The strong intrinsic character lodged in these recusants
was later made manifest; for many of them became the best citizens of
the commonwealth,--statesmen, merchants, soldiers, men and women of
affairs. They retained their idealism while becoming practical men.
There is hardly an example of what we should have thought would be
common in their later lives, namely, a reaction from so much ideal
effort, and a plunge into cynicism and malice, scoundrelism and the
flesh-pots. In their early life they resembled the Abolitionists in
their devotion to an idea; but with the Transcendentalists self-culture
and the aesthetic and sentimental education took the place of more
public aims. They seem also to have been persons of greater social
refinement than the Abolitionists.
The Transcendentalists were sure of only one thing,--that society as
constituted was all wrong. In this their main belief they were right.
They were men and women whose fundamental need was activity, contact
with real life, and the opportunity for social expansion; and they
keenly felt the chill and fictitious character of the reigning
conventionalities.
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