Emerson's Essays, Ralph Waldo Emerson [best english novels for beginners .txt] 📗
- Author: Ralph Waldo Emerson
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[73] This obscurely constructed sentence means: "For their acquiescence in a political and social inferiority the poor and low find some compensation in the immense moral capacity thereby gained."
[74] "They" refers to the hero or poet mentioned some twenty lines back.
[75] Comprehendeth. Here used in the original sense to include. The perfect man should be so thoroughly developed at every point that he will possess a share in the nature of every man.
[76] By the Classic age is generally meant the age of Greece and Rome; and by the Romantic is meant the middle ages.
[77] Introversion. Introspection is the more usual word to express the analytic self-searching so common in these days.
[78] Second thoughts. Emerson uses the word here in the same sense as the French arrière-pensée, a mental reservation.
[79]
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought."
Hamlet, Act III, Sc. 1.
[80] Movement. The French Revolution.
[81] Let every common object be credited with the diviner attributes which will class it among others of the same importance.
[82] Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774). An eminent English poet and writer. He is best known by the comedy "She Stoops to Conquer," the poem "The Deserted Village," and the "Vicar of Wakefield." "Of all romances in miniature," says Schlegel, the great German critic, "the 'Vicar of Wakefield' is the most exquisite." It is probably the most popular English work of fiction in Germany.
[83] Robert Burns (1759-1796). A celebrated Scottish poet. The most striking characteristics of Burns' poetry are simplicity and intensity, in which he is scarcely, if at all, inferior to any of the greatest poets that have ever lived.
[84] William Cowper (1731-1800). One of the most popular of English poets. His poem "The Task" was probably more read in his day than any poem of equal length in the language. Cowper also made an excellent translation of Homer.
[85] Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832). The most illustrious name in German literature; a great poet, dramatist, novelist, philosopher, and critic. The Germans regard Goethe with the same veneration we accord to Shakespeare. The colossal drama "Faust" is the most splendid product of his genius, though he wrote a large number of other plays and poems.
[86] William Wordsworth (1770-1850). By many considered the greatest of modern English poets. His descriptions of the ever-varying moods of nature are the most exquisite in the language. Matthew Arnold in his essay on Emerson says: "As Wordsworth's poetry is, in my judgment, the most important work done in verse in our language during the present century, so Emerson's 'Essays' are, I think, the most important work done in prose."
[87] Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881). A famous English essayist, historian, and speculative philosopher. It is scarcely too much to say that no other author of this century has exerted a greater influence not merely upon the literature but upon the mind of the English nation than Carlyle. Emerson was an intimate friend of Carlyle, and during the greater part of his life maintained a correspondence with the great Englishman. An interesting description of their meeting will be found among the "Critical Opinions" at the beginning of the work.
[88] Alexander Pope (1688-1744). The author of the "Essay on Criticism," "Rape of the Lock," the "Essay on Man," and other famous poems. Pope possessed little originality or creative imagination, but he had a vivid sense of the beautiful and an exquisite taste. He owed much of his popularity to the easy harmony of his verse and the keenness of his satire.
[89] Samuel Johnson (1709-1784). One of the eminent writers of the eighteenth century. He wrote "Lives of the Poets," poems, and probably the most remarkable work of the kind ever produced by a single person, an English dictionary.
[90] Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). One of the most distinguished of English historians. His great work is the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." Carlyle called Gibbon, "the splendid bridge from the old world to the new."
[91] Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772). A great Swedish theologian, naturalist, and mathematician, and the founder of a religious sect which has since his death become prominent among the philosophical schools of Christianity.
[92] Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827). A Swiss teacher and educational reformer of great influence in his time.
COMPENSATION[93] These lines are printed under the title of Compensation in Emerson's collected poems. He has also another poem of eight lines with the same title.
[94] Documents, data, facts.
[95] This doctrine, which a little observation would confute, is still taught by some.
[96] Doubloons, Spanish and South American gold coins of the value of about $15.60 each.
[97] Polarity, that quality or condition of a body by virtue of which it exhibits opposite or contrasted properties in opposite or contrasted directions.
[98] Systole and diastole, the contraction and dilation of the heart and arteries.
[99] They are increased and consequently want more.
[100] Intenerate, soften.
[101] White House, the popular name of the presidential mansion at Washington.
[102] Explain the phrase eat dust.
[103] Overlook, oversee, superintend.
