glories of blue water." Nevertheless, as it used to be the fashion to
find an English analogue for every American writer, so that Cooper was
called the American Scott, and Mrs. Sigourney was described as the
Hemans of America, a well-worn critical tradition has coupled Emerson
with Carlyle. That his mind received a nudge from Carlyle's early
essays and from _Sartor Resartus_ is beyond a doubt. They were
life-long friends and correspondents, and Emerson's _Representative
Men_ is, in some sort, a counterpart of Carlyle's _Hero Worship_. But
in temper and style the two writers were widely different. Carlyle's
pessimism and dissatisfaction with the general drift of things gained
upon him more and more, while Emerson was a consistent optimist to the
end. The last of his writings published during his life-time, the
_Fortune of the Republic_, contrasts strangely in its hopefulness with
the desperation of Carlyle's later utterances. Even in presence of the
doubt as to man's personal immortality he takes refuge in a high and
stoical faith. "I think all sound minds rest on a certain preliminary
conviction, namely, that if it be best that conscious personal life
shall continue it will continue, and if not best, then it will not; and
we, if we saw the whole, should of course see that it was better so."
It is this conviction that gives to Emerson's writings their serenity
and their tonic quality at the same time that it narrows the range of
his dealings with life. As the idealist declines to cross-examine
those facts which he regards as merely phenomenal, and looks upon this
outward face of things as upon a mask not worthy to dismay the fixed
soul, so the optimist turns away his eyes from the evil which he
disposes of as merely negative, as the shadow of the good. Hawthorne's
interest in the problem of sin finds little place in Emerson's
philosophy. Passion comes not nigh him, and _Faust_ disturbs him with
its disagreeableness. Pessimism is to him "the only skepticism."