Let us remember the world upon which the young Emerson's eyes opened.
The South was a plantation. The North crooked the hinges of the knee
where thrift might follow fawning. It was the era of Martin Chuzzlewit,
a malicious caricature,--founded on fact. This time of humiliation, when
there was no free speech, no literature, little manliness, no reality,
no simplicity, no accomplishment, was the era of American brag. We
flattered the foreigner and we boasted of ourselves. We were
over-sensitive, insolent, and cringing. As late as 1845, G.P. Putnam, a
most sensible and modest man, published a book to show what the country
had done in the field of culture. The book is a monument of the age.
With all its good sense and good humor, it justifies foreign contempt
because it is explanatory. Underneath everything lay a feeling of
unrest, an instinct,--"this country cannot permanently endure half slave
and half free,"--which was the truth, but which could not be uttered.
So long as there is any subject which men may not freely discuss, they
are timid upon all subjects.
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