IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I *'i IIM 112.5 •^ IIIIIM 11^ 114 2.0 1.8 1.25 1.4 1.6 M 6" - ► V5 -■^i 7; y >^ Photographic Sciences Corporation \ s •^ 4^ o ^1? 6^ % n? > "9,^ 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques 1980 Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques The Institute has attempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which may be bibliographically unique, which may alter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change the usual method of filming, are checked below. L'Institut a microfilm^ le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les details de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la methods normale de filmage sont indiquds ci-dessous. m D n D Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur I I Covers damaged/ Couverture endommagde Covers restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaurde et/ou pellicul6e □ Cover title missing/ Le tit D titre de couverture manque Coloured maps/ Cartes gdographiques en couleur Coloured ink (i.e. other than blue or black)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) I I Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur Bound with other material/ Relid avec d'autres documents Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion along interior margin/ La reliure serrde peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge intdrieure Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajoutdes lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, mais, lorsque cela dtait possible, ces pages n'ont pas dtd filmdes. Additional comments:/ Commentaires suppl6mentaires: □ Coloured pages/ Pages de couleur D D D D D Pages damaged/ Pages endommagdes Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restaur6es et/ou pellicul^es Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages d6color6es, tachetdes ou piqu^es Pages detached/ Pages d6tach6es Showthrough/ Transparence I I Quality of print varies/ Quality in^gale de I'impression Includes supplementary material/ Comprend du materiel supplementaire Only edition available/ Seule Edition disponible Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata slips, tissues, etc.. have been refilmed to ensure the best possible image/ Les pages totalement ou partiellement obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, etc., ont 6t6 film^es d nouveau de fapon d obtenir la meilleure image possible. This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ Ce document est filmi au taux de reduction indiqu6 ci-dessous. 10X 14X 18X 22X 26X 30X >/ 12X 16X 20X 24X 28X 32X :ails du >difier una nage The copy filmed here has been reproduced thanks to the generosity of: Library of the Public Archives of Canada The images appearing here are the best quality possible considering the condition and legibility of the original copy and in keeping with the filming contract specifications. Original copies in printed paper covers are filmed beginning with the front cover and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All other original copies are filmed beginning on the first page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impression. The last recorded frame on each microfiche shall contain the symbol —^-(meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol y (meaning "END"), whichever applies. L'exemplaire film6 fut reproduit grflce d la g6n6rosit6 de: La bibliothdque des Archives publiques du Canada Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition et de la nettetd de l'exemplaire film6, et en conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en papier est imprimde sont film6s en commandant par le premier plat et en terminant soit par la dernidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration, soit par le second plat, salon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont film6s en commengant par la premidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dornidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la dernidre image de cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbols — ► signifie "A SUIVRE ', le symbols V signifie "FIN". Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre film^s d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul clichi, il est fiimd A partir de I'angle sup6rieur gauche, de gauche d droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. rrata :o pelure, 1 d □ 32X 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 LECTURE ON A-LCOTT BY George Stewart, Jr., Esq., Author of ** Canada under the Admini§tration of the Earl of Dufl'erin," etc. DELIVERED BEFORE THE LITERARY AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF QUEBEC, 29th January, 1880. [Fifty Copies.] . QUEBEC: PRINTED AT THE "MORNINO OnRONICLR" OFFICE!. ; 1880. f^W LECTURE ON ,-A.I-iCOTT 3 DY George Stewart, Jr., Esq., Author of "Canada under the Adininistr.ition of (he Earl of Uiifferin," etc. DELIVERED BEPOUE THE LITERARY AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF QUEBEC, 20TII Januahy, 1880. ' QUEBEC: fUINTED AT THE "MORNING CHRONICLE " OFFICE. 1880. ALCOTf, THE CONCORD MYSTIC. READ BEL-^OUE THE SOCEETY ON THURSDAY EVENING, 2'Jni JANUARY, 1880, BY aEOUaE STEWART, Jr., Aulh)r of " Canada under the Administration of the Earl of Diifferin^' etc. Mr. Chabnixii, Lxdics and Gentlemen, A year has elapsed since I had the honour of addressing you from this platform. On that occasion I took the oppor- tunity of conveying to your notice a few imperfect thoughts which I had formed on the subject of Emerson and his writings, and the influence such a man must have, not only on the immediate community in which he may live, but among thoughtful people everywhere. To-night I purpose introducing, with your permission, a companion picture, and asking you to consider with me, the life and teachings of one who for more than half a century, has wielded a power — though in another way — scarcely less great than that of his friend and neighbour, Waldo Emerson himself. Concord, as many of you doubtless are aware, is one of the loveliest towns in New England. It is situated on the line of railway, and is scarcely an hour's ride from Boston. There are several Concords in the United States, but the Concord I mean, is the poetic and historic Concord of the State of Massachusetts — the Concord of Emerson, of Haw- thorne, of Thoreau and of Alcott the mystic teacher, whose literary, and social, and educational career, it is my inten- tion to enlarge upon to-night. — 4 — Next to reading the works of a favourite author, I think the desire is particularly strong within us all, to know somothing of the life and personal history of the man or woraan who amuses us during the hours of our leisure. Wo like to know how G-ibbon lived