[104] Res nolunt, etc. Translated in the previous sentence.
[105] The world ... dew. Explain the thought. What gives the earth its shape?
[106] The microscope ... little. This statement is not in accordance with the facts, if we are to understand perfect in the sense which the next sentence would suggest.
[107] Emerson has been considered a pantheist.
[108]Oἱ κύβοι, etc. The translation follows in the text. This old proverb is quoted by Sophocles, (Fragm. lxxiv. 2) in the form:
Emerson uses it in Nature in the form "Nature's dice are always loaded."
[109] Amain, with full force, vigorously.
[110] The proverb is quoted by Horace, Epistles, I, x. 24:
A similar thought is expressed by Juvenal, Seneca, Cicero, and Aristophanes.
[111] Augustine, Confessions, B. I.
[112] Jupiter, the supreme god of the Romans, the Zeus of the Greeks.
[113] Tying up the hands. The expression is used figuratively, of course.
[114] The supreme power in England is vested in Parliament.
[115] Prometheus stole fire from heaven to benefit the race of men. In punishment for this Jupiter chained him to a rock and set an eagle to prey upon his liver. Some unknown and terrible danger threatened Jupiter, the secret of averting which only Prometheus knew. For this secret Jupiter offered him his freedom.
[116] Minerva, goddess of wisdom, who sprang full-armed from the brain of Jupiter. The secret which she held is told in the following lines.
[117] Aurora, goddess of the dawn. Enamored of Tithonus, she persuaded Jupiter to grant him immortality, but forgot to ask for him immortal youth. Read Tennyson's poem on Tithonus.
[118] Achilles, the hero of Homer's Iliad. His mother Thetis, to render him invulnerable, plunged him into the waters of the Styx. The heel by which she held him was not washed by the waters and remained vulnerable. Here he received a mortal wound.
[119] Siegfried, hero of the Nibelungenlied, the old German epic poem. Having slain a dragon, he bathed in its blood and became covered with an invulnerable horny hide, only one small spot between his shoulders which was covered by a leaf remaining vulnerable. Into this spot the treacherous Hagen plunged his lance.
[120] Nemesis, a Greek female deity, goddess of retribution, who visited the righteous anger of the gods upon mortals.
[121] The Furies or Eumenides, stern and inexorable ministers of the vengeance of the gods.
[122] Ajax and Hector, Greek and Trojan heroes in the Trojan War. See Homer's Iliad. Achilles slew Hector and, lashing him to his chariot with the belt which Ajax had given Hector, dragged him round the walls of Troy. Ajax committed suicide with the sword which Hector had presented to him.
[123] Thasians, inhabitants of the island of Thasus. The story here told of the rival of the athlete Theagenes is found in Pausanias' Description of Greece, Book VI. chap. xi.
[124] Shakespeare, the greatest of English writers, seems to have succeeded entirely or almost entirely in removing the personal element from his writings.
[125] Hellenic, Greek.
[126] Tit for tat, etc. This paragraph is composed of a series of proverbs.
[127] Edmund Burke (1729?-1797), illustrious Irish statesman, orator, and author.
[128] Pawns, the pieces of lowest rank in chess.
[129] What is the meaning of obscene here? Compare the Latin.
[130] Polycrates, a tyrant of Samos, who was visited with such remarkable prosperity that he was advised by a friend to break the course of it by depriving himself of some valued possession. In accordance with this advice he cast into the sea an emerald ring which he considered his rarest treasure. A few days later a fisherman presented the monarch with a large fish inside of which the ring was found. Soon after this Polycrates fell into the power of an enemy and was nailed to a cross.
[131] Scot and lot, "formerly, a parish assessment laid on subjects according to their ability. Now, a phrase for obligations of every kind regarded collectively." (Webster.)
[132] Read Emerson's essay on Gifts.
[133] Worm worms, breed worms.
[134] Compare the old proverb "Murder will out." See Chaucer, N.P.T., 232 and 237, and Pr. T., 124.
[135]
Horace, Epist., I. XVIII. 65.
[136] Stag in the fable. See Æsop, lxvi. 184, Cerva et Leo; Phædrus I. 12. Cervus ad fontem; La Fontaine, vi. 9, Le Cerf se Voyant dans l'eau.
[137] See the quotation from St. Bernard farther on.
[138] Withholden, old participle of withhold, now withheld.
[139] What is the etymology of the
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