XI.

CULTURE.

EMERSON'S reference, quoted in the previous chapter, to "that mighty Yezdan prophet" who came to the Iranis in their evil days, may be followed by the legend of how their darkness and doubt were dispelled by Ardá Viráf.

"They say that once upon a time the pious Zoroaster made the religion which he had received current in the world, and till the completion of three hundred years the religion was in purity, and men were without doubts. This religion, namely, all the Avesta and Zend, written upon prepared cowskins and with gold ink, were deposited in the archives of Stákhar Pápakán. But Alexander the Great, who was dwelling in Egypt, burnt them up, and after that there was confusion and contention among the people of the country of Iran. They were doubtful in regard to God, and religions of many kinds and various codes of laws were promulgated.

'And it is related that the wise men and teachers of religion assembled, and agreed that they would give to some one among them a sacred narcotic, that he might pass into the invisible world and bring them intelligence. The lot for this task fell on Ardá Viráf.

"Then those teachers of religion filled three golden cups with wine and the narcotic Vishtasp; and they gave one cup to Viráf with the word 'Well thought,' and the second cup with the word 'Well said,' and the third cup with the word Well done.'

"While Viráf slept, seven women kept the ever-burning fire and the teachers chanted the Avesta. On the seventh

day the soul of Viráf returned, and he rose up as from a pleasant sleep, inspired with good thoughts and full of joy. An accomplished writer sat before him, and whatsoever Viráf said he wrote down clearly and correctly, as followeth :

'Taking the first footstep with the good thought, the second with the good word, and the third with the good deed, I entered paradise.

"I put forth the first footstep to the star-track on Hûmat, where good thoughts are received with hospitality; and I saw those souls of the pious whose radiance, which ever increased, was glittering as the stars. And I asked Ataro, the angel, 'Which place is this, and which people are these? And he answered, This is the star-track and these are they who in the world offered no prayers and chanted no liturgies; they also exercised sovereignty. Through other works they have attained this happiness.

"I came to a place and saw the souls of the liberal adorned above all others in splendour, and it seemed to me sublime.

"I saw the souls of the great and truthful speakers, who walked in lofty splendour, and it seemed to me sublime.

"I saw the souls of agriculturists in a shining place, as they stood and offered praise before the spirits of water and earth, trees and cattle. Great is their throne. The souls of artisans I also saw on embellished thrones. And it seemed to me sublime.

"I saw the souls of the faithful, the teachers and inquirers, in the greatest gladness, on a splendid throne; and it seemed to me sublime.

"I also saw the friendly souls of interceders and peacemakers, who thereby ever increased their brilliance, and they ever walked in an atmosphere of light.

"I also saw the pre-eminent world of the religious,

which is the light, full of glory and of joy, with which no one is satiated."

Five centuries after this was written down, after much earlier traditions, its vision was fulfilled in Concord. There, in the town of his fathers, Emerson went to reside in 1834. He dwelt in the Old Manse, built by his grandfather, with the venerable Dr. Ripley (for whom his mother was keeping house), until the following year. Then he was married to Lidian Jackson, and purchased the house and farm where he thenceforth lived. His mother came to reside at his house, and there lived until her death, November 16, 1853. His aunt Mary was a frequent inmate until her death in May 1863. Near by, at Waltham, and subsequently in the Old Manse at Concord, was Sarah Ripley, who died in 1867. And soon came the most brilliant and cultivated woman America ever produced,-Margaret Fuller.

While the teachers chanted their scriptures, and noble women kept the sacred fire ever burning, Ralph Waldo Emerson drank the Vishtasp, and with good thought, good word, good deed, mounted to the star-track, and conversed with the great souls of all ages, as transfigured in the light and liberty of his own genius. When he reappeared to the world, it was with the vision of one who had seen the invisible, and was able to shed the needed light upon the life and labour of the farmer and the artisan, no less than upon tasks of the teacher and scholar. The age of scepticism was ended, and the plague of pessimism was escaped.

And this Vishtasp, what was it? The life-blood of all noblest hearts and brains, distilled by finest art, and mingled with the wine of his own genius.

When Emerson was last in London, his friend William Allingham guided him to various places in Old London, Chaucer's "Tabard," Guildhall, and also at his special desire to Milton's grave in the Church of St. Giles, Cripple

gate. It is in the chancel, the stone partly covered by a pew. Allingham asked, "Do many people come to look at this grave?" "Americans, sir," was the pew-opener's reply. In the cab, Emerson said, "Perhaps nobody has so poor an opinion of my books as I have myself." "That seems to me very likely," answered Allingham with a smile.

Some day an artist will paint the picture of Emerson in St. Giles Church, and inscribe it, "At the grave of his father."

So soon as the pew, which partly covers Milton himself as well as his grave, is removed, it will appear that he has had no successor but in America. One may find in England a fragment of him kneeling here, another fragment singing there; but the whole of him has for some time been discoverable only in the literary fraternity of America, mingling morning lark-songs with the chants of prophecy, and illumining the scroll of human equality with the golden letters of poetry.

Above all was Emerson the flower of the heart of Milton. An unspeakable awe-stricken reverence for virtue and wisdom; a spirit ever kneeling before the universe as the transcendent temple of goodness and truth; a horror at the thought of raising private interests before eternal principles and laws; a faith not to be argued with, absolute, in personal righteousness as the primary condition of all worth, involving a sense of corruption in all qualities however brilliant which have not that foundation. These, however invested, were the essential elements of that Puritanism which in Milton saw the earth and sky aflame with cherubim, and coined winds and seas into anthems of adoration. In the course of two centuries Puritanism had, in the hands of the common people, been moulded and hardened into a grim unlovely dungeon. Abandon it, said Channing; Destroy it utterly, said Parker; but Emerson said, Be not afraid, this also is penetrable to the spirit: and he led the way

beyond the dark mouth of the old cavern to tinted halls and fairy grottos, repeating mystically the foliations and clusters of the bright world without.

An enterprising house in America has promised a reprint of the "Dial." It may be that those four volumes, long precious to their few fortunate owners, will presently be generally accessible. I will therefore select from them only such passages as may indicate the early impressions made upon Emerson's mind by the masters of literature. Comparison of these early criticisms with later writings will show pretty clearly that some of them are transcripts from his diary kept in youth. Horace Mann reports him as having in a lecture (1837) condensed the commandments, as regards young men, into “sit alone" and "keep a journal." two: 66 Have a room by yourself, and if you cannot do without, sell your coat and sit in a blanket." Emerson's advice came from his experience.

Let us read what in early years he wrote of Milton

"It is the prerogative of this great man to stand at this hour foremost of all men in literary history, and so (shall we not say?) of all men, in the power to inspire. Virtue goes out of him into others. Leaving out of view the pretensions of our contemporaries (always an incalculable influence), we think no man can be named whose mind still acts on the cultivated intellect of England and America with an energy comparable to that of Milton. As a poet, Shakespeare undoubtedly transcends and far surpasses him in his popularity with foreign nations; but Shakespeare is a voice merely; who and what he was that sang, that sings, we know not. Milton stands erect, commanding, still visible as a man among men, and reads the laws of the moral sentiment to the new-born race. There is something pleasing in the affection with which we can regard a man who died a hundred and sixty years ago in the other hemisphere, who, in respect to personal relations, is to us as the wind, yet by an influence purely personal

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