•Ÿ

DYNAMICS OF NEW ENGLAND TRANSCENDENTALISM

IN BENJAMIN ORANGE FLOWER’S ARENA (1889-1909)

Paul Purushottam Reuben

A Dissertation

Submitted to the Graduate School of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of .

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

August 1970

HOMING GREEN STAifc tWERSTTYUBRARY I

© 1971

PAUL PURUSHOTTAM REUBEN

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii

ABSTRACT

In this investigation the author studied an editor, a magazine and a movement. The editor was Benjamin Orange Flowerj the magazine the Arena, published at Boston between 1889 and 1909; and the movement was New England Transcendentalism, The procedure was to examine the biographical and mental make up of the editor, who had the chief influence on the Arena and was its guiding spirit. Secondly, the purpose and method of the magazine was investigated. Finally, the articles in the forty-one volumes of the magazine were studied to group together works dealing with the reassessment of Transcen­ dentalism and its major exponents.

The Arena was no ordinary magazine. In the words of Flower, the magazine sought to"cultivate intellectual hospitality" and tried to be "the meeting place of fearless thinkers." These were •bvious from the wide range of topics discussed.

Important for the author was the timing of the birth of the magazine in December, 1889. It is generally assumed that Transcenden­ talism, as a movement and as a moral force, declined during the early 1860s. The first number of the Arena appeared approximately twenty- five years later. A quarter of a century was taken to be an adequate span of time for the appearance of signs of a revival of interest in the movement. Through a survey of the magazine, the author was convinced that new interest in Transcendentalism was widespread. Flower, through editorials, articles and reviews, propogated and encouraged a revival of interest in and appreciation of the move­ ment and its chief exponents. Twenty-five articles in the Arena were individual studies »f Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman. Almost an equal number of works were studies of the different aspects of Transcendentalism.

Of particular interest to the author were the contributions of Hindu and Buddhist religions. The influence of Far Eastern religions on Transcendentalism is well known. It was concluded that the renewed interest in these religions was closely tied to the revival of Transcendental ideals.

Working with the premise that any idealistic philosophy is in essence a religious philosophy, the author found in the Arena a fertile field for the discussion of religious issues. An ethical and moral tone pervaded the pages of the Arena, a tone set by its editor. Therefore the assessment of the Transcendentalists was mainly related to ethical and religious aspects of their concepts of life. lii

The Transcendentalists* faith in the ideals of democracy was adequately reflected in the goals of the Arena« The editor found strength in Emerson’s faith in all men as capable of living accord- ing to reason. Emerson inspired Flower at every stage of the latter’s career, and the editor, in return, prophesied that Emerson would loom "the most commanding of all the giants of his day because his thought was most cosmic and his philosophy and ethical generalisations the most in harmony with the broadening concepts of advancing civi­ lizations." Flower used Emersonian terms in setting the guiding policy of the Arena. The goals of the magazine were to "agitate, to compel men to think; to point out wrongs ... to impress higher ideas on the plastic mind of childhood."

The author concluded that the articles in the Arena showed distinct signs of a renewal of interest in Transcendentalism and the related idealism of the ancient doctrines of India. The magazine’s editor, Flower, served as the revivalist of a new interest in idealism, which turned for its inspiration to New England Transcendentalism. IV

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Dr. Alma J. Payne introduced, me to Editor Benjamin Orange

Flower and the Arena. For three years I worked as her research assistant investigating for her the position and the role of women in the forty-one volumes of the Arena. Familiarity soon led to a deep interest in Flower and his magazine. I had early decided to study New England Transcendentalism and make it the subject of my doctoral dissertation. I was, therefore, very pleased when Dr. Payne suggested a study of Transcendentalism in Flower’s Arena. I must thank Dr. Payne for giving this study a direction and a purpose.

I must also thank Dr. Robert R. Hubach and Dr. Ray B,

Browne for their excellent suggestions and comments during the preparation and writing of the dissertation,

I owe a debt of thanks to the United States Educational

Foundation in India for selecting me as the Fulbright scholar in English for 1966, and to the State Department for providing for my maintenance in the United States during 1966-67 through the Smith-Mundt grant.

At Bowling Green my thanks go to the host of librarians and researchers who were always eager to help me, and. also to the Dean and staff of the Graduate School for their many kindnesses.

Finally, I must thank my wife for her patience, understanding and encouragement. V

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER Page

I INTRODUCTION ...... 1

II BENJAMIN ORANGE FLOWER AND THE ARENA ...... 6

Ill RALPH WALDO EMERSON...... 23

IV HENRY DAVID THOREAU AND WALT WHITMAN...... 50

V TRANSCENDENTALISM, HINDUISM AND BUDDHISM ...... 81

VI CONCLUSION ...... 113

NOTES ...... 117

BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 127 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

The term "New England Transcendentalism" was given to the

various expressions of idealism, between 1830 and I860, centered

in and around New England. There was no consistent philosophy among its chief exponents and, therefore, it is advantageous, as others have done before, to refer to them as belonging to the

same "movement", for in spite of differences, they shared a

common impulse. Said Emerson in the opening number of the Dial:

"This spirit of the time is in every form a protest against usage and a search for principles." This general spirit of unrest and hostility found diverse expressions and, therefore, they were lumped together under the protective covering of the term

Transcendentalism. This term, understandably, was variously defined. It was described (l) as a philosophy:

Transcendentalism ... is the recognition in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining a scientific knowledge of an order of existence transcending the reach of the senses, and of which we can have no sensible experience.

(2) as an expression of religious faith:

Literally, a passing beyond all media in the approach to the Deity, Transcendentalism contained an effort to establish, mainly by a discipline of the intuitive faculty, direct intercourse between the soul and God, 3

(3) and as a reform movement: 2

Transcendentalism was not speculative but essentially practical and reformatory

Octavius B, Frothingham, who wrote the history of the movement

as a sympathetic admirer, said:

Transcendentalism was a distinct philosophical system. Practically it was an assertion of the inalienable worth of man; theoretically it was an assertion of the immanence of divinity in instinct, the transference of supernatural attributes to the natural constitution of man­ kind. ... It is usually spoken of as a philosophy. It is more justly regarded as a gospel. As a philosophy it is ... so far Prom uniform in its structure that it may rather be considered several systems in one,-5

The religious aspect of the movement is of fundamental

importance, especially, for the purposes of this study. This aspect of the movement was highlighted in the definition of

Frances Tiffany:

First and foremost, it can only be rightly conceived as an intellectual, aesthetic, and spiritual ferment, not a strictly reasoned doctrine. It was a Renaissance of conscious, living faith in the power of reason, in the reality of spiritual insight, in the privilege, beauty, and glory of life.

Moreover, the New England Transcendentalists strived for the practical application of their idealism. The resultant practical idealism had its seed in the Puritan inheritance. H. C. Goddard said that it was "a blending of Platonic metaphysics and the

Puritan spirit, of a philosophy and a character ... taking place at a definite time, in a specially fertilized soil, under

>7 particular conditions." The truth remains that, in spite of 3

its eclectic nature, Transcendentalism remained a native product.

Charles Dickens aptly said in his American Notes: "If I were a

Bostonian, I think I would be a Transcendentalist."

By their births and local habitat, Emerson and Thoreau, were New England Transcendentalists. But what of Whitman? He has been included in this study for reasons which are best elaborated by Charles R. Metzger, who said:

...the epithet transcendentalist indicates more than mere geographical, historical or social distinction. ... (it) indicated a special cast of mind, one that has revealed many interesting and rewarding insights into a number of matters.0

According to Metzger, Whitman’s most obvious connection with New

England Transcendentalism was through his discipleship to

Emerson. Metzger said:

Both Emerson and Whitman were extreme radical Protestants. Like Emerson, Whitman objected to the dominion of institutions over religious experience. ... Like Thoreau he was secular in the special sense of denying the church as the principal agency of salvation. ... Along with Emerson he chose to extend radical Protestant religion till it embraced art and the artist, and like Thoreau he judged art and the artist as these were instrumental in achieving salvation here.

Whitman had further ties with Emerson and Thoreau in his indebtedness to ancient Indian idealism. The Leaves of Grass depended heavily, for its sources, on the Bhagvad Gita, a book which had earlier inspired both Emerson and Thoreau. Gay

Wilson Allen has shown that the most striking parallelism between

Whitman’s ideas and the Vedantic teaching was in the concept of Self. Said Allen:

This self is not material, but spiritual. ... In the same way Whitman's "Me, Myself" is immortal, and through his cosmic "I" he merges with all creation, feeling himself to be the Spirit of the universe. Out of this conception of the relation of the self to the cosmos arises the doctrine that good and evil are mere appearances (maya). 0

Walt Whitman, irrespective of geographical situation, was

closely tied, in spirit and outlook on life, with Emerson and

Thoreau. The fullest survey of the idealistic revival would

only be possible if Whitman is discussed together with Emerson

and Thoreau.

The Arena magazine appeared at a crucial time. First

published in December, 1889, it continued regular appearance

till the middle of 1909. The last decade of any century is

usually one of reassessment and stock-taking of what had taken

place in the ninety years before. The Arena afforded ample

opportunity for the study of the nineteenth century, in which

the writers, movements and ideas were examined for their relevant worth at the turn of the century. New England Transcendentalism

came under such a scrutiny. The magazine’s editor and the majority

of writers commenting on the movement believed that it was the best thing that could have happened to America at that time. They lamented the fact that industrialization and growing materialism, which had followed at the heels of the movement, had stifled its idealistic aspirations. 5

By the same token, if the last years afford, opportunity for looking back, the first years of a new century are helpful in projecting new hopes, new programs and new ideas for the betterment of existing conditions. The Arena provided a canvas for such projections. Its editor, Benjamin Orange Flower, led others in hoping for a return of that idealism which existed in the glorious years of mid-nineteenth century - a period which has rightly been called one of American Renaissance.

In the chapters that follow, the readers will be introduced to Benjamin Orange Flower as a man and as the founder and chief editor of the Arena. The aims, methods and purpose of the magazine will be then discussed. To capture the tone and language of the magazine, extensive quotations will be used. The next three chapters will be devoted to the study of New England Transcendentalism and its chief exponents, Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman, together with the consideration of Indian religions in the Arena, with the hope that the readers will not fail to notice a revival of interest in the movement. £

CHAPTER II

BENJAMIN ORANGE FLOWER AND THE ARENA

David H, Dickason, in his doctoral dissertation on Flower,

rightly says that "the physical facts of Flower’s life are of I less importance to the modern student than are his ideas."

It was not a spectacular life, hut a quiet one. He was horn

on October 19, 1858, in Albion, Illinois - a town founded by 2 his grandfather George FLower, an Englishman who came to the

United States to settle in 1818, bringing with him his father,

Richard, his mother, and several brothers and sisters. Benjamin

was born to the Reverend Alfred and Elizabeth (Orange) Flower,

and was educated in the public schools of Evansville, Indiana,

where the family had moved during his childhood. With the

intention of following the examples of his father and an older

brother, George, Benjamin went to the University of Kentucky

to study theology and eventually to become a minister in the

church of Disciples of Christ.

While at college, Benjamin underwent a change in his

theological views and gave up the idea of the pulpit in favor .

of journalism. He returned to Albion and joined the American

Sentinel. a social and literary weekly which he edited till 1880,

He then travelled east to Philadelphia and took refuge with his brother, Dr. Richard C, Flower, who gave him a secretarial 7

position in his office.

On September 10, 1885, Benjamin married Hattie Cloud of

Evansville, Indiana, Fred C, Mabee, Jr, has described the

Clouds as "a Southern family of Evansville, Indiana, where

Dr, Cloud was a physician, Benjamin met Hattie, according to

his sister, Mrs. Binley, when Benjamin accompanied his father as an itinerant minister. They stayed with the Clouds where ministers always stayed at Evansville."

Benjamin, during his stay in Philadelphia, became in­ creasingly interested in social reform. He left for Boston and began a career of agitation for the betterment in human relations through a number of publications and other agencies, which he continued till his death. His wife shared his concern for the oppressed and the wronged and his optimism and belief in a coming reign of human brotherhood. At Boston in 1886, he established the American Spectator. merged later with the Arena.

The latter, which soon came to be known as a liberal in the field of magazines, saw the light of day in December, 1889, and continued its monthly publication till 1909. The aims and objectives of this magazine will be discussed in detail later in this chapter.

Although the Arena continued its publication for two decades,

Flower disassociated himself from its editorship in December,

I896, From June, 1897, to March I898, with Frederick U, Adams, he edited the Mew Times at Chicago. He was co-editor with

Anna C. E. Reifsnider of the Coming Age, published at St. Louis 8

and Boston, until it was merged with the Arena in the Fall of 1900,

FLower again joined the editorial staff and in 190^ once more

became the editor-in-chief of the Arena. When, because of its

owner’s bankruptcy, the magazine ceased publication, Flower

founded and for two years, October, 1909» to November, 1911,

edited the Twentieth Century Magazine at Boston, In his later

years he was obsessed with the notion that the Roman Church was a

threat to democratic society and he led a crusade against the

Catholic peril through the editorship of Menace, published at

Aurora, Missouri.

In addition to his editorial work, Flower contributed

frequently to other magazines and wrote a number of books.