and worked, how Goldsmith wrote, of the long and entertaining walks which DeQuincey and bluff Kit North used to take together aoross the moors and fells of Scotland, of the regular habits of composition which Southey had, and of the struggles of the Grub street coterie. We love to read about the great breakfasts at the Banker poet's, and tha grand old dinners Qt Holland House, about Macaulay's horror of cold boiled veal, of Johnson's copious potations from the steam- ing urn, of the one-dish dinners which poor Charles Lamb used to eat, and of Sydney Smith and his private boef- stoak. What would we not give to hear Walter Scott re- cite, as he used to fifty years ago, one of his own ringing ballads, or a song of Burns', or the tender '* Braes o' Balqu- hither " of the misfortunate Tannahill, or to hear Macaulay recite lines from the *' Judicious Poet," or to hear the Et- trick Shepherd's lofty dissertation on the beauties of his own poetry, or to hear Tennyson read or rather drone "Locksley Hall." And we all like to know something about the houses in which these men of genius lived, and the little nooks and corners, which were at times their fa- vourite haunts. We are interested in knowing who were the companions of Landor, and of Byron, and of the mysti- cal Coleridge, and every glimpse which it may be our pri- vilege to steal of their inner life, their personal and private life, interests us afresh, and sends us again to our libraries that we may read anew, with our added information, those splendid things of which we seem never to tire. And then when we are fortunate enough to know the primary cause of anything, the reason why such a thing came to be written, the origin of a poem, or of a story, or of a bit of essay-writing, how fresh and delightful and delicious the — 5 — new reading^ is ! "We read with ten-fold pleasure Mr. Long- fellow's " Skeleton in Armour," when we learn that it was while riding alonj? the glorious beach at New Port, on a bright summer afternoon, that the subject of his poem ap- peared to him, clad in broken and corroded armour, and created so profound an impression on his mind that he could not rest until he put his thoughts lo paper. And those tremendous lines on the " Wreck of the Hesperus," which all of you have read again and again, and which I used to read with an almost timid pleasure on stormy nights when the wind howled up the Bay of Fundy, and the vessels in the harbour rocked uneasily on their bed of white caps — those lines which tell of death and destruction, of the wreck and of the storm, — those lines so wild and grand. But how much wilder and grander do they seem when we know their history and the circumstances under which they were conceived. You who know the story, can you wonder at the frame of mind into which Longfel- low was thrown, when the words of this ballad came wildly tearing into his head ? Can you realize the picture of the poet in his study sitting alone by the slowly dying iire, — sitting alone, smoking and thinking, and listening to the ticking of the " Old Clock on the Stairs," which seemed to croak the story of the great storm? It was midnight, and the day after the gale. The wrecked Hesperus came sailing and plunging into his mind. Every passionate fancy of his brain fluttered and would not be stilled. There was no rest. He went to bed at last, but he could not sleep. He arose and during those few hours which come to us in the gray still morning, and which seem al- ways the shortest, he wrote the burning words, not by sin- gle lines alone, but by whole stanzas. The clock struck three as the wearied minstrel concluded his labours. He had told his story : Such was the wreck of tl>e Hesperus, In the midnight and the snow ! Ciirist save us all from a death like this, On tJie reef of Norman's Woe ! — G — And tho ups and downs of authors arc a3 iutorostiiig to us as many of tho books thoy write. Their peculiarities and idiosyncrasies are generally entertaining, and assist us largely in the estimates which we often form of their char- acter and relative place in literature. We need not go back to the days of Johnson, or of Pope, to learn about au- thors and their trials and vicissitudes. History repeats itself in matters relating to literature with, the same unerring frequency as it does in political and social and military life. Hawthorne, you know, was so discouraged once because he could not find a publisher, that he burned the manuscript of his " S3ven Tales " in his despair. Carlyle carried one of his most i)recious volumes — " Sartor liesartus" — from one publisher to another for months before he could find anyone courageous enough to undertake it. Walt Whitman's jioetry fell dead from the press, and for years, " The Leaves of Grass " remained a housekeeper on the bookseller's shelves. Oar own Heavysege worked for a decade and more on his really great i^oem — tho masterly and Miltonic drama of " Saul," and though three editions of it were printed, tho third involving in its revision, tremen- dous labour and anxiety, none of them paid the actual ex- penses of publication. The poet received nothing, and ho toiled on to the day of his death, a man of all work, gather- ing news for an evening paper at one time, and setting type at another. It broke him down at last, and he died while in his prime. But I have said enough, I think. It is not my intention to-night to illustrate the struggles of au- thorship, or to ask you to penetrate the veil which hides so much privation and suffering from public gaze. I feel, however, it is only right that we should know something about the anxieties of mind, and the difficulties which our entertainers encounter now and then. We little know at what cost some of the most delicious morsels come to us. We seldom know of the sleepless nights which are spent in the elaboration of a story, or in the execution of a son- — T — net, which paints so delicately, perhaps, an ideal portrait^ or incident. Wo read the fragment and throw it aside and think, may be, no more about it. "We must be amused. We must bo entertained. When our fool with his cap and bells grows sluggish, and ceases to tickle our fancy, we hurry him off the boards, and call for a new court jester to take his place in our revels, and the fun, fast and furious, goes on again. The public is an uneasy tyrant. He has no acute sympathies, and the literary cripple finds little fa- vour in his eyes. I have said that we like to know the private history of our literary friends, and though the subject of my remarks, this evening, is hardly popular enough for a general audience, yet I hope to interest you as much in the man as in what he has done for broad humanity and his own im- mediate circle. The name of Alcott, I am well aware, is not altogether unknown