His figures of speech, his tropes, his
witticisms, take rank with the law of gravity and the precession of the
equinoxes. Philosophical exaltation of the individual cannot go beyond
this point. It is the climax.
This is the school of thought to which Emerson belonged. The sun and
moon, the planets, are mere symbols. They signify whatever the poet
chooses. The planets for the most part stay in conjunction just long
enough to flash his thought through their symbolism, and no permanent
relation is established between the soul and the zodiac. There is,
however, one link of correlation between the external and internal
worlds which Emerson considered established, and in which he believed
almost literally, namely, the moral law. This idea he drew from Kant
through Coleridge and Wordsworth, and it is so familiar to us all that
it hardly needs stating. The fancy that the good, the true, the
beautiful,--all things of which we instinctively approve,--are somehow
connected together and are really one thing; that our appreciation of
them is in its essence the recognition of a law; that this law, in fact
all law and the very idea of law, is a mere subjective experience; and
that hence any external sequence which we cooerdinate and name, like the
law of gravity, is really intimately connected with our moral
nature,--this fancy has probably some basis of truth.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25