His interests were diverse. He was fascinated with psychical research, and believed that the reality of the future life would ultimately be demonstrated. He became president of the

National League for Medical Freedom, and of the Free Press

Defense League. His death occurred in a hospital in Boston on December 24, 1918.

Apart from stray references in books of American literary history, Flower and the Arena. have remained largely unrecognized.

There is yet no full book-length study available. The scholar­ ship on the editor and his magazine is largely in the form of unpublished dissertations. The first full-length article on

FLower did not appear until over twenty years after his death.

H. F. Cline wrote two articles for the Journalism Quarterly 9

based, on his unpublished Honors thesis written at Harvard. Cline’s

opening remarks echo the sentiments of many of the magazine’s

admirers :

The Arena, living from 1889 to 1909» was a magazine that flourished during two pregnant decades of American life. Its peculiar qualities made it significant contemporaneously, for it was notable even for its stout resistance to conventions in all fields and for its unblinking disregard of stricture and taboo. Operating at a time when, according to its editor, "the very air is vibrant with a noble discontent," the Arena reflected many old, some new radicalisms, yet maintained prestige as a high-class, national, non-doctrinaire review, competing with a revived North American Review and Forum, under William Hines Page.^

The magazine spread in popularity rapidly and. its name even

became familiar in England and Western European countries.

Readers found in its pages a sincerity of purpose, a genuineness

in dedication and a will for reform of social evils. Editor

Flower set the tone of the magazine, and his influence and guiding

hand could be felt in articles whose subject matter may be poles apart. The editor set the aims and objectives for his magazine at a level which remained consistently high, almost idealistic, one in which it offered:

... to afford the American people the opportunity to become familiar with the ripest thought and conclusions of the ablest thinkers throughout the world holding advanced or progressive views and ideals, and who, not being in harmony with conventional, conservative, and reactionary opinions, found the great reviews, magazines and periodicals closed to them; while at the same time presenting opposing views on the most vital economic, social, 10

political, ethical, religious and philosophical questions.5

One of those "ablest thinkers" was Hamlin Garland. Cline

was fortunate to get from him his impressions of Flower.

Garland says of Flowers "I was surprised to find him of my own

age, a small round-faced smiling youth with black eyes and

curling hair. He was a new sort of reformer, genial, laughing,

tolerant. Nothing disturbed his good humor, and no authority

could awe him." Cline says that Flower, in spite of his warm­ heartedness and fearlessness, was not a great thinker. He was more of a publicist than a critical analyst. He wrote too much and it is difficult to follow a logical development of his thoughts.

Just as Emerson had renounced the pulpit, but never ceased to be God’s minister, so FLower used his editorial chair to make up for the ministership he had relinquished. Any reader of the

Arena, therefore, will not be surprised to hear ringing overtones of religious fervor and dedication which had its roots in a prairie childhood, and in Sunday schools under the influence of a father and an older brother who were both ministers.

The concept of Progress, Cline points out, was one of the favorite themes of Flower. Progress did not mean happiness, but material expansion which led to positivism and a decline of idealism. Progress had its claim for existence only when it was tied with morality and concern for the individual. Flower li

strongly believed in the dictum that things were for men, and not

the other way around. He said, "we must develop the ethical

side of man’s nature, we must emphasize the idea of moral res-

ponsibility.

Flower was the sponsor of the good in all forms, and a

represser of evil in all its ugly colorings. These served as

a two-pronged attack upon social evils, and they became the

objectives of the Arena:

Very clear and definite were the two great objects to be accomplished. First, the magazine was to give all-round discussions, by the ablest and most authoritative writers, on vital questions relating to the social, economic, religious, political, ethical, psychological, philosophical, educational, literary, dramatic, and artistic life of our age and people, giving special emphasis to the liberal or progressive thought of the day. ... The second master aim was the uncovering of crying evils which were sapping the moral, mental, and physical vitality of the nation. The unmasking of deadly evils in the social body was to be accompanied by suggestive con­ structive measures for meeting and overcoming them.

These two objectives were to be achieved in the spirit of orderly change, through reform, patience and prayer. Flower disavowed drastic, revolutionary measures.

Cline points out that FLower was steeped in the notion that the closing years of a century were ones of historical and cyclic changes. This added a sense of greater purpose to the editor’s inherent compassion for the downtrodden:

... today is a supreme moment for achieving great good, for so directing the current of 12

civilization that humanity may be thereby elevated, humanized, and ennobled,'

In his exposition of the social evils, Flower was criticized

adversely for being overtly pessimistic. He defended himself,

saying:

I have been charged with pessimism by superficial readers because I have unhesitatingly assailed the great wrongs and injustices of the present. I have done this because I have a strong faith in the ultimate triumph of mankind. ... Our greatest danger lies in the demoralizing power of organized wealth on the one hand and the moral lethargy of the masses on the other. The Arena therefore will continue to assail all evil and unjust conditions, without fear or favor, while we shall not fail to point out, as occasion requires it, hopeful signs of the times. A splendid dawn is streaking the east. It is an age which calls for courage, faith, and persistent labor. The giant wrongs of the nineteenth century, the gross inhumanity tolerated by our civilization, the brutal selfishness of organized monopoly - these must be overthrown. In this giant warfare the Arena will ever be found in the van of the conflict.10

In this warfare, Flower believed, justice would be forthcoming sooner, if he opened his magazine to differing points of view.

He respected the rights of individuals to differ from him, and this freedom and variety were noted by Cline in W, T. Stead's

Index to Review of Reviews:

It is an open arena for the discussion of subjects tabooed by Forum and the North American. The editor wisely refuses to to regard the vital and dominating questions of human society, right and wrong relations of men and women, as lying outside the sphere of a high class review. There is more audacity about the Arena than its older rivals. It has 13

an open mind, upon every subject from the im­ mortality of the soul to the scavenging of the streets.il

Regarding Flower’s conception of the function of art and artists, Cline said, "here ethics replaces esthetics completely."

Flower was so obsessed with social reform, that he found no place

for art for its own sake. The tone of the fiction printed in

the Arena was didactic, including even that of Hamlin Garland,

For fiction the scope of the magazine was thus limited: "each

issue of the Arena during the ensuing year will contain a well- written story which will point a moral or illustrate vividly some 12 great truth." This moralising and educating of the readers extended even to articles on Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman, where contributors took great pains to show these literary masters as being, in essence, moral and religious human beings.

But if Flower was weak in his presentation of artistic works, he adequately made up for this with his strong support of such themes as political and economic advance, social justice and ethical education - all revolving around the super-theme of progress. "Progress in all things is the keynote of civilization," editorialized Flower and he made the Arena "a leader of thought, not a camp follower, ... indespensible to everyone but the fossils." 1J3 This idea was further crystallized in what Cline called a definite policy for the Arena:

Steadily pursuing our course, we have continued to present all sides of the great fundamental problems which most intimately affect our 14

civilization, and upon which depends the progress of humanity. In this respect the Arena is unique. We devote little space to the superficial aspects of affairs, knowing that to arrive at a type solution, we must go to the foundation,1^

In his second article, called "Flower and the Arena:

15 Purpose and Content," J Cline discussed the methods and matter of the magazine. Flower deliberately planned a format which would make his magazine compete with the other leading periodicals of the time. To balance excessive emphasis on social reform,

Flower used biography and fiction. Cline noted this balance as an indication of the editor’s recurring affirmations of his magazine’s aims;

Our conscientious purpose in the future, as in the past, will be to make the Arena a great review of the best thought of the age, fair, progressive, just and liberal, encouraging the greatest hospitality among master brains of the day. No pains or expense will be spared in making the Arena indispensable to every one who is thinking along live lines of thought, or who is interested in the great questions which must interest all who are in the van of the world’s onward inarching workers.

A good insight into Flower’s shrewdness as an editor can be obtained from his policy of making his magazine appealing to women. Both as contributors and readers, said, Cline, women played leading parts in shaping the magazine, FLower was aware of this, as is evident from these unmistakable remarks:

No good review in the world, has given anything like the space to contributions from women, or articles of interest to women as the Arena. Indeed, until its appearance, women to a great 15

extent had been ignored by the leading reviews. We are, however, delighted to note some of the slow coaches are now waking up to the importance of giving women a fair hearing. This alone is an important work which we believe the Arena is chiefly responsible for.1?

For some time a woman, Helen Gardener, was co-editor of the magazine. Cline said that of the nearly eight hundred contri­ butors to the first twenty volumes, twenty-five percent were 18 women. Among the famous names in the feminist movement, the following wrote for the Arena: Elizabeth Cady Stanton,

Frances Russell, Mary Livermore, Anna Howard Shaw, Helen

Campbell, Abby Morton Diaz, Mary Jane Croly, and the Countess of Aberdeen. So successful was the crusade for women that the

Arena sponsored two crusades of its own; the agitation for rational feminine dress, in which Mrs. Flower took an active interest, and the enactment of proper age-of-consent laws.

"Important as they were," remarked Cline, "women were but one of the special classes the Arena sought to amuse and elevate.

Another was the urban dwellers. ...He (Flower) and most of his contributors accepted the city as a fact, realizing that a 'back to the farm' movement and their beloved Progress did not 19 coincide," Emphasis was placed on the improvement of city housing, cleanliness and job opportunities for the newly arrived immigrants, who usually flocked around big cities. Said one contributor about the mythic attraction of the city: "Once in sight of a city, it is like seizing an electric wire. No matter 16

20 how much you want to, you are unable to let it go,"

But Flower’s special love was religion and. Cline found,

significance in the fact that the first article in the opening

number of the Arena was M, J, Savage's "Agencies That Are Working

a Revolution in Theology," A good, number of contributors

were clergymen, and. no matter how much their doctrines differed

from one another, they never failed to see print in the pages of

the Arena. The articles were not merely confined to Christianity,

but included those on Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Catholicism,

and on the different denominations of Protestantism. There

was even room for Theosophy, Madame Blavatsky and her movement

in India, Mormonism and the question of polygamy, and the rise

of Christian Science.

Science was another of the more common topics of the Arena.

Flower depended more and more on science to support and supplement

spiritual truths. Moreover, the editor looked on science to aid

social reform. Electricity would provide for all kinds of con­

veniences in life, and, therefore, its experiments with new

gadgets were encouraged.

The Arena should also be credited for its discussions of

the race problem, particularly in reference to the South. Both aspects of the problem were given fair treatment and the contri­ butors included both white and black writers. Other minority groups were also discussed - particularly the groups of newly arrived immigrants and the underprivileged. 17

Editor Flower felt satisfied and proud with the results of

his magazine, and he assessed the success of the first phase of his association with the Arena in these words:

This review has never faltered in its allegiance to the cause of justice, or in its efforts to alleviate the sufferings of the people and bring about a higher morality and a broader, more tolerant and humane spirit. It has exposed the horrible conditions in the slums of our great cities and has raised and disbursed several thousand dollars among the exiles of society. It has been the agency through which several educational centers have been started. ... Unjust and immoral legislation has been .., ably pointed out. ... Another special feature of the Arena which finds no parallel in any other magazine is the systematic discussion of the root problems of civilization - questions such as heredity, prenatal influence, the fundamentals of justice in the social and economic conditions and the building of character. ... These are questions upon which happiness and progress depend. The Arena has inaugurated an educational program along these lines. ... This review appeals^ to the conscience of men and women of conviction.

Fred Carleton Mabee, Jr,, in his study of Flower and the 22 Arena. concentrated on the four most popular themes for the editor and the magazine - Social reform, Religion, Education and

Politics, His study was internal - based mostly on information available from the pages of the magazine. His chapter on religion was particularly informative, as it studied the turmoil surrounding the Church at the time. He gave a good description of Flower's own relations to the established Church and included biographical sketches of some of the contributors.

Written for the Political Science Department of Columbia 18

University, it stressed heavily the areas of social and political reform. Understandably, he dismissed consideration of literary and artistic contributions to the Arena in about half-a-dozen pages.

Within the space of three years, a third study on Flower and the Arena appeared in the form of a doctoral dissertation 23 by David Howard Dickason. It was the first specialized in­ vestigation of a particular aspect of the editor and the magazine. Dickason began his study by noting how Flower was 24 "overlooked by the majority of American literary historians," and he named twenty-one standard textbooks and their writers who had ignored Flower. Among them were such recognized names as

Brander Matthews, Lewis Mumford, Norman Foerster, F. L. Pattee and Granville Hicks. Against such odds Dickason set out

... to investigate the data, and to decide whether, as Blankenship declares, FLower was merely "an egregious fellow, ready and willing to swallow any proposed reform without the slightest preliminary exam­ ination" - thus enjoying deserved oblivion; or whether he was a constructive modern critic, in his own words seeking in the Arena "to cultivate intellectual hospitality," and trying to make his magazine "the meeting place of fearless thinkers" - thus meriting greater recognition.