to you. There is hardly a young lady present, I am sure, who has not read with delight, the charming stories of home and village life which Louisa Alcott has written. " Little Men " and " Little Women "— two classics by the way — are books which appeal at once to a wide interest, and " The Kose in Bloom," " The Eight Cousins," and " Under the Lilacs," are hardly less elegant specimens of fireside reading. The best and sincerest critics,— our boys and girls, — have, long ago, ranked " Little Women " w^th " Robinson Crusoe," and *' Little Men " as the only successful rival to the " Swiss Family Kobinson," or the Adventures of those distinguished and delightful personages, Masters "Sandford and Merton." And you will respect, I know, +he opinion of such saga- cious judges. Mr. Ruskin, the famous art critic and word painter, has told you in much better language than I can ever hope to use, that May Alcott's copies of Turner, are the only truth- ful ones he has ever seen, and that he considers Miss Alcott to be the only person living who has a right, by virtue of her genius, to copy the enduring masterpieces of his idol. This is high praise. But Miss Alcott is no merO copyist of the works of others. Her own pencil is skilful and delicate. Some of yoU may have seen in the galleriesi or you may possess in your own homes and have hanging on your walls, pictures which owe their life and tone and spirit to this lady's brush. Her panel pictures, her fruit and flower subjects exhibit best the poetic grace and artis- tic delicacy of her manner, a manner which is peculiarly her own and which individualizes all her work. You can toll one of her canvases as readily as you can determine a genuine Foster, or a Dore, or a Du Maurier, or a John Gilbert, or one of Tenniel's cartoons in Punchy for your really eminent artist has always some distinguishing fea* ture, some revealing touch or mark which proclaims the authorship.')^ I know that most of you are familiar with * I may say here, that the death of this estimable lady has just been announced. Two years ago she went abroad to perfect her art studies in Europe, and while there, she married Mr. Ernest Nieriker. She had been living in Paris up to the time of her death. These touching lines, entitled " Our Madonna," were written in her memory by her elder sister, Jiouisa. A child, her wayward pencil drew On margins of her book Garlands of flowers, dancing elves, Bird, butterfly and brook. Lessons undone, and play forgot. Seeking with hand and heart The teacher whom she learned to love Before she knew 'twas Art. A maiden, full of lovely dreams. Slender and fair and tall As were the goddesses she traced Upon her chamber wall. Still labouring with brush and tool. Still seeking everywhere Ideal beauty, grace and strength- In the " divine despair." A woman, sailing forth alone, Ambitious, brave, elate. To mould life with a dauntless will. To seek and conquer fate. Rich colours on her palette glowed, Patience bloomed mto power ; Endeavour earned its just reward, Art had its happy hour. the name of Alcott for the reasons just mentioned. But perhaps the acquaintance which some of you may have with the family ends with the younger branches of the household. And on that account I have thought it better to say something at this time about Amos Bronson Alcott, the father of these clever Concord girls. Jan. 4, 1880 A wife, low sitting at his feet To paint \vith tender skill The hero of her early dreamsj Artist, but woman still. Glad now to shut the world away, Forgetting even Rome ; Content to be the household saint SJirined in a peaceful home. A mother, folding in her arms The sweet, supreme success, Giving a life to win a life, Dying that she might bless. Grateful for joy unsjK'akable, In the brief, blissful past ; The picture of a baby face Her loveliest and last. Death, the stern sculptor, with a touch, No earthly power can stay. Changes to marble in an hour The beautiful, pale clay, But Love, the mighty master, come?. Mixing his tints with tears. Paints an immortal form to shine Undimmed the coming years. A fair Madonna, golden-haired, Whose soft eyes seemed to brood Upon the child whore little hand Crowns her with motherhood. Sainted by death yet bound to earth By its most tender ties. For life has yielded up to her Its sacred mysteries. So live, dear soul ! serene and safe, Throned as in Eaphael's skies, Type of the loves, the faith, the grief Whose patlios never dies. Divine or human, still the same To touch and lift the heart ; Earth's sacrifice is Heaven's fame And Nature truest Art. -—10-- A distinguisiiGcl author once said to me that Mr. Alcott's books were mistakes. I turned the observation over in my mind and it started a new train of thought. Before this I had read " Tablets,'' but had not been very much impressed with it. "When afterwards " I learned that Mr. Alcott's books were mistakes, and serious ones at that, I made up my mind to secure the entire series — not a very formidable array of volumes — and vigorously began the whole course. I read very slowly at first in order to get at the style of the author, and to discover, if possible, what my friend had meant by mistakes. I may truthfully say that I was a little disappointed at the beginning. The books dealt largely in the ideal character, in the mystical, in transcen- dentalism, in spiritualistic thoughts, and in a certain pecu- liarity of expression or method that Was not always clear, but quite profound enough in its way. As I read on I became more and more impressed with the idea that I was reading some very ancient but eminently re- spectable author, who was describing as something exceed* ingly new, several thoughts which had been very fully de* Veloped and explained two or three centuries ago. I was startled at the way in which Mr. Alcott grouped his favour- ites — riato, whose writings he read, Mr. Emerson says, without surprise, Pythagoras, the high priest of our author's philosophy, and such moderns as Hawthorne, Carlyle, Emerson and Thoreau. You would fancy these gentlemen were contemporaries. All through the books there was something which reminded one of the Song of Solomon, of the Book of Proverbs, and of some thii s I had read once in a translation of the Talmud. Words of wis- dom, quaint aphorisms, axioms, such as you would expect to find in Burton's "Anatomic of Melancholy," and books of that class and scope, crowded the pages at every turn, and as I got on with my task, I can assure you it did not appear as if my time was being unprofitably spent. Apart from the style, which does not flow easily, but is at times 11 — atrociously turgid, tho books possessed a true ring and a genuine flavour. They interested me very much, and I began to wonder at whxt I had been told. The next tiin3 I met my