family, that man, we say, has failed of success in life. Now, under this view of the case, how large a majority of the poets have failed! And, therefore, I contend that poetry is prejudicial to success.

Seventh Speaker. I think I understand the gentleman; but there is a fatal fallacy in his argument. If we are to measure a man's success in life by his attainment of a competence, of respectability, of popularity, then must we pronounce the lives. of some of the greatest ornaments and benefactors of humanity to be failures. Then Columbus did not achieve success in life, though he gave America to the world; John Gu'tenberg did not attain success, though he gave us the art of printing, for he impoverished himself, and made himself very unpopular, especially among the scribes, who got their living by copying manuscripts. John Huss did not attain success, for he was burnt at the stake

a very unpopular exit, and by no means respectable. Robert Fulton missed the prize of success in life, although he gave us the steamboat. In the words of my predecessor, his devotion was "too great to pursuits incompatible with worldly advancement." He derived little or no benefit from his invention, was scoffed at as a dreamer, and died poor.

Ah! sir, I do not believe in my friend's definition. That man is the most successful who has built up the noblest character, and who has done most for humanity. Though he die poor, though he die at the stake, though he die ignominiously on the gallows, still he is the truly successful one.

"Whether on the gallows high, or in the battle's van,

The fittest place where man can die is where he dies for man."

In short, sir, that man has best achieved "success in life" who has done deeds, and thought thoughts, which shall be to him the best crown of honor, the best source of satisfaction, in another and a higher life. Any other view of success than this is delusive, pernicious, and atheistical.

Eighth Speaker. Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that gentlemen are straying, in a most unwarrantable manner, from the topic immediately before us. The question, as I understand it, is, whether a devotion to poetry is adverse to worldly prosperity.

Chairman. The gentleman has not stated the question with precision. It is, "Whether the cultivation of a taste for poetry is prejudicial to success in life." Such being the question, it is no straying from the subject to discuss what is meant by "success in life."

Eighth Speaker. Well, sir, I must still believe that the dir

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cussion has taken too wide a range. We all have a general idea of what is meant by success in life; and I think there is no doubt that poets generally fail of that success. Why, sir, who is disposed to trust a poetical clerk, or a poetical lawyer, or a poetical doctor? No man of business wants a poet in his counting-house or his banking-room.

I know a young man who, whenever he wants money from his relations, threatens to publish a volume of poems. To prevent such a disgrace to the family-such a calamity to himself they readily come "down with the dust." Poets are notoriously improvident, careless, and unthrifty. The man who accosts me once a month with the inquiry, "You have n't such a thing as a V spot about you?" writes poetry for the magazines. Sir, I shall vote on this question in the affirmative.

Ninth Speaker. I hope, sir, that the gentleman will keep his mind open to conviction. Facts are unfortunately against him. When he asked "Who wants a poet in his banking-room?" I was irresistibly reminded of two American poets, who, if not at the head of the list, are second to none. I allude to Charles Sprague and Fitz-Greene Halleck. (Applause.) Halleck, the author of the immortal "Marco Bozzaris," was for many years the confidential clerk of the wealthiest man in the country, Mr. Astor. Sprague was the cashier of a bank, and famous for his punctiliousness, his diligence, and his wonderful accuracy in financial matters. If other examples are wanting, there is that of Horace Smith, a successful broker; of Samuel Rogers, a prosperous banker. Sir, it is not true that a taste for poetry unfits a man for active duties. Sir,

"Who trusts a poetical lawyer?" the gentleman asked. did he forget that Blackstone, the famous author of the Commentaries, of the first book studied in the law, was a poet? Did he forget that Mr. Justice Story, whose law-books are quoted throughout the land, was a poet? I might go on, and multiply instances without number, directly in the teeth of the gentleman's assertion; but there are other views of the subject more convincing than this, and I will make way for those who are better able to do them justice.

Tenth Speaker. Mr. Chairman, I do not believe that the cultivation of poetry is incompatible with legal studies or legal success. Sir, I have a friend in a lawyer's office, who is as diligent a student of Blackstone as can be found. He recently wrote some lines "on the coming on of spring." I am the fortu

* See Sargent's Standard Speaker, the most comprehensive of the series.

nate possessor of a copy; and, as pertinent to the subject under discussion, I will read them:

"Whereas on certain boughs and sprays
Now divers birds are heard to sing,
And sundry flowers their heads upraise,
Hail to the coming on of Spring.

"The songs of those said birds arouse

The memory of our youthful hours,
As green as those said sprays and boughs,
As fresh and sweet as those said flowers.
"The birds aforesaid - happy pairs!

Love 'mid the aforesaid boughs enshrines
In freehold nests themselves, their heirs,

Administrators, and assigns.

"O! busiest term of Cupid's court,
Where tender plaintiffs action bring!
Season of frolic and of sport,

Hail, as aforesaid, coming Spring!"

There, sir! Who will say, after that, that law and poetry can not go hand in hand? (Laughter and applause.)

