he was with us still, the central spirit, comforting and uplifting the
circle of those who were most dear to him.




GLIMPSES OF EMERSON


The perfect consistency of a truly great life, where inconsistencies
of speech become at once harmonized by the beauty of the whole nature,
gives even to a slight incident the value of a bit of mosaic which, if
omitted, would leave a gap in the picture. Therefore we never tire of
"Whisperings" and "Talks" and "Walks" and "Letters" relating to the
friends of our imagination, if not of our fireside; and in so far as
such fragments bring men and women of achievement nearer to our daily
lives, without degrading them, they warm and cheer us with something
of their own beloved and human presence.

From this point of view the publication of so many of these side
lights on the lives of what Emerson himself calls "superior people,"
is easily accounted for, and the following glimpses will only confirm
what he expresses of such natures when he says, "In all the superior
people I have met I notice directness, truth spoken more truly, as if
everything of obstruction, of malformation, had been trained away."

In reading the correspondence between Carlyle and Emerson, few readers
could fail to be impressed with the generosity shown by Emerson in
giving his time and thought without stint to the publication of
Carlyle's books in this country. Nor was this the single instance of