friend I asked him why Alcott's writings were looked upon by some persons as mistakes. •' Oh," said ho, "Alcott shouldn't write. Ilis forte is to talk." It then began to dawn upon me that Mr. Alcott was a conversa' tionalist, and that his books were composed of scraps of talk, bits of intellectual gossip from his easy chair and detached sentences from his drawing-room conversations I became at once deeply interested in the man. I had read his works, I wanted to know more about his personality and his mode of life. I am afraid I felt very much like the two young damsels, Thackeray tells of, who having paid their shilling to see the Zoological Exhibition, and being unable to get joast the pushing multitude, were about giving up in despair the idea of seeing anything for their money, when a man near them pointed out Lord Macaulay who was standing in the crowd, whereupon one of them exclaimed in a loud voice, is that Mr. Macaulay ? Never mind the hipjiopotamus. Let us see him. Mr. Alcott is four vears the senior of his friend and near neighbour, Emerson. lie was born at Walcott, Connecticut, on the 27th November, 1799, and like the looet-essayist at an early period in his life, ho studied philosophical subjects and leaned towards Transcendentalism — that intellectual episode, as some one has not inaptly termed it. Indeed he was one of the great prophets and heads of the faith in New England, and though he never belonged to the Brook-farm Association, he linked his fortunes with a similar undertak- ing on a farm at Harvard, to which he gave the name of Fruitlands. This project embraced among other things, the planting of a Family order whose great aim was to afford a means of enjoying a quiet, pastoral life — a sort of bucolic and ideal existence which the devoted people who comiorised the little community had framed in their — 12 — minds and carried in their hearts. It was a dream, a ro. mance, a transcendental figure. Its chief tenets were good and noble for they comprised love of true holiness, love of all humanity, love of nature, love of all heroic things and aipirations. To carry out the principles of this hopeful organization was no easy task. It required self denial and faith, and an endurance which was more than human. An estate of some hundred acres was secured. The spot was chosen for its picturesque beauty and pastoral simplicity. The long lines of beautiful and purple-tinted hills, the pretty streamlets that flowed gently through the fiirm lands, the groves of nut, maple and towering pine trees, and the mossy dells and velvet dales near by, all contributed in their way towards the formation of an Eden which seemed to pro- mise so much at first. Here the experiment was tried. Ten individuals, of whom five were children, formed the little circle. Work was begun immediately and a conscientious effort appears to have been made to bring the idea to a suc- cessful issue. A library containing the records of piety and wisdom was an early feature, and to it the members repaired in their hours of relaxation. The plan provided also for the culture and mental improvement of the inmates. The jirosecution of manual labour was of course one of the primary objects, for Mr. Alcott had implicit faith in the co-operation of the head and hands. Every member work- ed with the utmost diligence and spirit. There was no shirking o^ """"ties. The inhabitants belonged to one family. All work -X all. Love for one another was the fundamen- tal law which was respected and recognized and believed in. The project failed, however, and Fruitlands is only reme: abered now as a chimerical experiment. It was never as important as the Brook farm episode, or as lusty as Adin Ballou's Solution of the culture and labour problem at Milford, but the founder never lost faith in the ultimate success of his bantling. He only thought when the fancy picture which his imagination conjured up had disappeared, — 13 — that the members worj notproparad to actualize practically the life he had planned. He only postponed the fullilraont of his spectacular dream to a more propitious soason. As early as 1835 Mr. Alcott adopted the tenets of Pytha- goras and the Italic school of philosophy, and accepting their dietetic peculiarities, he b3cam3 a strict vegetarian. He observed the rules of diet as he practised the teachings of his religion. He was as uncompromising in the one case as he was in the other. An authenticated story is told of an argument which once took place between him and a sagacious man of the world on the question of vegetables as articles of diet. The mystagogue put forward as his reason for abstinence from animil food that one thereby distanced the animal ; for the eating of beef encouraged the bovine quality, and the pork diet repeats the trick of Circe, the fabulous sorceress, and changes, at will, men into sw'ne. But rejoined the sapient man of the world if absti- ce from animal food leaves the animal out, does not the partaking of vegetable food put the vegetable in ? I pre- sume the potato diet will change man into a potato. And what if the potatoes be small ? The Philosopher's rex^ly to this is not recorded. The first years of Mr. Alcott's manhood were devoted to educational purposes. The best days of his early life were spent in teaching small children. As a teacher he was an experiment — an exceedingly bold experiment. Those of you who take any interest in school matters, are doubtless familiar with Pestalozzi's method of imparting instruction to children of tender years. The Zurich philosopher, in his humble home, — for he sprang from the people — laid the foundation of a system which obtains largely in our day, in the Normal Schools of Europe and in many of the scholastic establishments of the United States. He treated everything in a concrete way. He originated object teaching. He taught the child to reason, and he introduced moral and religious training as a part of his plan. But the Swiss — 14 — teacher was too far advanced for his day. His school lan- guished, and after it had involved him in financial ruin he was forced to give it up for want of means to carry it on. In America Mr. Alcott founded a school which boast- ed of similar principles. Strange as it may appear, he had n3ver heard of Pestalozzi, nor did he know anything of his method. The idea had its original growth in his own mind. It formed itself in his brain as an original study of his own. He thought it all out, and it was some years after he had put the system in active and practical operation, that ho heard of the Zurich model. Pestalozzi at that time was in his grave. Alcott opened his school in Boston. Margaret TuUer, Elizabeth Peabody, known to you, perhaps, as a zealous apostle of the Kindergarten system, Mrs, Nathaniel Hawthorne and other