[Footnote 64: Ancient and honorable. Isaiah ix. 15.]

[Footnote 65: Complement. What is needed to complete or fill up some quant.i.ty or thing.]

[Footnote 66: Signet. Seal. Emerson is not always felicitous in his choice of metaphors.]

[Footnote 67: Macdonald. In Cervantes' "Don Quixote," Sancho Panza, the squire to the "knight of the metaphysical countenance," tells a story of a gentleman who had asked a countryman to dine with him. The farmer was pressed to take his seat at the head of the table, and when he refused out of politeness to his host, the latter became impatient and cried: "Sit there, clod-pate, for let me sit wherever I will, that will still be the upper end, and the place of worship to thee." This saying is commonly attributed to Rob Roy, but Emerson with his usual inaccuracy in such matters places it in the mouth of Macdonald,--which Macdonald is uncertain.]

[Footnote 68: Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778). A great Swedish botanist.

He did much to make botany the orderly science it now is.]

[Footnote 69: Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829). The most famous of English chemists. The most important to mankind of his many discoveries was the safety-lamp to be used in mines where there is danger of explosion from fire-damp.]

[Footnote 70: Baron George Cuvier (1769-1832). An ill.u.s.trious French philosopher, statesman, and writer who made many discoveries in the realm of natural history, geology and philosophy.]

[Footnote 71: The moon. The tides are caused by the attraction of the moon and the sun. The attraction of the moon for the water nearest the moon is somewhat greater than the attraction of the earth's center.

This causes a slight bulging of the water toward the moon and a consequent high tide.]

[Footnote 72: Emerson frequently omits the princ.i.p.al verb of his sentences as here: "In a century _there may exist_ one or two men."]

[Footnote 73: This obscurely constructed sentence means: "For their acquiescence in a political and social inferiority the poor and low find some compensation in the immense moral capacity thereby gained."]

[Footnote 74: "They" refers to the hero or poet mentioned some twenty lines back.]

[Footnote 75: Comprehendeth. Here used in the original sense _to include_. The perfect man should be so thoroughly developed at every point that he will possess a share in the nature of every man.]

[Footnote 76: By the Cla.s.sic age is generally meant the age of Greece and Rome; and by the Romantic is meant the middle ages.]

[Footnote 77: Introversion. Introspection is the more usual word to express the a.n.a.lytic self-searching so common in these days.]

[Footnote 78: Second thoughts. Emerson uses the word here in the same sense as the French _arriere-pensee_, a mental reservation.]

[Footnote 79:

"And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought."

_Hamlet_, Act III, Sc. 1.

[Footnote 80: Movement. The French Revolution.]

[Footnote 81: Let every common object be credited with the diviner attributes which will cla.s.s it among others of the same importance.]

[Footnote 82: Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774). An eminent English poet and writer. He is best known by the comedy "She Stoops to Conquer,"

the poem "The Deserted Village," and the "Vicar of Wakefield." "Of all romances in miniature," says Schlegel, the great German critic, "the 'Vicar of Wakefield' is the most exquisite." It is probably the most popular English work of fiction in Germany.]

[Footnote 83: Robert Burns (1759-1796). A celebrated Scottish poet.

The most striking characteristics of Burns' poetry are simplicity and intensity, in which he is scarcely, if at all, inferior to any of the greatest poets that have ever lived.]

[Footnote 84: William Cowper (1731-1800). One of the most popular of English poets. His poem "The Task" was probably more read in his day than any poem of equal length in the language. Cowper also made an excellent translation of Homer.]

[Footnote 85: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832). The most ill.u.s.trious name in German literature; a great poet, dramatist, novelist, philosopher, and critic. The Germans regard Goethe with the same veneration we accord to Shakespeare. The colossal drama "Faust"

is the most splendid product of his genius, though he wrote a large number of other plays and poems.]

[Footnote 86: William Wordsworth (1770-1850). By many considered the greatest of modern English poets. His descriptions of the ever-varying moods of nature are the most exquisite in the language. Matthew Arnold in his essay on Emerson says: "As Wordsworth's poetry is, in my judgment, the most important work done in verse in our language during the present century, so Emerson's 'Essays' are, I think, the most important work done in prose."]

[Footnote 87: Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881). A famous English essayist, historian, and speculative philosopher. It is scarcely too much to say that no other author of this century has exerted a greater influence not merely upon the literature but upon the mind of the English nation than Carlyle. Emerson was an intimate friend of Carlyle, and during the greater part of his life maintained a correspondence with the great Englishman. An interesting description of their meeting will be found among the "Critical Opinions" at the beginning of the work.]

[Footnote 88: Alexander Pope (1688-1744). The author of the "Essay on Criticism," "Rape of the Lock," the "Essay on Man," and other famous poems. Pope possessed little originality or creative imagination, but he had a vivid sense of the beautiful and an exquisite taste. He owed much of his popularity to the easy harmony of his verse and the keenness of his satire.]

[Footnote 89: Samuel Johnson (1709-1784). One of the eminent writers of the eighteenth century. He wrote "Lives of the Poets," poems, and probably the most remarkable work of the kind ever produced by a single person, an English dictionary.]

[Footnote 90: Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). One of the most distinguished of English historians. His great work is the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." Carlyle called Gibbon, "the splendid bridge from the old world to the new."]

[Footnote 91: Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772). A great Swedish theologian, naturalist, and mathematician, and the founder of a religious sect which has since his death become prominent among the philosophical schools of Christianity.]

[Footnote 92: Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827). A Swiss teacher and educational reformer of great influence in his time.]

COMPENSATION

[Footnote 93: These lines are printed under the t.i.tle of _Compensation_ in Emerson's collected poems. He has also another poem of eight lines with the same t.i.tle.]

[Footnote 94: Doc.u.ments, data, facts.]

[Footnote 95: This doctrine, which a little observation would confute, is still taught by some.]

[Footnote 96: Doubloons, Spanish and South American gold coins of the value of about $15.60 each.]

[Footnote 97: Polarity, that quality or condition of a body by virtue of which it exhibits opposite or contrasted properties in opposite or contrasted directions.]

[Footnote 98: Systole and diastole, the contraction and dilation of the heart and arteries.]

[Footnote 99: They are increased and consequently want more.]

[Footnote 100: Intenerate, soften.]