According to Dickason, the literary climate, at the time when the Arena started publication, was one of flux. The old order was changing. The 1880's and. the early 1890’s saw the literary greats pass away - among them Emerson, Longfellow,

Whitman, and Melville. Romantic novelists, noted Dickason, 19

were in full bloom and sold well - especially Lew Wallace and his Ben Hur and Helen Hunt Jackson and her Ramona. There was also the noticeable rise of the local color movement, which later influenced realism and Mark Twain, William Dean Howells and Henry James. But the form, said Dickason, which was to become popular with the Arena was that of the literature of protest, especially social protest. Dickason remarked:

The end of the frontier in 1890 marked the conclusion of one era and the opening of another; and at this crucial point the Arena appeared. ... Literature was belatedly becoming aware of actual American life, after following the by-way of local color. °

In an article called "Benjamin Orange Flower, Patron of 27 the Realists," Dickason said that of the four thousand pages of editorials and articles written by Flower, almost one- fourth were concerned with literature - both national and

European. The editor was also a prolific reviewer of books and encouraged and accepted works from a host of American writers, among them, Hamlin Garland, Moncure Conway, Edward Everett Hale,

Clarence Darrow, and Thomas Dickinson, Works of foreign writers were studied and reviewed - some of them were Ibsen, Hugo,

Balzac, Zola, Maupassant, Marx, Nietzsche, Turgenief, Tolstoy, and almost all the prominent English writers of the late nine­ teenth century.

More important, said Dickason:

... is the Arena's attack on the orthodox romanticism in the America of its time, in 20

conjunction with its energetic defense of the younger realistic writers who were as yet almost unheard. Especially in the light of what it has to say about Garland, Norris, London, Crane, Upton Sinclair, and James A, Hearne, the Arena definitely merits re- evaluation; for ... it did much to shape the American public’s reactions to the literary milieu, and to further the cause of realism in American letters,

As was seen in Cline’s articles, Flower did not accept art for its own sake. For him its role was clearly defined:

"The supreme mission of art is to further justice, progress, 29 and enlightenment among the children of men. Flower favored, didactic literature, being more interested in the meaning than in the form. This editorial attitude prevented the Arena from establishing a firm foothold among the great literary reviews of the time. However, Flower's enthusiasm and encouragement provided opportunity for many young writers to publish material in the magazine. Denied this chance perhaps a figure like Hamlin

Garland would have remained unrecognized for a long time,

Dickason noted that Flower was among the first to praise Frank

Norris's new work:

In The Octopus Mr. Norris has produced a novel of American life exhibiting the strength, power, vividness, fidelity to truth, photographic accuracy in description, and marvelous insight in depicting human nature, together with that broad philosophic grasp of the larger problems of life, that noble passion for justice, that characterizes the greatest work of Zola, ... a novel that every reader of the Arena should possess.30 21

Remarks similar to the above were used to praise Norris's The

Pit. Jack London’s The Call of the Wild, and Crane’s Maggie.

The last novel was hailed by the Arena at a time when regular

publication was denied to the book.

Dickason, thus, saw Flower as a patron of the realists -

he "wrought better than he knew," one whose

... ardent support of and practical assistance to the proponents of the newer realism at the beginning of this century resulted, then, not from any profound apprehension of their method, per se. but rather from his conviction that their literary products would help to solve some of society’s problems. ... But whatever his critical shortcomings, whatever his reasons for reacting favorably to the "veritists" or realists, his resulting active patronage and public appreciation gave a vital impetus to their writings, and helped to establish realism in modern American letters,31

If FLower was a patron of the realists, he was also the

reviver of the Transcendentalists. Time after time, through

editorials, book-reviews, and articles, he longed for a return of

the ideals to which Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman devoted their

lives. With these three, FLower shared a belief in the perfect-

ability of man. His three main principles, as shown by Roy P.

Fairfield, resulted from this belief which were among the

fundamental tenets of Transcendentalism. They were Flower’s

(l) moral attitude toward life; (2) belief in freedom and (3)

32 an optimistic outlook regarding the future of civilization.

Flower, like the Transcendentalists, craved for the

supremacy of mind over matter. His philosophical outlook tended 22

to deny the truth of materialism and asserted the reality and importance of mind. He did not go so far as to say that matter did not exist, but he believed that it was closely dependent on the existence of mind. As with all idealistic philosophy,

Flower's was a religious philosophy which regarded the material world as somehow less real than the world of mind or spirit.

However, like the Transcendentalists, he was not satisfied with men as they were. This dissatisfaction was married to an optimism, in which he proclaimed that the present world was the best of all possible worlds, and, therefore, that life was worth living.

Thus, Flower referred to his outlook on life as one of practical idealism. It proclaimed freedom of mind, with a zeal for reform through a hope in the approaching millennium:

We are living today in one of the most wonderful transition periods known to man, and during which such epochs more can be accomplished in a year than would be possible in a decade of peaceful years, when the thought of the world moves sluggishly and the imagination of the people is dormant.33 • These concepts of idealism, optimism, and individual freedom, cherished by Benjamin Orange Flower, were central to the beliefs and practises of Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman. 23

CHAPTER III

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

In 1914 Flower published a book called Progressive Men.

Women and Movements of the Past Twenty-Five Years. It was a

review of his association as founder and chief editor of the monthly

magazine Arena. One of the chapters of this book is entitled

"Emerson’s Philosophical Concepts and the New Thought Movement,"

This chapter is significant for it projects Flower’s fervent

belief in a revival of idealism as an antidote to the widespread

material progress of the last decade of the nineteenth century.

Flower looked back to Emerson as "the man who did more than any

other thinker of our time to prepare the popular mind to accept 2 the new practical idealism and gospel of optimism," He con­

sidered Emerson to be the pioneer New World diffuser of metaphysical thought and oriental philosophy. Emerson was the source of in­

spiration for what came to be known as the New Thought Movement - a Movement which Flower found difficult to define - it was a form of liberalism fed by many great currents like the metaphysics of India and Greece, as well as those of the Hebraic origin and the Trancendental thought of the mid-nineteenth century.

The New Thought Movement was marked by intellectual hospitality and that searching critical spirit which, in Flower’s time, challenged all passing theory that assumed to explain the profounder 24

problems of life. Flower recognized Emerson’s broadening and

illuminating influence on American thought. Flower’s own

liberalism and religious tolerance matched very well that of

Emerson, who was broad-visioned and open-minded, always looking

for the good in literature of aspiration. In this respect,

said Flower, he resembled the great Mohammedan Akbar, Moghul

King of India, who welcomed to his court scholars of all

faiths, encouraging them to present their religious concepts;

and when the Mohammedan zealots protested, Akbar refused to yield

to those narrow-minded sectarians, saying in substance, what

Tennyson clothed in verse:

There is light in all, And light with more or less of shade In all man’s modes of worship.

Emerson was Flower’s hero and inspiration. Consequently he received the greatest coverage in the Arena - more than any other

major literary figure in American or British literature. In an article called "A Golden Day in Boston's History,' Flower prophesied:

Perhaps the figure that as the years pass will loom forth as most commanding, because his thought was most cosmic and his philosophical and ethical generalizations most in harmony with the broadening concepts of advancing civilizations, was Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Emerson was the greatest of American idealistic philosophers who appealed to the intellectual, moral, and the aesthetic sides of man's nature. Flower was impressed try Emerson's successful 25

attempts to adorn his native thought with the wisdom of Plato, the wonderful philosophy of the Far East, and the congeniality of German romanticism until

... his soul was filled with high, fine and true ideals, and he felt impelled to summon those who loved and dared to think to ascend with him the Nebo of the New Time and behold the Promised Land that lay beyond the dark valley, which with the prescience of a sage he divined would soon be that battle field of warring forces - storm swept and wreck-strewn - the Promised Land of the highest spiritual realization and desire to which the soul of man aspires.-5

Emerson had a cosmic view. He scanned the past, present and future, and understood that supreme fact that man was rising,

"that the Golden Age lies before and not behind humanity.

Flower was fascinated at discovering the elements of the evolutionary theory in Emerson’s writings over twenty years before Charles Darwin’s Origin of the Species. (l859)!

Always rising, always evolving from the lower to the higher, always advancing - that is what Emerson beheld, and beholding this, he became serene, confident and full of joy« Re spoke for all time and his thought is more prized and read today than ever before.?

Emerson’s special message, however, was the infusion of a deeper faith in God and in humanity. This message has special importance for Flower, who earnestly hoped for a reawakening among the masses of an interest in the living God - free of old theo­ logy. Emerson preached such a God and provided man with a firm foothold upon the eternal spiritual truths after the onslaught 26

of physical science which had shattered the old dogmatic and

creedal theologies, Emerson stood as a dam checking the turbulent river of agnosticism and materialism, provoked by the evolutionary theory. He provided a reservoir of calm, serene, and lofty utterances that gave one an alternative and a choice.

According to Flower, this Emersonian alternative was absolutely necessary to check the growing current of skepticism and materialism that had long been evident, not only in the church, but also throughout society. It was a mistake, asserted Flower, to regard

Emerson and the other transcendentalists as the authors of wide­ spread skepticism of the nineteenth century. Skepticism towards dogmatic and creedal theology existed before and had successfully grown with the demonstrations of Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler,

Newton’s discovery of the law of gravitation, and the dazzling revolution in physical science, astronomy, and archaelogy, that progressed with accelerating rapidity since the dawn of modern times.

Emerson was not merely obsessed with metaphysics, he actively took issues with the crying evils of has day. This is seen in his strong stand for freedom during the anti-slavery agitation, and in his brave utterances on the subject of education and similar reforms. Nothing could have pleased Flower more, who was more than anything else, a social reformer. He recognized in

Emerson a kindred spirit, inasmuch as the latter remained absolutely fearless and at all times loyal to his highest 27

convictions, illustrated time and again, but never more clearly

than when he took his bold stand on religious questions - a stand

which, he recognized, would alienate even many of his best friends

and thwart a promising career. Similarly Flower would antagonize

a host of his reading public through his sympathetic stand in

favor of Christian Science doctrine.

Flower, therefore, was very receptive to articles dealing

with Emerson and his works. Emerson’s birth centenary, in

1903, was celebrated by the Arena through the publication of a

number of Emersonian studies.

The articles on Emerson in the Arena can be conveniently

classified under three groups (l) biographical; (2) critical studies; and (3) message and influence.

Curiously enough, the majority of these articles were

biographical. The writers appeared to be taking great pains to sketch Emerson’s life all over again as though he was a character removed for a long time from the present generation. Emerson's recent death, in 1882, spurred renewed interest in him. The prominent biographical writers were those who knew Emerson personally.

In a series of sketches collected under the title "Personal

Recollection of America's Seven Great Poets" in the Arena of g December, 1895, there were two on Emerson, The first one was by the Reverend John White Chadwick (1840-1904) who was a graduate of the Harvard Divinity School and pastor of the Second 28

Unitarian Church, Brooklyn, New York. Chadwick’s first opportunities

for hearing Emerson were singularly fortunate. Theodore Parker

had gone abroad, not to return again, and his Transcendental

Club was hearing Emerson, Garrison, Phillips, and other men of

note from week to week. On one of these occasions, Emerson

made an address on Thoreau, shortly after the latter's death.

An occasion far more memorable, said Chadwick, was a Sunday shortly

following Lincoln’s proclamation threatening emancipation (Sept.

22, 1862):

I have heard Sumner and Phillips, and Lincoln and Gladstone and other famous orators, but never from other lips words so impressively spoken as those concluding that address. "Do not let the dying die. Hold them back to this world until you have charged their ear and heart with this message to other spiritual societies, q announcing the melioration of our planet."'*

Another of Chadwick's memorable experiences was a visit to

Emerson's own house. There was plenty of good talk with Alcott,

Conway and Sanborn also present. Chadwick says that Emerson was a copius talker and so captivating that those who knew Emerson or were acquainted with him must have thought that his con­ versation was his most delightful gift:

To me it always seemed to be of the essence of the man, an expression of his conscience for reality and truth. We seemed not so much to hear him as to overhear his mind rethinking what he had written,1®

If Emerson laughed at all, it was very quietly. Carlyle's loud and roaring laugh must have been intolerable to him. But

Chadwick could not forget Emerson’s smile - it was the wisest 29

smile. Chadwick was ecstatic when he recalled Emerson speaking to

him:

"Let me see," he said on one occasion, "where did I see you last? Oh, I remember! It was at the tavern, the stone tavern on School Street," meaning the Parker House! It was close by the said "tavern" that I saw him for the last time, and the whole street seemed to be lighted up and cheered and brightened with the ineffable sweetness of his face. It was as if some superior being from a higher world had lost his way amidst the jostling crowd,

Franklin Benjamin Sanborn (1831-1917) was closer and more

intimate with Emerson than was the Reverend Chadwick, After

graduating from Harvard, Sanborn taught school in Concord, 12 Massachusetts, In his brief sketch "Emerson in his Home,"

Sanborn said that it was his good fortune to see much of Emerson

in his own home at Concord, and to converse with him freely and

intimately on many topics, Sanborn was struck from the first - his first call was in the summer of 1853 ~ by the readiness and force with which Emerson expressed himself in conversation.