distinguished people took a deep in- terest in the proceedings. The school was held in the Masonic Temple. The room was tastily furnished and ap- pointed. There were busts of Socrates, of Shakespeare, -of Milton and of Scott, pieces of statuary representing Plato, and the image of Silence with out-stretched finger, and a cast in bas-relief of the Messiah. Several pictures and maps hung on the walls and the interior furnishing was ol a class likely to interest and encourage the cesthetic taste of the smallest children. The scholars ranged in age from three to twelve years, and the progress they made in their studies can be considered nothing short of wonderful. The strictest discipline was enforced, and on certain aggravated occasions the teacher himself endured the punishment at the hands of those who transgressed the rules. Mr. Alcott insisted on the individual attention of his pupils and per- mitted no idle or careless moments. The replies to his questions were never given parrot-like. They were the result, always, of a liberal and conscientious exercise of the reasoning faculty. The children were taught to think for themselves, to reason and give their own impressions of a subject. Some of them scarcely four years of age, returned — 15 — answers to quostiohs which would put to the blush maliV boys of sixteen or eighteen years old. The replies showed a most extraordinary familiarity with i^hilosophical and literary and religious subjects. Nor were the ordinary branches as taught in public schools neglected, drawing, mathematics and the dead languages also received due attention, Miss Peabody's especial care being the Latin class. The children w^ere not crammed, nor forced. Their progress was but the natural result of the peculiar system in operation. We can count on our fingers the precocious boys who could read books at four and five years of age and enjoy them, but these, you know, are the John- sons, and Chattertons, and Macaulays and Whipples of history. Mr. Alcott Lad thirty children in his school who could not only read and understand such books as Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Krummacher's Fables, iEsop's Fables, "Wordsworth's Poems and many others, but they could even criticise the thoughts and meanings of these authors with rare and judicious perspicacity. Let me give you an ex- atnple. Heading one day "Wordsworth's great ode — the Lakeside poet's masterpiece and the poem which will out* live all his other work, as Tennyson's Idyls of the King w^ill survive his dramas and other poetry, — Mr. Alcott stopped at a verse and asked the little group before him what effect the rainbow, the moon and the waters on a starry night had on ourselves. '• There are some minds," he went on, " which live in the w^orld, and yet are insensible ; w^hich do not see any beauty in the rainbow, the moon, and the waters on a starry night." And he read the next stanza, that glorious burst that tells of the animation and beauty of spring, and pausing at every line he asked questions. "Why are the cataracts said to ' blow their trumpets ?' " said he. A little girl replied, " because the waters dash against the rocks." The echoes thronging through the woods, led out to the recollections of the sound in the woods in spring ; to echoes which they had severally — 16 — heard. "What a succession of beautiful pictures," exclaimed one very little girl rapturously. The pupils held their breath as Mr. Alcott read : " But there's a tree, of innn3', one, A single field which 1 have looked tipoii, IJoth of thcin speak of sometliiiig that is gone : The pansy at my feet Doth the same tale repeat : Whither ia fled the visionary gleam ? Where is it now, the glory and the dream ?" When he ceased reading the verse, ho waited a moment and then said, " was that a thought of life ?" " No, a thought of death," said several. " Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting,""— " How is that ?" asked the teacher. After a pause, one of the more intelligent boys, eight years old, said he could not imagine. The two oldest girls said they understood it, but could not explain it in words. *' Do you understand it ?" said Mr. Alcott to a little boy of five, who was hold- ing up his hand. " Yes, sir." " "Well what does it mean ?" '• Why, you know," said the little fellow, very deliberatelj", " that for all that our life seems so long to us, it is a very short time to God." This was not an unusual occurrence. Every day the exercises were carried on in the same way, and the most interesting things were developed. Great latitude of expression was encouraged and pains were taken to make the pupils speak out without hesitancy or fear. Mr. Alcott made conscience a study. The general con- science of a school, he was often heard to declare, was the highest aim. The soul, when nearest infancy, was the purest, the noblest, the truest and the most moral. The very artlessness which children possessed led them to express their convictions, their strongest impressions. The moral judgments of the majority, urged the teacher, would be higher than their conduct, and the few whose conduct was more in proportion to their moral judgment, would — 17 — will keep their high place. The innocent, ho somclimos punished alike with the guilty, justifying the correction administered, on the ground, that it tended to enlist the sentiment of honour and noble shame in the causo of cir- cumspect conduct and good behavior. The intellectual influences which were brought to bear were in nearly all cases and in all resjiects quite salutary. Investigation and self-analysis also formed i^art of the plan, Mr. Alcott read and told stories to the children, and related incidents which were calculated to arouse within them various moral emotions, enquiry and intellectual action, Journal-writing was another feature in the school which was prosecuted with good effect, and lessons in English composition were made very useful and entertaining. Of course, as in the case of Pestalozzi, there were many objec- tions raised against Mr. Alcott's school. Some thought that one faculty was cultivated more than another, that the children were instructed far beyond their mental capa- city, and that the body was weakened and the brain was hurried on to the very verge of destruction. It was aver- red that so much study would ultimately ruin the children and render them utterly unfit for the active duties of life. They would become mere intellectual monstrosities. But the teacher's faith in the*soul and in his system remained firm. He began a series of conversations on the Gospels, and continued them for some time with surprising results. The newspapers, however, were dissatisfied, and a furious onslaught was made on the school in many of the leading journals of New England. It was attacked religiously, intellectually, medically, and I may add systematically. Boston was aroused to white heat, old time prejudices were shocked, and the narrow sectarian spirit openly rebelled against the teachings of the mystic philosopher. The school fell from forty pupils to ten, the receipts — the real back-bone of the institution — dropped from §1,794 to $343. 