EMERSON, Ralph Waldo. Autograph letter signed ("R.W. Emerson") TO HENRY DAVID THOREAU in Staten Island; from Concord, Massachusetts, 8 September 1843. 3 pages, large 4to, integral address leaf with panel in Emerson's hand. (Small seal hole, not affecting text) .
EMERSON, Ralph Waldo. Autograph letter signed ("R.W. Emerson") TO HENRY DAVID THOREAU in Staten Island; from Concord, Massachusetts, 8 September 1843. 3 pages, large 4to, integral address leaf with panel in Emerson's hand. (Small seal hole, not affecting text) . EMERSON TO THOREAU ON "THAT UNHAPPY CLASS OF MEN WHO HAVE MORE REASON & CONSCIENCE THAN STRENGTH OF BACK & ARM" HAWTHORNE, HOMER, THE DIAL, THE NEW RAILROAD AND "THE POOR IRISH" building it, are among the subjects in this long, remarkable letter that brings together the two literary giants of mid-19th century American letters. Emerson has learned that Thoreau was "forsaking the deep quiet of the Clove for the limbo of the false booksellers...I could heartily wish that this country that seems all opportunity, did actually offer more distinct & just rewards of labor to that unhappy class of men who have more reason & conscience then strength of back & of arm, but the experience of a few cases that I have recently seen look I confess more like crowded England & indigent Germany, than the rich & roomy nature. But the few cases are deceptive and though Homer should starve in the highway, Homer will know & proclaim that bountiful Nature has bread for all her boys. Tomorrow our arms will be stronger, tomorrow the wall before which we sat will open of itself & show the new way." In May 1843 Thoreau had settled on Staten Island as tutor to the son of Emerson's brother, William. While there, Thoreau had explored New York City, but commented that "I don't like the City," where "the pigs in the street are the most respectable part of the population." Here Emerson keeps him apprised of Concord news: "Ellery Channing works & writes as usual at his Cottage," and "Hawthorne has returned from a visit to the sea shore in good spirit." A new railroad is under construction: "Now the humanity of the town suffers with the poor Irish, who receives but sixty, or even fifty cents, for working from dark till dark, with a strain and a following up that reminds one of negro-driving. But what can be done for their relief as long as new applicants for the same labor are coming in every day? These of course reduce the wages to the sum that will suffice a bachelor to live, & must drive out the men with families..." He is resigned: "you see our fate is sealed. I have not yet advertised my house for sale, nor engaged my passage to Berkshire...but I can easily foresee that...the road...shall drive me from my rest." Turning to his own work, he says, "I mean to send the 'Winter's Walk' to the printer to-morrow for the Dial. I had some hesitation about it, notwithstanding its faithful observation..." which he terms "a trick of the rhetoric: for example, to call a cold place sultry, a solitude public, a wilderness domestic (a favourite word): and in the woods to insult over cities, whilst the woods, again, are dignified by comparing them to cities, armies, etc. By pretty free omissions, however, I have removed my principal objections. I ought to say that Ellery Channing admired the piece loudly and long...Lane has sent me A Day with the Shakers: Poetry have I very little....I beg you to tell my brother...that the review of Channing's poems, in the Democratic Review, has been interpolated with sentences and extracts, to make it long, by the editor..." NO EMERSON LETTER TO THOREAU HAS APPEARED AT AUCTION FOR THE LAST 40 YEARS. Published in The Emerson-Thoreau Correspondence: The Dial Period , ed. F.B. Sanborn, The Atlantic Monthly , May 1892, no. xiii.
EMERSON, Ralph Waldo. Autograph letter signed ("R.W. Emerson") TO HENRY DAVID THOREAU in Staten Island; from Concord, Massachusetts, 8 September 1843. 3 pages, large 4to, integral address leaf with panel in Emerson's hand. (Small seal hole, not affecting text) .
EMERSON, Ralph Waldo. Autograph letter signed ("R.W. Emerson") TO HENRY DAVID THOREAU in Staten Island; from Concord, Massachusetts, 8 September 1843. 3 pages, large 4to, integral address leaf with panel in Emerson's hand. (Small seal hole, not affecting text) . EMERSON TO THOREAU ON "THAT UNHAPPY CLASS OF MEN WHO HAVE MORE REASON & CONSCIENCE THAN STRENGTH OF BACK & ARM" HAWTHORNE, HOMER, THE DIAL, THE NEW RAILROAD AND "THE POOR IRISH" building it, are among the subjects in this long, remarkable letter that brings together the two literary giants of mid-19th century American letters. Emerson has learned that Thoreau was "forsaking the deep quiet of the Clove for the limbo of the false booksellers...I could heartily wish that this country that seems all opportunity, did actually offer more distinct & just rewards of labor to that unhappy class of men who have more reason & conscience then strength of back & of arm, but the experience of a few cases that I have recently seen look I confess more like crowded England & indigent Germany, than the rich & roomy nature. But the few cases are deceptive and though Homer should starve in the highway, Homer will know & proclaim that bountiful Nature has bread for all her boys. Tomorrow our arms will be stronger, tomorrow the wall before which we sat will open of itself & show the new way." In May 1843 Thoreau had settled on Staten Island as tutor to the son of Emerson's brother, William. While there, Thoreau had explored New York City, but commented that "I don't like the City," where "the pigs in the street are the most respectable part of the population." Here Emerson keeps him apprised of Concord news: "Ellery Channing works & writes as usual at his Cottage," and "Hawthorne has returned from a visit to the sea shore in good spirit." A new railroad is under construction: "Now the humanity of the town suffers with the poor Irish, who receives but sixty, or even fifty cents, for working from dark till dark, with a strain and a following up that reminds one of negro-driving. But what can be done for their relief as long as new applicants for the same labor are coming in every day? These of course reduce the wages to the sum that will suffice a bachelor to live, & must drive out the men with families..." He is resigned: "you see our fate is sealed. I have not yet advertised my house for sale, nor engaged my passage to Berkshire...but I can easily foresee that...the road...shall drive me from my rest." Turning to his own work, he says, "I mean to send the 'Winter's Walk' to the printer to-morrow for the Dial. I had some hesitation about it, notwithstanding its faithful observation..." which he terms "a trick of the rhetoric: for example, to call a cold place sultry, a solitude public, a wilderness domestic (a favourite word): and in the woods to insult over cities, whilst the woods, again, are dignified by comparing them to cities, armies, etc. By pretty free omissions, however, I have removed my principal objections. I ought to say that Ellery Channing admired the piece loudly and long...Lane has sent me A Day with the Shakers: Poetry have I very little....I beg you to tell my brother...that the review of Channing's poems, in the Democratic Review, has been interpolated with sentences and extracts, to make it long, by the editor..." NO EMERSON LETTER TO THOREAU HAS APPEARED AT AUCTION FOR THE LAST 40 YEARS. Published in The Emerson-Thoreau Correspondence: The Dial Period , ed. F.B. Sanborn, The Atlantic Monthly , May 1892, no. xiii.
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