In extempore speaking before an audience, there was always some hesitation in his manner, and this, according to Sanborn, grew to be painful in his latest years, when his memory began to fail. Emerson was always interested in poetry and eloquence and he knew the whole of Milton’s "Lycidas," His habit was to walk every day and Sanborn had been his companion during hundreds of miles in these excursions. It was on a walk with him in the summer of 1855, and crossing a certain bridge that Emerson first 30

spoke to Sanborn of Walt Whitman, whose earliest book, the thin

quarto of Leaves of Grass had. just appeared.. He praised the work,

"a singular mixture of the Bhagvad Gita and the New York Herald,*1

Emerson said and gave Sanborn a copy.^

Richard Heber Newton (1840-1914) who attracted, considerable

attention by his liberal views, wrote a detailed appreciation of

Emerson for the Arena, "It is well," he said, "that our nation

should pause amid its tasks of speculation and politics to

ponder the significance of the life opening on our world a hundred

years ago," For Newton, Emerson had no predecessor in American

literature; nor did he leave any lineal heir in the spirits "He

so steeped himself in our national springs and. life that, wherever

our mental and spiritual forces flow fresh and full to-day,

his presence may be felt like a fine flavor, a tonic quality as

of the roots of his New England pines." Emerson was the true

original American, He was the teacher of the loftiest life.

He was an elect soul. A descendent of eight generations of

cultivated, devout ministers, Emerson turned naturally to the pulpit. He did not remain long in it, yet he never really left

it. He did not give up the service of God in giving up the ministry. He carried his ordination in other tasks. Emerson, said Newton, was too individualistic for any organization.

Instead he turned towards the freedom of Nature. He linked him­ self to the eternal forces:

What a legacy to our country is such a life, 31

such a genius! How divinely beautiful a being thus poised in strengthful self- control, crystallizing the rich elements drawn from a noble ancestry and from wisely ordered surroundings beading purpose of highest moral aim.

Newton exhorted his readers to pay more attention to what Emerson

stood for and concluded:

...the same consecration to the power that wrought in him can make us, too, the children of light. You and I can achieve the building of a man - "the end to which all nature works": So high is grandeur to our dust So close is God to man When duty whispers low, "Thou must," The youth replies - "I can."l?

Flower heard this whisper and he consecrated his own life in the

noble cause of bettering the conditions of the poor and the

downtrodden, 1A In his article, "The Charm of Emerson," J. R. Mosley

recorded that Emerson impressed most of his contemporaries as one

who was of the heavens heavenly rather than of the earth earthy.

Emerson’s writings were, for Dr. Mosley, the best key to his

biography. After all that he had to say on the deepest and most

vital themes, one was left with the feeling that Emerson saw

more than he had reported. While the charm of Emerson was in

itself indefinable, it was suggested by his being a transcendental and practical idealist, optimist, individualist, seer and poet, all in one. Dr. Mosley discussed six distinct phases of Emerson’s mental make-up.

1, Emerson was the prince of philosophical idealists. 32

19 "He is the modern Plato and the New England Socrates." Emerson’s idealism was eclectic - it had the individual freedom and inde­ pendence of the subjective idealism of Fichte, the common- sense rationality of the objective idealism of Shelley, and the transcendental charm of the romantic idealism of Novalis, To

Emerson, God is infinite Cause and nature infinite effect; God is the Divine Mind and nature the incarnation of this Mind; God is the Over-Soul and nature its universal parable or symbol.

Nature, or the external world, is the realization of God in time and space, "the screen through which the glory of the one peeps out everywhere." But nature apart from its cause is cruel and unspiritual, Man represents an intermediate phase of being, tending upwards towards freedom as he gravitates Godward, and downward towards slavery as he regards himself as a part of the physical nature,

2, Emerson was the most optimistic, hopeful, and certain of all the philosophical idealists. His optimism, said Mosley, was the expression of his serene and hopeful temper and of his radiant and joyous insight. Through every medium of human ex­ pression available to him, Emerson was forever asserting the same gospel of optimism, the omnipresence of God, the unity of the human race, the universality of spiritual laws, the correspondence of the ideal and phenomenal worlds, and the impartiality of both

God and nature.

3. Emerson was an individualist. It was as much a part of 33

his gospel as is idealism and optimism. As an interpreter of

individualism he has never been surpassed, said Dr. Mosley.

Emerson’s concept of individualism was enmeshed with his idealism.

It was the concept of that individual who is coming to his real

self through the renunciation of his lower self. Emerson's in­

dividualism made him skeptical of all reform that did not begin

with the individual. He saw that "society gains nothing whilst

a man not himself renovated attempts to renovate things around

him"; that "there can be no concert of two, where there is no 21 concert of one."

4. Emerson was a New England Transcendentalist, an idealist, an optimist and an individualist on Puritan and Unitarian soil.

His Transcendentalism was less a philosophy than an independent and receptive state of mind; it was "the opening of the human mind to a new influx of light and power from the Divine Mind"; 22 it was "a feeling after the infinite"; it was Unitarianism stripped of its dogmatic and orthodox character; it was religion without a church, without a creed, without a dogma; it was a high tide of spirituality outside the Church.

Dr, Mosley proceeded to discuss the different characteristics of Emerson's charm. Emerson regarded man as too fine a being to be too much concerned with the finite. This showed itself in the least of things as well as in the greatest. When Mrs. Emerson wanted wood, he cheerfully left his meditations to get it; but as soon as it was supplied, he returned, as he expressed it, to 34

"the real things." This, said. Mosley, was the charm of Emerson,

23 He was always returning to "the real things." J The charm of

Emerson's Transcendentalism was enriched by an exquisite sense of wit and humor. Dr. Mosley considered Emerson to be a great humorist.

His appeal, however, was always to the mind:

We smile and laugh as we read Emerson, because he is always voicing the wise, true, fitting and inevitable word about the loftiest and most serious things; and the laughter he awakens is the refined laughter of the mind, nearer a smile, than a laugh, often no more than a smile.

Emerson strove for effect. His humor enabled him to see the ridiculous as well as the genuine side of every interest that enlisted his enthusiasm and devotion.

5. Emerson was always the seer; he never argued, never tried to prove anything, never tried to make disciples of his readers.

He was content to be a witness, a seer, a beholder, and a reporter.

He placed great importance on prayer, which was divine contemplation, the beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord and the transformation into the image of this glory,

6, Emerson was a "born poet"; a poet not always great in actual achievement, yet always a poet. In his characteristic modesty he said: "My singing for the most part is very husky, and for the most part in the soul and in matter (nature), and

„25 especially the correspondences between these and those.

Where Dr, Mosley in his study of Emerson was more concerned to see the whole of the man, W, H. Savage concentrated on Emerson's 35

26 religion. In his study, "The Religion of Emerson," Savage

traced the origins of the Transcendental movement. He said that

the elements of storm had been slowly gathering themselves and

only waited some signal to burst forth. Then came Carlyle’s

"Sign of the Times," and soon a Boston edition of his Sartor

Resartus (1833)« This, said Lowell in his essay on Thoreau, was

2*7 "the signal for a sudden mental and moral mutiny." ' The acceptable time had come at last, and it was hailed by a wild chorus of voices of every conceivable pitch.

The sanity and divinity of the Transcendental movement found their highest expression in Ralph Waldo Emerson - a man, said

Savage, to whom what was highest in the mental and moral culture of America owed more than to any other, if not to all others 28 combined. Savage quoted Lowell’s impressions of Emerson’s speech before the Phi Beta Kappa society: "His oration ... was an event without any former parallel in our literary annals, a scene always to be treasured in the memory, for its picturesqueness and its inspiration. What crowded and breathless aisles, what windows clustering with eager heads, what enthusiasm of approval, what grim silence of foregone dissent! It was our Yankee version of a lecture by Abelard, our Harvard parallel to the last 29 public appearance of Schelling,"

Discussing the essence of Emerson’s beliefs and teachings,

Savage first spoke of the concept of this universe as a spiritual universe, a manifestation of God. Secondly, the soul of man lives 36

and moves and has its being in and from this soul of the universe.

Emerson soon ran into trouble since his beliefs were rejected by

the Church, To him it was a fact; to them it was a phrase. The

first two led to a third belief, which was a declare/tion of

war on all the recognized creeds of Christendom. This third

step was his declaration that the soul itself is the source and

seat of authority, the creator of texts and their rightful lord.

In 1848 in his A Fable for Critics. James Russell Lowell called

Emerson a "primitive pagan"; and later the North American Review

30 termed his doctrine and his spirit "refreshingly pagan,"

Savage rejoiced' that the paganism of the year 1848 became the

Christian theism of today (1894), Emerson never left the lofty ground he took in I838. It has been found, said Savage, that the paganism was not so much in him as in those who denied to him the

Christian name. "Religion or worship," said Emerson, "is the attitude of those who see that the nature of things works for truth and right forever."^ Emerson revolted against the organized forms of religion because they represented routine and not beliefs. The grand need of religion and of the soul was the touch of reality. Savage concluded: "It is impossible to think of him as ’dead*. When we wander, lost in the awful and sweet immensity of his thought, we somehow cannot doubt our own im­ mortality. We have the feeling by which he himself speaks, that the soul antedates the shining accidents that spangle the sky of night, and is coeval with the Infinite Life that builds and unbuilds J?

the worlds."32

This ethical outlook towards life was shared by Flower, who

repeatedly emphasized the primacy of the individual over matter.

For him, the individual soul was part of the divine, creative

force, hence, the creator and owner of the material things, and

not a slave to them.

The second group of articles on Emerson dealt primarily with the teachings of Emerson and with critical studies of his works. Two articles contributed by Dr. James T. Bixby in the

Arena of May-June, 1908, provide a good starting place. In his first paper, called "Emerson as Writer and Man,"33 Dr. Bixby decried those critics who dismissed Emerson as being too difficult. The circle of Emerson readers was, however, widening with every generation. The highest literary authorities recognized him as the largest, loftiest and most characteristic intellect produced by the American soil. In a nutshell, Bixby described

Emerson’s message as the one in which

God is a living God - not a relic of the supernatural past. God is a present God - not an absentee. Through the whole universe God flames sparkling, now in atom, now in star, but halting never and baffling all imaginations. Everything in Nature or Art or history has its spiritual significance and ends. Matter and Man are Deity clothed upon; and. this hidden God (who yet is most manifest) is as near to every man and woman in America In our day as ever he was to Moses on Sinai or to Jesus by the shores of Galilee. This was the gist of Emerson’s message.34

Emerson pointed men back from dead formalism to reliance on their 38

uncorrupted, instincts. Bixby also'-noted Emerson’s concern with

the social evils of his day, ■ They were the same concerns which

haunted Benjamin Flower throughout his life, and made him dedicate

his career to the service of mankind. Man to Emerson was more

than constitutions or cotton-crops; and an injustice to the

humblest black man was treason against the spirit alike of re­

publicanism and Christianity. Emerson’s writings, said Bixby,

were most important for young men and women who would get a better

bracing for their moral natures; regal instructions, in self-

reliance, courage, individuality, high principle; aspiration to

use life nobly, serve one’s country wisely and minister to

humanity unselfishly. Bixby concluded, "Among those who in the

last thousand years have befriended the life of the Spirit with

pervasive intellectual and moral impregnation - the name of Ralph Waldo Emerson will ever lead the illustrious roll."^

Dr. Bixby, more than any other Emersonian contributor to the Arena. showed the best understanding of the dynamics of

Emersonial Transcendentalism. In his second article called

"Emerson’s Message," Dr. Bixby discussed the initial reactions to Emerson's early lectures and essays. They were characterized as "the latest form of infidelity." Emerson was stigmatized by one set of critics as an atheist and by another as a pantheist - a name, Bixby said, which was in those days almost equally sinister. This was because Emerson could not put the Infinite into definitions or familiar creedal formulas and he was frank 39

enough to say that he did. not know the secrets of the beyond and

the exact condition of our future being. Emerson looked on in­

spiration not as a monopoly of the first century of the Christian

era, but as a channel as open now as it was then.

Emerson’s Transcendentalism, as Bixby understood it, meant

a warm, spontaneous revival of belief in a living God, in the

reality of spiritual insight, and the glory of Nature. Emerson

rejected the concept of miracles. They seemed noxious to him

since the majority of men were spending time in hunting for

signs and wonders and Divine over-rulings of the customary order,

whereas they should have turned to the heart to trust the Power

by which it daily lives and see the miraculous that already floods

the commonplace. "Speak the truth," said Emerson, "and all

nature and all spirits help you with unexpected furtherance.

Spiritual truth is an intuition. It cannot be received at second hand.">37

Dr, Bixby very correctly highlighted Emerson’s emphasis on character. To Emerson, character was the secret of destiny - the key to salvation and to heaven itself. And not only was character thus in Emerson's thought the determiner of earthly destiny, but of the great hereafter. Immortality, he held, will come to such as are fit for it. "He who would be a great soul in the future must be a great soul now."^

Finally, Dr. Bixby picked out the most Christian message of

Emerson's teachings - the message of service. Much had been said 40

of Emerson’s simplicity of life and the severe economies of his

country home. But Bixby asserted that Emerson was no ascetic

who made self-denial an end in itself. He delighted in beauty

and all elegancies and generosities. It was for the sake of

human welfare that he would foster high thinking. If Emerson had

lived longer, he would have discovered, in Editor Flower, a true

disciple - one who renounced fame and fortune, to champion the

cause of that segment of society, the depraved and the deprived, whose very existence was a-reminder that social injustice was

prevalent. Flower kept hammering at the themes of poverty and discrimination, and through the wide circulation of the Arena. awakened the conscience of many, who had hitherto been apathetic.