3 — 18 m Tho blow fell soon after, and in April 1839 Iho furniture, library and apparntiis were sold to pay tho debts. Miss Peabody — Mr. Alcott's assistant — has given in her volume, " The Record of a School," full details of the plan and scope of the teacher's system. It is dry reading, and portions of the diary are unutterably tedious, but for all that it is a good book to dip into now and then, and a very clear idea may be gathered from it regarding the school- master and his wonderful school. You can also read in more spirited language, perhaps, the romance of the Plum- field school, in Miss Alcott's " Little Men," the scenes of which w^ere suggested by the Temple school. The copy is fiiithfully modelled on the original. Harriet Martineau \Yas startled at what she called Mr. Alcott's strange management of children, and in the third volume of her Society in America, — an affected and con- ceited book by the way, and one which you will hardly care to read, — she gives quite freely and dogmatically her opinion about it. On her return to England from America she spoke to Mr. Greaves — a follower and early friend of Pestalozzi ; — about Mr. Alcott, and enlisted the attention at once of that gentleman, who wrote a long letter and actually meditated a visit to America for the sole purpose of seeing Alcott and learning liis views. He even travo the name of " Alcott House " to the school which he had established near London, on tho Peslalozzian principle. Mr. Greaves died, however, before he could carry into ex- ecution his intention of visiting the United States. In 1837 Mr. Alcott was the father of Transcendentalism, the moving spirit, the guide, philosopher and friend of the movement. He regularly attended the meetings of the peripatetic club which met at the iirivate houses of the members from 1836 to 1850, and always gave it his warm- erst support and sympathy. In speculative thought he was a leader. In spiritual philosophy ho was an earnest teacher. He was never the critic that Rii)ley is, nor the -10- gavo d3dr tint Emerson is, nor had he the bright pictorial fancy of Curtis, nor the studiousness of Margaret Fuller, but h3 had great faith in, and loyalty to, the religion which was putting forth its buds and blossoms in every town and village of New England. He was stern and unyield- ing, and thoroughly saturated with his principles. Every- thing he did, he did with all his might, with all his soul. "When Lloyd Garrison asked him to join the American Anti-Slavery Society, he held out his hand and said, " I am with you in that cause to the end." And he did remain faithful to the end, as long as the Word slave had a mean* ing at all in the land. He sympathized heartily with the movement for the emancipation of women, and he Was one of the Reformers of 1849 who met to discuss plans of uni- versal reform. His early life in Concord provoked a good deal of ill" natured ridicule and carping criticism, and oVen contempt in several rather influential quarters. He was regarded as a foolish visionary, an improvident fellow Who allowed himself to be so carried away by fanciful dreams that ho could do nothing but build castles in the air, and indulge from morning until night in what the Gl-reeks called, the habit of empty happiness. For a while he supported him- self during the summer months by tilling the soil, and in the winter time he chopped wood. But whether he plant- ed or reaped in the garden and in the field, or felled giant trees in the resounding forest, his fancy still turned to thoughts of high endeavour, and his eloquent imagination pictured the airiest visions and the most lovely of all lovely things. His mind was full of quick-coming and beautiful creations, and like Wordsworth, like Bryant, like Thoreau, the friend of his youth, he listened to the songs which the brooks seemed to sing, to the lays which the birds chanted in his ear, and to the hymnal sounds and roundelays which echoed from the dark recesses of the wild woods he loved so dearly. He saw poetry in everything. To him nothing — 20 — was cdmmoiiplacici. IIo found truly, " toiig-Uos in trees, books in the running ])rooks, sormons in stones and good in everything." It WHS at this time that ho sent his scries of papers to the Dial ; the articles which bore the signature of " Orpheus." They were looked upon with suspicion, however, and his " Orphic sayings" became a by- word, and sometimes a re- proach. Dr. Channing loved Orpheus at the plough, but ho cared little for him in the Dial. But Orpheus as a man or as a writer, was the same in heart, in feeling and ni principle. He was sincere through it all. lie was honest in purpose and faithful in all things. In 1843 he withdrew from civil society, and, like Henry Thoreau, four years later, he refused to pay his taxes, and was cast into jail. A friend interceded and paid them for him, and he was released, though the act gave him pain and annoyance. Shortly before this happened he went to England and became acquainted with a number of fiiends of " The First Philosophy." He was warmly and hospi- tably received, and his advent among the disciples of this faith was the signal for meetings for the discussion of social, religious, philosophical and other questions. The assem- blies took place principally at the "Alcott House," and those of you who have traced out the progress of Trans- cendentalism in New England, will not bo surprised to hear of the curious and motley collection of people who assembled to see and hear the Concord Mystic. There were CommunistSj Aiists, Syncretic Associationists, Pesta- lozzians. Hydropathic and Philosophical teachers, followers of Ihe Malthusian doctrine. Health Unionists, Philansteries and Liberals. Whether there were any Conservatives, pure and simple, or merely Liberal-Conservatives, present, I do not know. The record is silent on this point. The proceedings, it is said, were exceedingly interesting, and the Dial ad, the time jmnted a copious abstract of what was done. Papers on Formation, Transition and lleforma- — 21 — tion — all of a most ultra stripo — were road and commontod on. Mr. Alcott took scarcely any part in tlio discussion, but ho was very much interested in wliat occurred and listened with marked attiMition to the opinions whieii were advanced. His sympathies remained unawakened, how- ever, and ihc Radicals gained no new convert to Ihcir cause. He returned homo shortly