Eleventh Speaker. Sir, I agree with the Opener, that if we would discharge successfully the serious business of life, we must keep the imagination in check. Lord Bacon tells us that "poetry is subservient to the imagination, as logic is to the understanding;" and there is keen insight in the remark. But, sir, an hour of honest action is worth an age of mere imagining. Poetry gives to the imaginative faculty a morbid activity, at war with our every-day interests at war with a steady attention to business at war, in short, with success in life. Sir, we must not allow ourselves to be juggled by the imagination, if we would succeed as men of action; and, therefore, the less we have to do with poetry, the better.

Twelfth Speaker. I would ask, sir, what stimulates a man to action but imagination? What sent Columbus across the untraversed seas? What but the imagination that by sailing westward he should reach the extreme eastern coast of India? Ah! sir, the men falsely called "practical men," and "men of action,” in his day, all sneered at him as a fa-nat'ic and a visionary. Some of the greatest discoveries in chemistry had their origin in the imaginations of the old alchemists, who labored over their crucibles in the hope of finding the secret of transmuting the baser metals into gold. Franklin's great discovery of the identity of lightning and electricity was first an imagination. Some of the noblest achievements on record had their origin in an impulse of the imagination. Sir, the imagination precedes the act, as the lightning does the thunderbolt.

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Some gentlemen prate of the imagination, as if it were an excrescence, to be seared with a red-hot iron. Sir, it is a faculty which God has given us for good uses. Like other faculties, it

may be abused; and, sir, there is no man who abuses his imagination more deplorably than he who thinks the chief end and aim of existence is the accumulation of material wealth. By the magnifying power of that man's imagination, happiness is made to reside where no sound and well-balanced mind ever yet found it. Sir, his elysium is more visionary than the fool's paradise.

To talk of a man of action as one who has got rid of his imagination, is a mere absurdity. He is often indebted to his imagination for all of good that he effects outwardly. Crush the imagination, and where is hope- where is faith—where is that power which makes us as secure in the things unseen and eternal as in the things visible and transient? I thank the gentleman for the quotation from Bacon; for, if "poetry is subservient to the imagination, as logic is to the understanding," poetry fulfills a good office, and is conducive to the highest order of success in life of which the human being is capable.

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- the

Thirteenth Speaker. This discussion has reminded me, sir, of that poem by the great German bard, Schiller,* entitled "The Sharing of the Earth." Jupiter cries from heaven unto mankind, "Take ye the world." Immediately there is a scramble. The husbandman takes possession of fields for cultivation; hunter ranges through the wood; the merchant takes whatever he can put in his warehouses; the abbot chooses the noblest wine; the king claims a tenth of every thing. At length, after the sharing is all over, in comes the poet. But for him not a remnant is left, and he begins to murmur. Jupiter rebukes him with the inquiry, "What were you about when all the rest were making their choice?"- "Ah!" says the poet, "I was with thee. The harmony of thy heavens entranced my ear: the glory of thy countenance enchained my sight.". "What shall I do?" says Jupiter; "every thing is disposed of; but if it will be any accommodation to you to come and live with me in heaven, do so; the doors shall be always open to you."

Sir, the moral of the fable is evident. Bad as the poet's lot may seem to our more practical, positive, and acquisitive brethren, there is compensation in it; and perhaps the poet's success, when weighed in those scales which can not err, will not prove so inferior as some gentlemen seem to suppose. In the end he may appear the man of true sagacity.

* Pronounced Shil'ler.

Fourteenth Speaker. Mr. Chairman, as I understand it, it is of worldly success that we are speaking.

Chairman. The phrase is "success in life."

Fourteenth Speaker. Well, sir, by life is meant that only life of which we are conscious of having had any experience— the life of this world. It seems to me that gentlemen are transcending the fair logical bounds, when they seek a basis for their arguments in the sacred but unknown regions of futurity. Sir, no one doubts that success in life may coëxist with a taste for poetry. The question is, may not that success be more surely and easily attained without that taste? I believe that it may be. Such is the competition in all branches of business at the present time, that a man must give his undivided attention to a pursuit, if he would succeed in it. Now, the only effect of poetry is to prevent that singleness of attention, that concentration of energy, without which success is doubtful, if not impossible. Under this view of the case, there can be no doubt that poetry is practically prejudicial.

Fifteenth Speaker. Sir, the gentleman has assumed that success in a pursuit is identical with success in life. But the two successes may be much at variance. A man's failure in business may lead him to a far higher success in the true art of living. Sir, if a man's business is such that he has no thoughts — none whatever - to spare for higher and better things, all I can say is, that if he does not soon change that business, his life will be a dead failure. I care not what the competitions of trade may require. A true man will find out, before it is too late, that Heaven did not intend him for a mere money-making machine. The more poetry there is in his nature, the sooner will he find that out. My friend who spoke last seems to think that the poet's recompenses are wholly in the future. Sir, they are real, and tangible, and present. They exist all around him. All nature lays her tributes at his feet. Sir, wealth without poetry is mere dirt.

Fancy 's the wealth of wealth, the toiler's hope,
The poor man's piecer-out; the art of nature,
Painting her landscapes twice; the spirit of fact,
As matter is the body; the pure gift

Of Heaven to poet and to child; which he
Who retains most in manhood, being a man,
In all things fitting else is most a man ;
Because he wants no human faculty,

Nor loses one sweet taste of this sweet world."

Sixteenth Speaker. I think no one will deny, Mr. Chairman, that, however prejudicial poetry may be to success in the dry