Dr. Bixby was the only Arena writer to see a connection between

Emersonial Transcendentalism and the evolutionary theory. Emerson published his famous essay on Nature some twenty years before

Darwin published his Origin of the Species. "Yet," said Bixby,

"where could the British apostle have found a more pregnant text for his epoch-making book and a terser summary of his philosophy than in the original stanzas that the Concord seer prefixed as a motto to that equally noble American statement (Nature) of what was substantially the same pregnant interpretation of the kosmos:

A subtle chain of countless rings, The next unto the farthest brings; The eye reads omens where it goes, And speaks all languages the rose; And striving to be man, the worm Mounts through all the spheres of form,"''' 41

That Emerson seriously believed and taught evolution in the

eighteen thirties and forties was, however, plain from his

frequent and frank assertions of it in his prose essays. Emerson

said: "The embryo does not more strive to be man than yonder

burr of light we call a nebula tends to be a ring, a comet, a 40 globe, and a parent of new suns ; and again: "This process of

evolution publishes itself in creatures reaching from particles

to spicula, through transformation to the highest symmetries, 41 arriving at consummate results without a shock or a leap."

Emerson’s message, insisted Bixby, was still needed since the

modern religion was far from being that straight-forward look at divine realities and sincere report of them that Emerson

sighed for. In the present religion, still, tradition replaced the soul; and faith, instead of being a living testimony of godly men, was but a repetition of creeds, a dependence on certain forms of churchly organizations or substitutional cleansings.

What we need, said Bixby, was a revival of faith in the living

God, a God who is - miraculous in every daily mystery and divine in all the inscrutable order and eternal beauty. Flower craved for the very same attributes for his concept of God. In Bixby’s time, as in Emerson’s, church and state were being dragged down by mercenary standards and virtue was again insulated in certain official personages. In a voice sounding desperate, Bixby pleaded:

"We need another period of Transcendental glow to melt the crust of convention and kindle the Promethean fire of genius. We need 42

more of that ‘strong enchantment' that made our Concord seer so commanding a figure; we need the same sincere truth seeking and direct contact with the Divine Spirit that gave him such matchless 42 power." Flower agreed whole-heartedly with this plea for the s return of interest in the Transcendental ideals.

Dr. Bixby concluded his important study with a call to his readers for a renewed interest in the teachings of Emerson:

If we are in truth to honor him and show due gratitude ... we must do so, not by attending ostentatious functions to celebrate noted days or events in his history, but by drinking at that same living fountain of truth and reality where he drank, ... We ought to free our minds from the mists of our present artificial and worldly existence and from the heights of lofty principle behold the infinite perspectives and possibilities of life. As God has not forsaken this world, they who devote themselves with uncalculating devotion to the advancement of the Divine Kingdom shall not fail both to help forward the brother to whom they reach out the hand of helpfulness and to bring to their own life a new light and blessedness.

Bixby sounded very much like Flower, who envisioned an idealistic reaction through a renewal of interest in Emerson and the other

Transcendentalists.

The third group of articles discussed Emerson’s influence on and his contributions to the later generations. In an article called "The Social Message of Emerson,"^ the Reverend Owen R.

Lovejoy showed his dismay at the false impression circulating among the readers because of the tag of "extreme individualist" that had been attached to Emerson's name. The popular concept 43

of "Individualism", said. Lovejoy, was a complete contradiction

of every principle for which Emerson stood. His interest in the

individual was not an interest in this or that particular in­

dividual, hut in Man. Humanity was to him not a mass of living

animals to be fed and clothed, but a race of persons of infinite

significance. That he was concerned in the development of

individuals, not merely as individuals, but in their social

relations, was clear from Emerson’s criticism of those Trans­

cendentalists whose "... solitary manners ... withdraw them ... 45 from the labor of the day." ' The struggling multitudes, their problems and troubles, were very close to Emerson, who said:

"When government reaches its true law of action, every man that 46 is born will be hailed as essential," This is the kernel of the social message, remarked Lovejoy, of one whose soul suffered pain because he saw that multitudes of people were forced into conditions which rendered them unimportant to the world - conditions in which, Flower found for himself, men were considered less important than material things,

Lovejoy made it clear to his readers that when he spoke of the social message of Emerson, they should not look for doctrinaire teachings of any specific reform, nor set programs for carrying out special measures. What Emerson did was to call us from our faith in things to faith in Life. Whatever social message Emerson had was directed to this end - that humanity might be redeemed from its littleness, sordidness, ugliness, and cowardice and 44

might put on the glory of Gocl - a message which captivated Flower

himself.

At the time when Emerson came to his intellectual maturity,

De Tocqueville was investigating the American democracy under

the direction of the French Government and he published his report

in 1835 under the title Democracy in America. This was a

stinging criticism of American life and institutions. It was a

time of compromise. There were topics on which polite society

preserved a discreet silence. Moreover, it was a period in

American history of infinite and depressing diplomacy. It was

this condition in society which drew from Emerson an expression

that has been popularly considered the climax of his "Individualism,"

He said: "Leave the hypocritical prating about the masses,

Masses are rude, lame, unmade, pernicious in their demands and

influence and we need not to concede anything to them, but to

tame, drill, divide, and break them up, and draw individuals out

of them. Away with the hurrah of masses, and let us have the

considerate vote of single men, spoken on their honor and their 47 conscience." In the context of the times, Emerson discerned the danger to American democracy, as had De Tocqueville, which was the tyranny of majorities.

The Reverend Lovejoy sensed, in the first decade of the twentieth century, the same attitudes, the same atmosphere of compromise that existed at the time of Tocqueville and Emerson.

Therefore, he felt, that it was only proper to remind the masses of ^5

Emerson’s message to society. The tendency to surrender independent

personal thought to the overpowering decision of numbers disgusted

Emerson. It led him to assert the necessity for complete emancipation

of human nature and to show that abuse of any good custom may 48 corrupt the world.

Lovejoy also discerned, in Emerson’s social message, a word

for industries and laborers. It was expressed in Emerson’s "The

Boston Hymn":

But laying hands on another, To coin his labor and sweat He goes in pawn to his victim For eternal years in debt.

Emerson here, said. Lovejoy, joined with Ruskin and Willia,m Morris in condemning an economic system which vitiated, the ratio between labor and reward. An institutional slavery, the chattel ownership of men’s bodies, was not the only form of bondage.

He saw the slavery which existed in society in 1905 in some respects as more depressing and deadening than that which was practised until the middle of the nineteenth century. It was the suppression of individual freedom. This was more difficult to remove, concluded Lovejoy, because it was insidious and not sectional.

Just as Lovejoy was worried about the correct meaning of

"Individualism," so was Bolton Hall concerned with the term "Anarchist." In his paper "Emerson, the Anarchist,"^ Hall gave the example of a conservative New York paper, the Evening Mail which commented, thus on the arrest of eleven Anarchists at a meeting

called to eulogize Czolgosz: "The adult Anarchist is past

reasoning with and past reform. He Is an enemy to society, worse

than the Malay who runs amuck or the rabid dog. These rage openly

and indiscriminately. The anarchist aims at the best and highest 50 only, and strikes through the agency of the dupes.Hall

lamented the definition and wondered at the reaction if he suggested

that America's special pride and chief treasure in literature and ethics, Ralph Waldo Emerson, was himself an Anarchist. He, too, aimed at "the best and highest" only and he was a great teacher. But it was not instruction that he imparted, only pro­ vocation - accepting the premise that we cannot teach anything to anybody that he does not know himself. Emerson had a clear under­ standing of what constituted man. He took pains to show us that the nature of man is threefold. There is the physical or material, then the spiritual, and then the mental, and no man can understand where one begins and the other ends. Emerson never made the mistake of speaking to the physical as though it were spiritual; he spoke always as the spiritual man and always to the spiritual man, Emerson believed that when we have realized the universality and the unity of Spirit, we have solved the problem of the universe, we have justified the ways of God to man, and we have explained the suffering and have shared in the pain and. joy of others; we have the knowledge of good and evil; we know that everything that happens, everything that ever did. happen, happened 47

to all people, for we are all the family of God, and we are One.

That intense sense of unity was what made Emerson an anarchist.

He said: "The state exists only for the education of the wise

51 man; when the wise man appears the state is at an end."

Said Hall in conclusion that Emerson was really only a theoretical

anarchist.

This discussion of Emersonian studies, in the Arena, could he

concluded with remarks by Its editor, B. 0. Flower. They were in

the form of a review of Edwin D. Mead's book The Influence of 52 Emerson. Flower agreed with Mead when the latter pointed out

that the great masters of philosophy, from Plato were at heart

but one. Emerson’s insistence on the belief that the universe

was an embodiment of God was, for example, according to Mead,

pure Plato. The idea that "everything in the phenomenal world

takes place at once mechanically and metaphysically" was shown

by Mead to be a reflex of the thought of the great German trans­

cendentalists. "A perfect parallelism," Emerson said, almost in

the words of Liebnitz, and in the precise thought of Hegel,

"exists between nature and the laws of thought. The whole

53 nature agrees with the whole of thought.' J

If, however, said Flower, Emerson was in perfect accord with

the world's greatest philosophers and metaphysicians, he was thoroughly

out of tune with the religious concepts of his day. He rejected the dogmatic and creedal theology of his age and hoped to preach the gospel of a livirg God - one who was closer and real for 48

the masses.

Emerson was also different from the other philosophers in his anticipation of the evolutionary theory. On this point

Flower quoted Edwin Mead, who wrote:

But nothing could so strikingly illustrate the truth that the method of thought is the method of nature as what is called the "Darwinism" of Emerson himself - the anticipations and clear expressions everywhere of that view of development which our science has adopted and made so cardinal. Of this Darwinism in Emerson much has been made, yet not too much. Darwinism, as we have already noticed, was made the very motto of Nature twenty years before The Origin of Species was written. Nature is full of Darwinism.5^

The old order, said Flower, always was against the larger truth born of the broader vision. He referred to Mead’s assessment of the opposition of the Church to the philosophical ideals of Emerson. Emerson objected not to the doctrine of

Christianity, but to the claim of miraculous dispensation. He firmly believed that the miraculous claim was contrary to the law of nature. The attempt to elevate Christ above humanity took his teachings out of logic and out of nature, "and distrust of the story prompts distrust of the doctrine,

Benjamin Flower was very sympathetic to this outlook, for he had himself rejected his family church and had become more and more eclectic. His religious sympathies, like Emerson’s, crossed the barriers of traditional Protestantism and surveyed Catholicism,

Hebraism, and the ancient religions of India, This commonality of interest will be studied in a later chapter where Hinduism, 49

Buddhism and Transcendentalism, as found in the Arena. will be discussed. CHAPTER IV

HENRY DAVID THOREAU AND WALT WHITMAN

Editor FLower deserves credit for recognizing, long before

many other people had done so, the true greatness and contribution

of Henry David Thoreau. Said FLower: "Our people have not yet

recognized the essential greatness or sanity of Henry Thoreau.

In him the human element was far stronger than the world

imagines, and he intuitively recognized the great fact, which

we are only beginning to appreciate, that the safety and sanity

of civilization demand the return to the heart of nature."

The conditions of society which disillusioned Thoreau were

similar to those in Flower’s time. The madness of the millions

bitten by gold, and the artificiality and superficiality of

urban life hampered normal growth, originality, and great

works. Thoreau saw through the superficiality, rejected it,

and turned towards Walden Pond, He saw the need to get closer

to the elements of nature, to forget the hue and cry of industrial

society and to live fully, according to the dictates of his

intuition. Flower saw Thoreau’s message as aptly relevant to the early years of the twentieth century, which was a time in which the basics of human nature and individuality were threatened in the name of industrial progress.

Apart from stray references the only full-length study of 51

Thoreau, in the Arena. was the one called. "Henry Thoreau - An

Estimate." Its author, Walter Leighton, realizing how easy it is to ignore someone like Thoreau who is overshadowed by the awesome Emerson, began with a sketch of the essential features of Thoreau’s life. All through life, said Leighton, Thoreau was at heart a Transcendentalist - one of those who believe human knowledge is ascertainable, in greater or less degree, without the aid of scientific experiment - and as such was the friend, not only of Emerson, but also of his contemporary celebrities such as the Alcott's, the Channings, and Margaret Fuller.

Thoreau had few comrades or friends. His neighbors did not know what to make of him - each had his own opinion; he attracted the young and often acted as guide, philosopher and friend to them on their excursions into the fields and woods.

The farmers and the older people of Concord regarded him as un­ social and his negative ways as queer, but Thoreau never cared for the opinions of others. Early in his life, he deliberated on the course of his future life and came to the conclusion which we find in the words of Polonius in Hamlet:

To thine own self be true, And it must follow as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any men.

Said Leighton, it is perhaps because Thoreau was so true to himself and lived so highly and nobly in accordance to the promptings of his genius and the circumstances of his environment, that his career and character attract so many of us - notwithstanding 52

the fact that few, if any, would care to follow exactly in his

footsteps.

To Thoreau, life was a thing to be lived - he desired to

live for himself fully and freely from beginning to end,

Leighton quoted that important paragraph from Walden in which

Thoreau explained the purpose of his going to Walden Pond:

I went into the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach - I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and cut close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.3

What Leighton found so remarkable in Thoreau was his confident challenge to the virtues of the modern complex civilization with reference to its effects on the formation and development of human character, and his sharp criticism in respect to the advantages of the present customs and institutions.

