Ever the most precious in
the common. Ever the fresh breeze of field, or hill, or lake, is more
than any palpitation of fans, though of ivory, and redolent with
perfume; and the air is more than the costliest perfumes.
And now, for fear of mistake, we may not intermit to beg our
absolution from all that genuinely is, or goes along with, even
Culture. Pardon us, venerable shade! if we have seem'd to speak
lightly of your office. The whole civilization of the earth, we know,
is yours, with all the glory and the light thereof. It is, indeed, in
your own spirit, and seeking to tally the loftiest teachings of it,
that we aim these poor utterances. For you, too, mighty minister! know
that there is something greater than you, namely, the fresh, eternal
qualities of Being. From them, and by them, as you, at your best, we
too evoke the last, the needed help, to vitalize our country and our
days. Thus we pronounce not so much against the principle of culture;
we only supervise it, and promulge along with it, as deep, perhaps a
deeper, principle. As we have shown the New World including in itself
the all-leveling aggregate of democracy, we show it also including the
all-varied, all-permitting, all-free theorem of individuality, and
erecting therefor a lofty and hitherto unoccupied framework or
platform, broad enough for all, eligible to every farmer and
mechanic--to the female equally with the male--a towering selfhood,
not physically perfect only--not satisfied with the mere mind's and
learning's stores, but religious, possessing the idea of the infinite,
(rudder and compass sure amid this troublous voyage, o'er darkest,
wildest wave, through stormiest wind, of man's or nation's
progress)--realizing, above the rest, that known humanity, in deepest
sense, is fair adhesion to itself, for purposes beyond--and that,
finally, the personality of mortal life is most important with
reference to the immortal, the unknown, the spiritual, the only
permanently real, which as the ocean waits for and receives the
rivers, waits for us each and all.
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