On Emerson

The Sage of Concord has always been noted for his mystic sentences. Occasionally he purchases compression at the expense of clearness, and condenses almost to abruptness. His style – apparently modeled after that of Carlyle – is marred by affectation and conceit.

In the early years of the nineteenth century, when Boston was as yet only a comfortable little seaport town, and its principal streets still gave room for gardens and cow pastures, there stood at the corner of what is now Summer and Chauncy streets a gambrel-roofed wooden building.

WE stand by Emerson’s new-made grave without sadness — indeed a solemn joy and faith, almost hauteur — our soul-benison no mere “Warrior, rest, thy task is done,” for one beyond the warriors of the world lies surely symboll’d here.