aCtorwards, and founded, with what success wo already know, the little colony .of Fruitlands. In stature, Mr. Alcott is tall and stately. Though l)eyon<l his eightieth year, ho is as straight as an arrow, aiid walks with a quick and lirm step. Not a single faculty is dimmed, and his capacity for work, manual or mental, is as great as it was half a century and more ago. Regular in his habits and careful in the cultivation of dietetic prin- ciples, he seems destined yet to enjoy many yea;.j of use'- fulness. His head and face are an index to his character. His features are regularly drawn and full of expression, and a phrenologist would tell you that his Language is very large, his Brain is full, his Capacity is largo, and his Mental Power scores seven on the chart. " A revered and beloved man," says Louise Chandler Moulton, " whose lace is a benediction, whoso silver hair is a crown of glory, and whose mild and persuasive voice never spoke one harsh or ungenerous word in all the many y«^ars he has spoken to his fellows." Aiid Lov/ell, in that companion of The Dun- ciad, — " A Fable for Critics," — says : — " Yonder, calm as a clond, Alcott stalks in a drcnni, And fancies liiniself in tliy <j;roves, Acadonie. Witii tlie Pantlienon ni^jli and tiie olive ti'ee>o\'r lilin, And never a fact to nerulex him or bore liim. ♦ »»•• ••♦ • « Forliis liighcst conceit of a hapi)iest state is Where thev'd live upon acorns and hear him luli< <fralis. • > »• • • • • «■-« When he talks he is great, but goes out like a taper, If you sliut him up closely with ])en, ink and jiai)er ; Yet his lingers itch for 'em from morning till night, And he thinks he does wrong if he ditu't always write ; In t'lis, as in all things, u saint among jnen, lie goes suie to death when lie goes to his pen." 11: — 22 — This is a trup portrait. The description is perfect, Yoil Can recognise at a glance the peripatetic philosopher, the visionary, the character you might expect to find, perhaps, in a romance, but never hope to meet in real life. And he lives in Concord, the very atmosphere of which tinged the life o I' Emerson, and coloured the weird fancies of Haw- thorne, and i)oetized the nature of the Hermit of Walden, the odd genius of the place. What a galaxy of names ! How proud the little town is of her one great novelist, her famous essayist, her naturalist w^hom she ranks next to Audubon, and her Mystic Teacher ! It is worth while visit- ing* Concord (go in the summer if you can) just to hear the ])eople talk about the great men and women who once lived there, and of those who reside there still. You will be hurried along that dusty but historic road of theirs which was known in the dark days of the \a ar, a hundred years ago, as the pathway along which the red-coated soldiers of His Britannic Mnjosly marched wilh their imple- ments of death and destruction irlistoiiinij in the bright sun- shine. You will bo told stories of '7G which have never been in print, but have been handed down along with old (lint-look muskets and rusty swords, from father to son for generations. You will bo shown houses which can exist nowhere but in Concord You will have pointed out to you the Concord library — an edifice whose spire and golhic build prompt you to ask if it is not a church — and your guide will smilingly tell you how many volumes it con- tains, and how often the Emerson, and Hawthorne, and Thoreau, and Alcott books have to be renewed, for your Concord citizen proper is a born philosopher, a poet who has not yet begun to write verses, and a true lover of the weird and mysterious in fiction. He even envies Salem in her boasted monopoly of the only true and original New England witch. If you are following your guide pretty attentively you will pause a moment or two before the large and comfortable-looking house of Emerson. This is the -23- house which was rebuilt, you remember, on the same plan as the old one which perished in the flames a few years ago. It has a good solid and substantial look about it, and you may be disposed to linger a while here, but you must press on, for presently you will come upon what you will be told is the delightful home of the Alcott's. This is cartainly an historic house. It is more than a century and a half old. It is a mansion wath a history, a house which would throw Mr. Wilkie Collins into ecstasies. "What a quaint and grim old structure it is ? Its tremendous beams are of solid oak, and the heavy wrought nails which hold them together were driven firmly home about the time that King George the Second ascended the throne of Britain. A famous old country house it is with its great rooms and spacious cham- bers, wide window seats, and ample fire-places and ghostly garret, and huge chimney-tops, and dearest and best of all, its lion-headed door-knocker — which never utters an un- certain sound or gives a wrong report. And look at its site and fairy-like surroundings! A rustic fence of gnarled trunks and boughs, every stick of which was cut and fashioned by the mystagogue himself — and proud indeed is he of his handiwork — encloses the manse and the elms W'hich form a charming bower of velvet greenery in the summer, and a brave and stalwart defence from the cold and biting blasts in the winter. No one knows who planted those sentinel elms, but they w^ere here in all their glory and love- liness long before the Rev. Peter Bulkeley arrived with his company of settlers from England in 1 635. They overshadow the roof and the gables of the liouso, but they do not hide the grateful light wh'ch steals so softly into the hall and cham- bers. The view from the house takes in the whole country round. Broad meadows on one side, the Lincoln Woods on the south and east, the Willows by the Rock Bridge, Mill- brook, the winding lane and the far-stretching hills beyond, and the ancient w^ood on the south-west are not a tithe of the rich and variegated scenery which meets the eye. And — 24 — what delightful surroundings ! It is but a mile to AValden Pond, and to get to it you must pass through the lane oppo- site Wayside— Hawthorne's last residence — both spots justly dear to every admirer of the hermit and the romancer. You may penetrate the wood and read here on some sunny afternoon Thoreau's "Excursions," or " Walden," or " A week in Concord," or you may take up for an hour or two, " Septimius Felton," or " The Blithedale Romance," or you may turn, if you will, to Mr. Alcott's " Concord Days." You would enjoy such books in a place like this, with nothing to disturb you in the reading, with no sound save, perhaps, the twittering of the birds, with no living thing near you except, may bo, a family of nimble Chipmonks watching vou, curiously, from the branches of the trees. "When Mr. Alcott took possession of his house, some