They shall not be careful of riches and privilege--they shall be
riches and privilege--they shall perceive who the most affluent man
is. The most affluent man is he that confronts all the shows he sees
by equivalents out of the stronger wealth of himself. The American
bard shall delineate no class of persons, nor one or two out of the
strata of interests, nor love most nor truth most, nor the soul most,
nor the body most--and not be for the Eastern States more than the
Western, or the Northern States more than the Southern.
Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the
greatest poet, but always his encouragement and support. The outset
and remembrance are there--there the arms that lifted him first, and
braced him best--there he returns after all his goings and comings.
The sailor and traveler--the anatomist, chemist, astronomer,
geologist, phrenologist, spiritualist, mathematician, historian, and
lexicographer, are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets, and
their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem. No
matter what rises or is utter'd, they sent the seed of the conception
of it--of them and by them stand the visible proofs of souls. If
there shall be love and content between the father and the son, and
if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness of
the father, there shall be love between the poet and the man of
demonstrable science. In the beauty of poems are henceforth the tuft
and final applause of science.
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