Assessing Thoreau's beliefs, Leighton picked out the most relevant and understandable one, which was that happiness came from within. To realize this kind of happiness one has to elevate himself from the baser life of physicality and transcend to a realm where intuition becomes the guide. The Transcendentalists,

Thoreau asserted, considered themselves "as paragons for the 53

edification of their less elect brethern."^ There was good reason

for this feeling of edification. Thoreau could discover more

resources for enjoyment in a day in a meadow than most of us

could discover in a year on a continent. He possessed a kind of

quick wisdom, too, that often enabled him to penetrate into the

heart of things,

Thoreau is admired and respected for the peculiar blend of

his spiritual and earthly nature. His desire was not to attain

knowledge in particular, but to develop sympathy with intelligence

in general. He wrote: "You think I am impoverishing myself by

withdrawing from men, but in my solitude I have woven for myself

a silken thread or chrysalis, and nymph-like shall erelong burst forth a more perfect creature, fitted for a higher society."3

Leighton noted Thoreau’s natural affinity for the mystical

philosophies of the East but did not elaborate on it further.

At times Thoreau appeared as an inhabitant of an atmosphere

more ethereal than that in which most of us exist—he was ever

groping about in, or trying to fit himself for those unexplored

and immortal regions which lie beyond human comprehension.

Although Thoreau craved for the spiritual experience, he

found in himself an instinct toward a lower and more savage

life. At times he was inclined to roam the woods like a wild

animal, with his senses heightened, ready for any eventuality.

Then, at other times, he would relapse in so celestial a mood that the motions of the commonest of animals, or the most silent- &

flowing water seemed, to him pulsations of the Infinite. Leighton

recalled an appropriate passage from Thoreau:

When after feeling dissatisfied with my life, I aspire to something better, am more scrupulous, more reserved and continent, as if expecting somewhat, suddenly I find myself full of life as a nut full of meat, even overflowing with a quiet genial mirthfulness. I think to myself I must attend to my diet. I must get up earlier and take a morning walk. I must have done with business and devote myself to my muse.

Thoreau should also be respected, said Leighton, for practicing

his preachings, He led the life of an ascetic. He was chaste

and abstemious. He never allowed himself to indulge in "any

bacchanial debauch, in any marital frenzy, in any unwise romanticism,

<7 in any disspiriting morbidness." His weakness was his repeated

insistence on a life totally structured by one’s whims and beliefs.

But one cannot live for himself entirely. An individual, believed Leighton, cannot almost altogether detach himself from the society of his fellows. Human faculties are quickened and knowledge and abilities increased by living in company with fellow men, Thoreau distrusted friends and company. For some reason or other, he could not, or did not, impart the tenderness and affection in him to others; and so, as a natural consequence, he got little from them in return.

Leighton listed the principal works of Thoreau and said that his style was like himself—lacking in sweetness and amenity, but possessing a peculiar purity, simplicity, vitality and poise, all its own. Although Thoreau appears to be an iconoclast, he 55

helped, to fix his reader’s attention on the good in life and nature,

on the highest and best. In spite of the narrowness and eccentricity

of his career, Thoreau, Leighton admitted, was worthy of esteem.

In the midst of the materialism of modern civilization, he was

a wholesome reactionary, or a counterbalancing force. A highly

civilized and complex life, according to Leighton, tends in time

to become debilitated and degenerating; and, "when we feel

ourselves debilitated and degenerated by it, we would do well

to chasten and invigorate ourselves by reading what Thoreau

has written. We need not swing so far in a recalcitrant direction

as he did. But we might to advantage follow him part way, 8 adopt the golden mean course."

It is easy to dismiss Thoreau as a "crank." But much has

been contributed by "cranks" who later became leaders, Carlyle,

the author of Sartor Resartus. and Emerson, the author of Spiritual

Laws, were, each in his own fashion, "cranks" like Thoreau.

Indeed, lamented Leighton, it is a little deplorable that more

of us do not have time to read oftener such a "crank" as the

author of Walden.

It is unfortunate that Thoreau did not receive a wider o coverage in the Arena. As it has always been, he was shadowed

in this magazine, too, by the overpowering presence of his friend

Emerson, However, the revival of interest in Emerson in the

Arena surely must have led to a wider popularity of Thoreau, and had the Arena survived another decade, there would have been 56

a growing appreciation of this neglected writer. He started

coming to his own with the dawn of the twentieth century, and

in the Arena we hear only the faint echoes of Thoreauvian

appreciation, which was later to match that of Emerson,

Whereas Thoreau received scant notice in the Arena. Walt

Whitman fared much better. There were a number of well-written

articles on Whitman discussing his personality, his beliefs,

and his poetry.

Walter Leighton, who wrote the estimate of Thoreau, called

10 his paper "Whitman’s Note of Democracy." He said that Whitman

rightly deserved the title of "the Poet of Democracy" because of

his enthusiastic utterance on American life, "His vision sweeps

over everything in our modern democracy, and, as his mood quickens,

he celebrates in verse all that he sees." On Whitman’s poetic

canvas one can see the salient characteristics of the United

States, types of robust men and women, and suggestions concerning

their future. Like the poetry of all great artists, Whitman’s

poems were of the native soil, showing clearly how very well

their creator had absorbed and comprehended its spirit, A good

example, in Leighton's judgment, of the kind of rhapsody Whitman

now and then goes into over the American people and the United

States was the following passage from "By Blue Ontario's Shore":

These States are the amplest poem; Here is not a nation, but a teeming Nation of nations; Here the doings of men correspond with the broadcast doings of the day and night; 57

Here is what moves in magnificient masses careless of particulars; Here are the roughs, beards, friendliness, combativeness the soul loves; Here the flowing trains, here the crowds, equality, diversity the soul loves.12

Whitman saw the American life in relation to the mountains

and valleys, forests and prairies, lakes and rivers, and clear

bracing atmosphere. He believed that such a land, teeming with

material resources, pulsating with industrial and commercial

pursuits, and interested in furthering the development of art,

literature, and science was destined to accomplish great things.

Leighton heard a call from Whitman to all Americans to take up

the primeval burden of progress and to bear it forward from the

point where other nations had set it down. When Whitman declared

that to understand these States each and every one of the Americans

must share their sublime surge, their fluidity and audacity, he

seemed an Inspired herald of equality and opportunity to come -

of greater life and wider freedom. Thoreau was right when he

proclaimed: "Whitman is democracy." 1J3

Together with Whitman’s enthusiastic portrayal of American life, Whitman’s poetry was also significant for its sympathy for common humanity. Leighton described him as one of those rare souls who preferred human sympathies to interests. He felt and thought with the divine average of humanity; through natural inclination, he leaned towards the rough and the uncultivated elements of the masses, although nothing human was ever cut off 58

from his sympathetic nature.

As far as the various vocations of men were concerned he was fairly impartial. Poets, philosophers, scholars, statesmen, artists, musicians, with all their talent, had no more respect from him than did the dedicated weavers, coopers, cab-drivers, masons, dock-builders, or ferry-men. All work, in Whitman’s opinion, is good as long as it is wisely and cheerfully performed as a part of the social order. What really mattered was charity and personal force, and Leighton rightly came to grips with the essence of Whitman’s thought when he asserted that it is not the kind of work, but the spirit in which a work is done that the 14 poet "enumerates and glorifies with tender solicitude."

Seldom does one come across a mind so democratic and humani­ tarian as Whitman's, The poet, said Leighton, was not only especially attracted by brawny specimens of manhood, indiscriminately interested, in all useful occupations, but he was also profoundly pleased by sheer propinquity with humanity. In "Children of

Adam" he wrote:

I have perceived that to be with those I like is enough; To stop in company with rest at evening is enough; To be surrounded by beautiful, curious laughing flesh is enough; To pass among them, or to touch anyone, to rest my arm ever so lightly round his or her neck for a moment - what is this then? I do not ask any more delight; I swim in it as in a sea. 59

There is something in staying close to men and women and looking on them, and in the contact and odor of them, that pleases the soul well. All things please.the soul, hut these please the soul well,

Leighton rightly said that Browning could soothe us with out-

reaching optimism, and Emerson could preach serene self-reliance;

but for joy and health through simple, human relations we had to

turn to Whitman.

If Whitman was against anything, he was against artificiality.

He did not feel burdened with the demands of society, but wrote

with freedom of human nature as found in the common people, "He

bursts forth, torrent like," wrote Leighton, "with chants in

exaltation of them and their way of life. It is hard, at times,

to tell whether his stirring plebian utterances should be rated

as barbaric yawps from one of the crude masses themselves, or as l6 something far higher and better."

There was something so primordial - so Adamic - in Whitman

that to many his anomalous outbursts must ever remain nebulous.

He believed that human nature is basically good, as are human passions and appetites. More significantly, he believed that it was among the common people that American democracy existed in its most robust and healthiest form.

Leighton thought that Whitman was unregenerately radical. In everything he said he went to extremes. Nevertheless he was a poet suited for the times, unlike Dante, whose writings were steeped in Catholicism, or Shakespeare, who was steeped in 60

feudalism, or Goethe, so greatly influenced by the classic romantic spirit of his own day. Whitman realized that America, with its eager and hardy peoples and its vast industrial and political activities, was ready for a grand order of poetry -

just as Germany, in times past was ripe for a grander order of opera. "Heartily in sympathy with the life en masse of our country, and justly intolerant of the effete as well as emulous of the virile spirit of European life and literature, Whitman

17 aspired to be the new great bard of the new great democracy." '

In a passage from the "Song of the Broad-axe" he said among other things, in presaging an Ideal democratic city of a coming age, that the place where the greatest city stands is not where the tallest and costliest edifices and best libraries and schools are set up, but -

Where the city stands with the brawniest breed of orators and bards, Where the city stands that is belov’d by them, and loves them in return and understands them, Where no monuments exist to heroes but in the common words and deeds, ... Where the populace rise at once against the never-ending audacity of elected persons, Where fierce men and women pour forth as the sea, to the whistle of death, pours its sweeping and unript waves, Where outside authority enters always after the precedence of inside authority, ... Where children are taught to be laws to themselves, and to depend on themselves, ... Where the city of the healthiest fathers stand, Where the city of the best bodied mothers stand - There the great city stands. °

Leighton took issue with Whitman on his excessive dependence 61

on an individual’s freedom, for it may seem subversive of the best interests of society. For society to function and progress,

Leighton found it necessary to have an iron-handed government,

fashioned out of the experiences of the past. Unchecked in­ dividualism may lead to extreme egoism; hence "Whitman’s attitude toward social tact and courtesy, is simply disdainful." 197

Leighton’s remarks reveal that the mood of America, at the be­ ginning of the twentieth century, was one of conservatism.

People were not ready to question the validity of existing institutions - particularly that of the government, the Church and the society.

What was remarkable about Whitman was his lack of didacticism; he never passed as a preacher of peace or morality. He believed that excessive refinement led to unreality and unnaturalness.

Therefore he pleaded for freedom of individual development. He had faith in the goodness of human nature, but human institutions hindered that progress. He expressed this sentiment eloquently in the following lines from "Song of the Open Road":

All parts a way for the progress of souls; All religion, all solid things, arts, government - all that was or is apparent upon this globe, or any globe, falls into niches and corners before the procession of souls along the grand, roads of the universe .,. Forever alive, forever forward, ... They go! they go! I know that they go, but I know not where they go; But I know that they go toward the best - toward something great.

Leighton's article, written in 1902, was an indication that Whitman’s reputation as a master-poet had not yet been established

The poet had a good following of admirers, but the final verdict was still uncertain. However, Leighton sensed an increase in the number of Whitman readers. In conclusion he said, "already several eminent men of letters seem certain he portrays American democracy so enthusiastically - with a sympathy for common humanity so good-hearted, a dislike of effete artificiality so regenerating, and a spiritual scope so heroic and expansive - that his Leaves of Grass poems have few parallels in this history of literature; and, despite the faults of their form, zealous 20 disciples have begun to regard them as a sort of Bible," We may add that Leighton’s own article must have contributed to the furtherance of Whitman’s growing popularity in the twentieth century.

In the January, 1905, issue of the Arena appeared an article by Clarence Cuningham called "A Defense of Walt Whitman's Leaves 21 of Grass." This article was a review of an anthology of poems, edited by Professor Frank McAlpine, which included the poem "The 22 Two Mysteries." However, it is clear from a note by Editor Flower, that Whitman never wrote "The Two Mysteries" and Professor

McAlpine was mistaken in assigning it to Walt. Moreover,

Cuningham reviewed McAlpine's remarks on Whitman, without in­ vestigating the true authorship of the poem. This was the correction announced by Flower:

In the January Arena. Mr. Clarence Cuningham 63

in his thoughtful paper on Walt Whitman, following the lead, of Professor McAlpine, erroneously quoted, the exquisite poem, "The Two Mysteries," as from the pen of Whitman. This poem has for years, or since the publication of Favorite Poems of English and American Authors. which appeared in the eighties of the last century, been published and re-published as the production of the "good, gray poet;" for in that volume it was credited to Whitman. The following extract from a letter received by us from W. F, Clark, associate editor of St. Nicholas, will serve to correct the error:

"This poem was written by Mrs. Mary Mapes Dodge, the editor of St. Nicholas. It has been several times ascribed to Whitman, but in every instance where this mistake has come to our notice we have endeavored to have it corrected."