eighteen or twenty years ago, he was advised to pull it down and build it anew^ But the carpenters, believing, probably, with Mr. Ruskin, that a house to be in its prime must be all of five hundred years old, told him it was good for a century more at the very least. So instead of tearing it down the owner set himself about to improve and beau- tify it. He prosecuted his a3sthetic tastes to such an extent that Miss Louisa Alcott said that when her father had got through with his improvements even the tin-pans in the kitchen rested on gothic brackets. Ho did not modernize but retained all the old-fashioned characteristics of the place, everything was made to harmonize and serve some useful and pretty purpose. This house has, in its day, been the home of many distinguished persons, real persons and ficti- tious persons. Among the latter you will find the name of Robert Hagburn, the husband of Rose Garfield. The " Little Men " lived there too, for they are Mr. Alcott's grand- children, and so did the Little AVoraen, for they claim even a nearer relationship still. Mr. Alcott's place is not on the platform, or in the pulpit. He is not a great writer. He is a very ordinary lecturer. ■— 25 — But he has iriadc a liame for himself in another sphere. Ho is a talker — a conversationalist of brilliant talents and parts. In this department of culture he is to-day, by all odds, the best living exponent. Coleridge, you remember, was un- equalled in the art of graceful conversation, and the record is as full regarding his talks as it is of his books. Do Quincey talked well, so did Margaret Fuller, so did Sher- idan and so did Macaulay, who had, as Sydney Smith quaintly puts it, " occasional flashes of silence." But in our time we have very few eloquent talkers, if I may make exceptions of Holmes, and Aldrich, and Fields, and perhaps one or two others. I do not mean of course public speak* ers or orators, or parliamentary debaters, for of such lights we have very many notable examples. Mr. Alcott is not a platform celebrity. He would be as nervous on the lec- ture stage as Mr. Froude, and as unsatisfactory as Chas. Kingsley. And I think if he undertook to read you one of his own papers, — but no — the politeness and gallantry of Q Quebec audience are proverbial. You would remain in your seats and hear him out. But Alcott, in the drawing- room or in the parlour, is quite another man. It is hero that we have him at his best. It is here that you can per- ceive the wonderful breadth of his mind, and witness the splendid play of emotion in his sympathetic and earnest face, as he rolls out sentence after sentence of delicious and suggestive discourse. You are completely carried away, you listen as one entranced, you are enthralled with his subdued eloquence, for he is never noisy or declamatory. He talks on with the air of One who might be inspired- like a poet who cannot restrain the utterance of the fanciful things which struggle in his mind, like a romancer who in vain attempts to call back the escaping children of his brain. His tones are like the notes of the sweetest music you ever heard. You find yourself going over them softly to yourself. Yoq seem to beat time, and as one mellow 4 I 1 — 20 If: strain, moro delightful perhaps, thau its fellows, floats through the air, you resign yourself in reckless abandon to the intoxicating impulse of the moment, and the calm and graceful soliloquy of the speaker still goes on. You take in his words and listen with amazement to the glowing, ilowing diction, and the happy expression of idea, and you wonder at the fecundity of thought, and the charming va- riety and manner of the talk. Every winter Mr. Alcott takes the field and goes to the western and eastern cities of the United States, where his conversations are recognized and popular institutions. His audience is composed of cultured ladies and gentlemen, generally persons of kindred tastes and feelings. The meetings are held in a large room, and the guests are ranged round the speaker, who occupies a central and commanding position. When circumstances admit of it, the parlour is decorated in a manner which is calculated to lend an additional charm to the evening's entertainment. This is all very pleasant, and enhances quite considerably the interest of the occasion. Flowers, softened lights, pictures, pieces of statuary, a bit of bronze here and there, pretty carpets, and tasteful furniture add spirit and life to the performance, and gratify, alw^ays, the oesthetic in our nature. A topic of general interest is then started by Mr. Alcott, and his talk is framed in such a way that those who wish to take i)art in the conversation may exchange thoughts with the speaker. If none respond ho goes on and talks for an hour or more. He instructs as ho ffoes along. He creates enthusiasm in his theme. He do- lights, amuses and teaches his hearers. Sometimes his soul is so filled with ideal figures that he forgets he is not alone, and ho talks on, elaborating and building and perfecting the thought w^hich is uppermost in his mind. Pythagoras, Plato, Socrates, Swedenborg, Plotinus, Fludd, and curious old John Selden, whose bits of philosophic raillery delight- ed our forefathers two hundred and fifty years ago, com- prise the famous group at whose feet Alcott loves to sit 27 — I, floats idon to ,1m and )U take [owing, ,nd you ing va- Alcott 3ities of agnized )sed of vindred ;e room, •ccupios istances hioh is ening's hances llowers, bronze re add s, the s then away may ^nd he as ho [le de- lis soul alone, lecting jgoras, irious ^light- com- Ito sit and muse. His books are full of references to them and to their lives, and to their writings. His talk is rich in allu- sion to those literary masters of his, and to the influence they have had upon his mind ; and in the shaping of his career. He is not a sermonizer, nor a preacher, but a talking phi- losopher, a modern mystic, a teacher of the ideal, the emo- tional and the moral element which is in man's nq,ture. All unmindful of the world's progress, in a utilitarian sense, he chases the sunbeam still, and adheres to the old faith, to the doctrine of his early years. For some the glittering bauble has lost its charm, and the day of the Transcen- dentalist has waxed and waned, and finally passed aw^y forever, but Alcott still looks beyond the veil, still seeks to l^now more of the unfathomable, still pursues his airy vision, still upholds the bright and shining star of his des- tiny. The mystery of life and death is yet unsolved. Is Transcendentalism only a mental weakness after all ? Is it nothing, or is it but the frothy effervescence of a mind shattered by disease ? Are we mocked by its beautiful phantoms ? Does it lure us silentljr to destruction ? Ou^ht we to call it madnegs ?