This poem first appeared in Scribner * s Monthly in the summer of I876, and was pre­ ceded by the following note, which probably first led to its being attributed to Walt Whitman:

"In the middle of the room, in its white coffin, lay the dead child, a nephew of the poet. Near it, in a great chair, sat Walt Whitman, surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little girl on his lap. The child looked curiously at the spectacle of death, and then inquiringly into the old man’s face. •You do n't know what it is, do you my dear?’ said he; adding, ’We do n’t either.’"¿3

Because of this error of mistaken identity, we can easily dismiss Cuningham’s article as insignificant. However, the writer did make a few points in the defense of Leaves of Grass which are worth assessing. Cuningham reacted sharply to

McAlpine's charge that the Leaves of Grass "contains passages of a very objectionable character, so much so, that no defense 6k

24 that is valid, can he set up." Cuningham said.: "To Professor

McAlpine’s polished, and. well-wiped, surface I can see how the

rugged, soul-tones of the 'carpenter-and-builder' poet could cause

such a radiation of cracks as would mar the panel of its

place in my lady’s boudoir," 7 Cuningham reminded McAlpine that

Whitman was no nobleman, only a plain, blunt workman. Whitman

was honest and sincere and he clearly said: "Leaves of Grass has

mainly been the outcropping of my emotional and other personal

nature - an attempt from first to last, to put a person, a human

being (myself, in the latter half of the nineteenth century, in

America) freely, fully, and truly on record. I could not find any

similar personal record in current literature that satisfied

me." Society had for too long steeped itself in putting

forward a better face, not a truer face, Sincereity was at a

low ebb. But, we see in Whitman a unique boldness in proclaiming

himself as himself, not as what others would like him to be.

Cuningham said.: "It is only when our subjective minds work freely, fully, and truly on record - it is only then that the world, and that we ourselves, will know us as God knows us, as

He knows the Ego, the Alma, the Spirit as it dwells behind and gives the vital forces to the physical body - the animal soul - the human soul. Not until then can we - mankind - truly deduce 27 the definition of sin." '

Cuningham rightly remarked that many of Whitman's own comments misled the readers and hampered their understanding of his poems. 65

In referring to Leaves of Grass. Whitman had candidly said that it

was avowedly the song of Sex and Amativeness, and even of

Animality. Possibly this was the feature which misled "our

Profession Technique" (reference to McAlpine) in uttering his

ultimatum: "(it) ... contains passages of a very objectionable

character, so much so, that no defense that is valid can be

set up," Cuningham believed that in making this charge,

McAlpine betrayed his own nature and comprehension. For it is

this subject matter which lay at the root of all the tension

and struggle in society, which has long held a discreet silence

and has been indifferent to the natural human instincts.

Moreover, it is Sex, Amativeness, and Animality, as pure entities,

which are the proper soil for generating our physical, moral

intellectual, esthetic Personalities in their reality. Walt

Whitman understood this and lived, moved, and acted under its meaning. This was clear when he elaborated upon his earlier

statement thus: "Difficult as it will be, it has become, in my

opinion, imperative to achieve a shifted attitude from superior men and women towards the thought and fact of sexuality, as an element in character, personality, the emotions, and a theme of literature." And, therefore, Whitman’s use of sex borders on spirituality; it was a thing holy and indestructible. Cuningham beautifully said: "He sees and understands that the key to the meaning of earth-life is the soul in its nudity, not the soul 30 in its inky cloak. 66

Cuningham concluded, his rebuttal of McAlpine‘s charges by-

calling Whitman's poems anthems to be sung by a man of courage, of

truth, and of God: "I sing my own identity, ardors, observations,

faiths and thoughts, colored hardly at all with any decided

coloring from other faiths or other identities! I sing America and to-day, modern science and democracy, and not the songs and myths of the past, ... nothing, as I may say so, for beauty’s sake - no legend, no romance, nor euphemism, no rhyme, but the broadest average of humanity and its identities in the now 31 ripening Nineteenth Century.' To all these new and evolutionary facts, meanings and purposes, Whitman said: "New poetic messages, new forms, and expressions, are inevitable. In the center of 32 all, and object of all, stands the Human Being."

Two articles on Whitman were published in 1892, the year of the poet’s death, early'in the life of the Arena. They were D. G,

Watts’s "Walt Whitman," and W. Boughton’s essay, also called

"Walt Whitman."

In his article. 33 Watts considered Whitman to be the ugly duckling of American literature - a butt for all critics. He admitted that Whitman's recognition had been scant, the magazines and reviews were filled with panegyries on Browning, Emerson,

Longfellow and Tennyson, but no voice was raised in praise of

Whitman. Quoting Carlyle’s dictum "sympathy is the first essential of insight," Watts called his article an exercise in sympathy, hoping that the readers may put themselves en ra-p-port with Whitman, 6?

if they wished, to understand, him. If asked, to state in one word,

what Whitman stood for, Watts would say Freedom - Freedom of a

nations Democracy; freedom of the spirit: man.

Emerson, said Watts, struck the key-note of the new thought

movement in his address to the divinity students of Cambridge,

and. many like Alcott, Ripley, Thoreau, and Whitman were led into

some extremes of thought and. life. It is interesting to observe

the effect of the idea of liberty upon such widely dissimilar

natures as those of Thoreau and Whitman. The former, because of

injustice in the State, defied the laws of the State; Whitman

because of inconsistencies in the laws of society, defied its

laws. The one, shy, shrinking, and sensitive, seeing man’s

coarseness and grossness, sought solitude. The other, rugged,

self-asserting, and combative, seeing the incongruity between man’s

profession and man’s life, did not fly, but stayed to fight the

laws. Watts said eloquently: "Flee from man - he seems to say -

man my brother? Why, it is from him that all nature coheres 1

Man, the ever-old, ever new problem; man the universe in miniature; man created in the image of God - himself a god - he alone is worthy of my song. I, Walt Whitman, sing of myself, reveal 34 myself to myself, and thus reveal you to yourself," This was

Whitman's position and his message. It was his attitude towards the body, thought Watts, which had prevented his taking his rightful place in American literature.

According to Whitman’s philosophy, the body and the soul 68

are one. Although Watts did. not accept this philosophy he saw

some merit in it. He quoted. Thoreau's comments on Whitman:

That Walt Whitman, of whom I wrote you, is the most interesting fact to me at present, I have just read his second edition (which he gave me), and it has done me more good than any reading for a long time. Two or three pieces in the book are disagreeable, to say the least; simply sensual. He does not celebrate love at all. It is as if the beast spoke. No doubt there have always been doors where such deeds were unblushingly recited, and it is no merit to compete with their inhabitants. But even on this side he has spoken more truth than any American or modern I know. I have found his poems exhilarating, encouraging. As for his sensuality - and it may turn out to be less so than it appears - I do not so much wish that those parts were not written, as that men and women were so pure that they could read them without harm, that is without understanding them. On the whole it sounds very brave and American, after whatever deductions. Though rude and sometimes ineffectual, it is a great primitive power.35

Passing from his philosophy to his poetic style, Watts pointed out that Whitman's style was "veritably bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh,"7 Like himself, it was coarse and rugged, and although at times unwieldy, it was not without music of its own.

Emerson and other leaders of the Transcendental movement, although claiming perfect freedom of thought, conformed to the old models in the manner of expressing their thoughts. But

Whitman carried his revolt further. He saw that the world was in bondage to the past. He rebelled against this notion and formed his style independent of the past. His great achievement was his 69

disregard of the past, not out of ignorance, but from a purposive

sense of freedom, which he hoped would pump fresh blood and add

vigor to American liberation.

Watts proceeded to assess Whitman’s poetry. He admitted, difficulty in selecting poems that would best convey the beauty, range, and aim of his poetry. He grouped his selections into the following divisions: Descriptive (miscellaneous) poems; poems of nature; poems of war; and poems of Democracy and man.

The division was arbitrary, but functional. From time to time, said Watts, Whitman turned away from his war against outward and inward foes to voice an aspiration or to give a glimpse of the lowly lot of man. As an example, Watts cited

"Faces," which illustrated Whitman’s keen sympathy with humanity:

I saw the face of the most smear’d and slobbering idiot that they had at the asylum, and I knew for my consolation what they knew not; I knew of the agents that emptied and broke my brother; the same wait to clear the rubbish from the fallen tenement, and I shall look again, in a score or two of ages, and I shall meet the real landlord perfect, and unharm'd, every inch as good as myself.37

This message had special appeal to the reform spirit of Benjamin

Orange Flower, With nature, Whitman was also in true sympathy, as seen in this description of the "Twilight":

The soft, voluptuous, opiate shad.es, The sun just gone, the eager light dispell'd - (I, too, will soon be gone., dispell'd) A haze - nirvana - rest and night - oblivion.3° 70

For an example of Whitman’s war poetry, Watts quoted the following lines from "Drum-Taps":

Brave, brave, were the soldiers (high - named to-day) who lived through the fight; But the bravest press’d to the front and fell, unnamed, unknown.39

Watts went through a number of poems without really making any critical comments of note. He, however, concluded his essay by noting how Whitman had been denied, recognition, especially since he had given expression to the longings for universal brotherhood. Watts considered it unfortunate that the poet had been sooner recognized and acclaimed in England than in the United

States: "When the spiritual movement," concluded Watts, "is sweeping over this and other lands; now when religion is seen to rest on the dual principle of the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, it seems to us 'due time’ for America to advance to meet America's poet, he who prophesies the glorious, joyful triumph of the new faith, the new hope."^ This comment was interesting since Watts noted the spread of that new idealistic and spiritual reaction of which we have talked earlier. n4l Professor Willis Boughton’s article, "Walt Whitman, was the first written for the Arena after the poet’s death on

March 26, 1892. The article was in the nature of a eulogy, recounting the merits of Whitman's life and concluding with questions such as: "By what authority does he claim to be the poet of America? Is he an unscrupulous braggart, an immodest ?i

egotist, or is he the great original? Is the Leaves of Grass. 42 indeed, a ‘barbaric yawp,’ or is it a great poem?" Boughton initiated the discussion with the premise that "the world is ¿jo ever on the qui vive. awaiting the creator." 9 So in literature, for three centuries America had been waiting anxiously for someone original. Walt Whitman himself declared the lack of a national literature in keeping with the vastness of the land and institutions, and he determined to attempt a revolution in letters, "To

Foreign Lands" he said:

I heard that you ask’d for something to prove this puzzle, the New World, And to define America, the atheletic Democracy. Therefore I send you my poems, that you behold in them what you wanted.

He boldly and presumptuously forestalled criticism, by proclaiming in "Poets to Come":

Poets to come! orators, singers, musicians, to come! Not to-day is to justify me and answer what I am for, But you, a new-brood, native athelectic, continental greater than before known, Arouse! for you must justify me. 5

The poet asserted that his was the poem of democracy. But before declaring Whitman the poetic messiah, Boughton suggested that we try better to understand Leaves of Grass. One way of approaching it was through Democratic Vistas - a series of speculations which Whitman compiled from memoranda made from time to time during his long life. In Vistas the poet grappled with the problem of a future for American literature. He advocated 72

a radical and abrupt change in form and spirit. He claimed:

The great poems, Shakespeare included, are poisonous to the idea of pride and dignity of the common people, the life-blood of democracy. ... I say I have not seen a single writer, artist, lecturer, or what not, that has confronted the voiceless but erect and active, pervading, underlying will and typic aspiration, of the land, in a spirit kindred to itself.

Throughout the Democratic Vistas. Whitman kept hammering

at the idea that the American poets must be singers of Democracy.

"America demands a poetry that is bold, modern, and all­

surrounding, and kosmical, as she is herself - a poetry for the 47 People." With this notion in mind and with the vigor of a

pioneer, Whitman set out to create an American poem. He was

adequately qualified for the venture - he had mixed with the

populace, he had worked with the laborers, and he had probably

tasted forbidden pleasures and sweets of good fellowship. In

Leaves of Grass he proposed to sing of all this, exclaiming:

Of Life, immense in passion, pulse, and power, Cheerful, for freest action form’d under the laws devine, The Modern Man I sing. °

Boughton then mentioned the main divisions of this work and commented upon its subject matter and language. He credited

Leaves of Grass as being original, if in nothing else, at least in style. The poet discarded conventional rhythms and meter and sang without restriction. The result was that his verses vary in length, the music is soft and at times that of a "throat-splitting 73

Professor Boughton, however, discredited Whitman for his

disregard of the principles of poetic writing, which resulted

in many passages being "halting and harsh to an extent inexcusable

in any form of writing. .,. Though Leaves of Grass be the out­

pouring of an overcharged soul, we maintain that the music of

the spheres is rarified and beautified in the attempt to

restrict it to the accepted poetic scale. The poet, perhaps,

need be a natural singer; but he may profit by the experience

of the ages. If rhyme will heighten, if measured verse will

beautify, if rhetorical devices will aid him in his art, he may

not recklessly discard them.

Leaves of Grass. argued Boughton, was not the work of an

artist, for it did not project any grand image like Milton's

Satan, Whitman did not shape the materials, with the result

that the reader is confused, with his mind "lost in a labyrinth

51 of verbiage without a thread to guide it into the light,

Even Whitman's thoughts were to be criticized, since they verged on indecency, Boughton charged the poet with deliberately trying to arouse vulgar thoughts in the minds of his readers. No artist was justified in taking liberties with modesty. But still Editor Flower published several articles about Whitman in the Arena, which indicates that he was not unsympathetic to his realism.

In spite of its drawbacks, Leaves of Grass was the life-work, conceded Boughton, of an American patriot who had the genius to 74

conceive the necessities of American literature and the perseverance

to attempt a great original poem, Boughton believed that it was

still too early, only a few months after Whitman’s death, to

assess his place in and his contribution to the national

literature. Whitman had left himself, in Boughton's opinion,

open to criticism in various ways, but he deserved praise for

his identification with the uncultured, with the people who toiled

for democracy. That Whitman could write poetry no one doubted;

but the literary world will long lament his refusal to recognize

the importance of art, concluded Boughton. "If he succeeds in

arousing American writers to a determination to create a national

literature, ... he will have accomplished a noble work. Future

generations must decide. If he is worthy, they must award him the palm,"32

M. J. Savage, in the very beginning of his article, "The

Religion of Walt Whitman,"77 excused himself from any discussion concerning the poet’s place in American literature. Instead, he hoped to interpret some of the things Whitman had to say about important human themes. Savage proposed to follow an approach to Whitman in which he would select those passages of poetry which struck him as being significant. After scanning these passages, he hoped to group the important themes under general headings and to see the significance of the message the poet had for the world. For his reference Savage used Whitman's Centennial Edition, 54 published at Camden, New Jersey, in I876, In fourteen pages 75

Savage quoted hundreds of lines from Whitman on such themes as religion, the immanent God, man’s place and importance in the

eternal order, contemplation of the animal world, the elevation

of a soul, and equal divinity of the physical and spiritual worlds.

Hoping that the readers had understood and enjoyed reading the quotations, Savage turned towards an analysis of these verses. As for his style, Savage said that Whitman had clothed his poems in forms which were untraditional, both in meter or rhythm. But Whitman had a rhythm all his own, "as much as the waves and the surf-beat belong to the sea. Some of his work is exquisite in its word-music and grand as the roll of the breakers."-^

But Whitman would not have many imitators as far as his style was concerned. Savage’s comments display a unique critical perceptive­ ness for such early criticism of Whitman,

Whitman’s message, however, was, in Savage’s opinion, his most important contribution. It was saturated with religion, more than the work of any other writer. But it was a religion which many might find difficult to believe in. Some might not even call it religion. But Savage insisted that if the message deals with the deepest and most essential things in one’s relation to another person and with the Power manifested in the universe, it is hardly anything but religious. Whitman was strangely in keeping with the revelations of science, He was not Christian in the popular concept of any of the theologies that claim that title. 76

He spoke of Jesus with insight, tenderness, and admiration; and

his own teachings were in accord with those of Jesus, Realistically

speaking, Whitman was a truer disciple of Jesus than are most of

the churches with their creeds and dogma - a sentiment shared by Flower, who has himself turned away from his family church to

find comfort somewhere else.

Whitman worshipped the essential Spirit, the immanent God

or the Eternal Life of all worlds. Savage called him so "God- intoxicated"^^ like Spinoza, that he saw almost nothing but God, and wondered that any man could be mean or an infidel.

Next in importance, said Savage, was Whitman’s great doctrine of the infinite worth of the human personality. Much of his writings sounded egotistical, till such times when the reader realizes that the "I" does not mean Walt Whitman only, but any "I," however outcast or poor. The poet felt that any personality is a majestic, divine thing. Nothing in the universe is more wonderful, not even God, for it shares with God the mystery of the essential and the eternal life. It was an optimistic doctrine which says that whatever the human condition is now, it has in it the possibility of all things.

Whitman’s optimism finds no better expression than when he is faced with death. Especially in poems like "Death Carol,"

"Whispers of Heavenly Death," and "Joy, Shipmate, Joy!" there was no resignation to the inevitable but a glad welcome to what is believed to be a part of a lovingly-perfect divine order. 77

Death is considered, as God’s angel of the higher birth. In all

literature, said Savage, he knows of nothing like Walt Whitman’s

sublime attitude in the presence of death.

Savage admitted that his resume was necessarily brief. His

aim was to get whatever attention directed towards Whitman as

was possible. He concluded his article by asserting that Whitman,

more than anyone else in literature, was his message. He lived

his democracy, his friendship, his philanthropy, his independence

of money, his faith, his serenity, his calm, simple welcome of

death. "In poverty, in old age, in pain, he waited the coming of death,with the serenity of a god. ... Neither by act, word,

gesture or look did he ever go back on the sublime trust which

he had sung. So, as we stand beside him at the last, we cannot

think of death:

Some parturition, rather - some solemn, immortal birth; On the frontiers, to eyes impenetrable, Some soul is passing over.

Where is he now? Let us hear his own word as to finding him again:

Failing to fetch me at first, keep encouraged; Missing me one place, search another: I stop somewhere, waiting for you."7'

Horace L. Traubel knew Whitman very well personally and had extended conversations with the poet before the latter’s death.

Traubel digested his conversations and presented the mainpoints in an article called "Conversations with Walt Whitman," which appeared in the Arena of January, 1898. Traubel did not relate 78

anything that was surprisingly new about Whitman. However, his article had. merits of capturing some of Whitman’s thoughts ex­ pressed. just before his death, Traubel said that Whitman was content in his achievements. The poet said.: "I see nothing to regret, I have not always been satisfactorily expressed. ,,, If there is any mistake at all - any lack of full emphasis anywhere - it is in what I have written in behalf of the criminal, outlawed, discredited classes, I might have said more for these - made my sympathy, hospitality, more manifest. But I guess I will be 59 understood.,

Whitman's remarks on Leaves of Grass were worth noting. He told Traubel: "The Leaves of Grass are not a literary exercise or a lesson in literary values and proportions: they are crude imprints from the life, in which all valuations and proportions are recognized but whose primary power is resident elsewhere than in the art-impulse."^

The most imteresting aspect of Traubel’s sketch was the discussion concerning Whitman’s fondness for the generic word

"America," To the poet America was not a geographical name or a political institution but a spirit. To him, America and democracy were synonymous. He conceived of America at all times as being tolerant of all the races. Still, he was not indifferent to the churches, although his religion was eclectic. "I am as much

Buddhist as Christian, as much Mohammedan as Buddhist, as much nothing as something. I have a good, deal of use for all the 79

religions, ... while I expect to see the whole nature of Christian theory changed, much old trumpery and barbarity dismissed, I do not feel called upon to use an axe myself.

In social reform, Whitman's sympathies were towards the largest justice. He was especially concerned with the fate of those who were victims of privilege, discrimination, greed, and robbery.

He was also for free trade and for conscience, solidarity, good heart, and. universal recognition of just rights.

Henry David Thoreau, surprisingly, received merely one full-length study and. a portrait during the twenty-year span of the Arena (1889-1909). This was symptomatic of the delayed recognition given to Thoreau - a recognition that would not be forthcoming for another twenty years. On the other hand, con­ sidering Whitman’s recent death in 1892, the Arena extended him an adequate coverage, especially since Whitman was a controversial figure with his reputation still suspect. Most of the contributors to the magazine praised Whitman’s legacy to American literature and helped to add to his growing popularity. Benjamin Orange

Flower's avid interest in realism made him naturally more sympathetic to the realistic Whitman than to the more withdrawn Thoreau, CHAPTER V

TRANSCENDENTALISM, HINDUISM AND BUDDHISM

In an editorial for his magazine the Arena, called "Nineteenth

Century Positivism and the Coming Idealistic Reaction,"^ Benjamin

Orange Flower traced the progress of human life through periods

of positivism and of idealism, of egoism and altruism, of material

ascendency and of spiritual domination. This ebb and flow,

Flower said, this going and coming was quite as apparent in the

ascent of human life as elsewhere in nature. No race or civili­

zation could become senile or decadent so long as it was dominated

by idealism, because it was vitally related to the source of

Life. Emerson, according to Flower, was one of the last as well

as one of the greatest of golden priests, one of the noblest

of the idealistic prophets. "Less than a generation after

Emerson, the age of iron, of commercial prosperity and material

advancement had ushered us into one of the most pronounced periods

of materialistic reaction, prosaic materialism and sordid egoism 2 known to western civilization." In other words, the higher,

fewer and most vitally essential ideals which dominated all

progress that possessed the elements of permanence were sub­

ordinated to the passion for the acquisition of wealth, power and material objects. There was no regard for the underlying

principles of justice and freedom, which constituted the soul of 81

altruism and without which no enduring material or social progress

is possible.

In this same editorial, Flower saw another contributing

factor to this age of positivism. According to him the discoveries of the great evolutionary scientists strengthened the agnostic attitude of thousands of the keenest thinkers. Almost as by magic, said Flower, we found ourselves in the midst of the era of positivism - positivism that was as dogmatic and aggressive as was orthodox theology at an earlier date. The exalted idealism of

Emerson, Thoreau, and Whitman was all but silenced for a time by the loud voiced and oracular declarations of the positivists, who having discerned or perceived certain great half-truths, proceeded to build card-houses, as men have done in all ages, on an inadequate basis, mistaking a partial appearance for the while phenomenon.

Flower concluded this important editorial, however, on an optimistic note. He said that his generation was on the threshold of a new age and in the coming idealistic movement, he hoped, science would more and more battle on the side of the spiritual verities. Never before, not even in his life-time, were the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson so widely read as they were then. This was a sure indication of an ethical and idealistic reaction that would lift the social consciousness to a nobler eminence than it had hitherto obtained. It would bring to the weary and perplexed brain of the world that peace which came only 82

to those who, thoughtless of self, elected, to live for happiness

and. well-being of others, and. who, unconsciously, placed, themselves

en rap-port with the master-law of life, of growth and. of joy.

In his book Progressive Men. Women and. Movements of the Past

Twenty-Five Years. Flower saw Emerson as "the pioneer New World.

diffuser of metaphysical and transcendental thought and Oriental

q philosophy,"^ Although Emerson was well known as a scholar of

Christian theology, his chief contribution, according to Flower,

was the introduction and interpretation of Hinduism and Buddhism

for the American reading public. Flower said that Emerson was ever

broad-visioned and open-minded, ever looking for the good in the

literature of aspiration.

Like Emerson, Benjamin Orange Flower was himself a liberal

in his outlook and consistently practised religious tolerance.

He said: "the lesson I have learnt is that it is not for me or

you to judge our fellowman, but it is our duty to cultivate

intellectual hospitality, and try and find the good in all other

lives, all systems of thought and theories of government." He

further elaborated his stand, which was reflected in the wide- ranging religious hospitality of his magazine Arena. He said:

Personally I have ever believed with my whole heart in the Biblical declaration that "where there is no vision the people perish." I believe that spiritual idealism is the very oxygen of enduring civilization; and yet I recognize as a great fundamental fact that those who honestly believe views diametrically opposed to this concept have the same right to present their conclusions before the bar of public reason as I have to express my convictions,^ 83

The editor’s religious tolerance was adequately reflected in the

religious debates that took place in the pages of the Arena. This

magazine not only considered the issues surrounding Christianity,

but also gave broad scope for comparative studies of Catholicism,

Hinduism, Hebrewism, Buddhism and the different creeds within

Protestantism.

In his Master’s thesis,3 F. C. Mabee showed that unlike most

of the reviews and magazines of the time, the Arena devoted ex­

tensive space to religious debates. During the same two years,

1890 to 1892, Mabee said, North American Review had 11, Atlantic

Monthly 6, Munseys 6, Century 11 articles dealing with religious

issues as compared to 55 in the Arena. Moreover, Mabee did not

take into account several Arena articles in order to throw the

balance in favor of the other magazines in questionable instances.

This high proportion was maintained throughout the remaining years of the magazine. With such a wide canvas for religious discussions,

it was only natural that the Far Eastern religions found adequate space for comparative and informative studies.

Arthur Christy, in his book The Orient in American Transcendentalism

(1932), spoke of an increase in the awareness of the fact, that the Emersonians were a very potent factor in bringing the Orient into American life. Christy himself became interested in the subject after coming across the challenge by Romain Rolland, who wrote in his Prophets of New India;

It would be a matter of deep interest to know 84

exactly how far the American spirit had been impreg­ nated, directly or indirectly, by the infiltration of Hindu thought during the Nineteenth Century, for there can be no doubt that it has contributed to the strange moral and religious mentality of the modern United States,.,,I do not know whether any historian will be found to occupy himself seriously with the question. It is nevertheless a psychological problem of the first order, intimately connected with the history of our civilization,7

Arthur Christy took the challenge and attempted to write the first

chapter of the general study that Rolland suggested.

Let us for a moment look at some of the causes responsible

for the vogue of Hinduism in New England Transcendentalism as

elaborated by Christy. "The first was Emerson's inability to

find at home a complete refutation of the eighteenth century Q rationalism against which his idealist temperament revolted."

When Emerson reached his intellectual maturity he found himself

surrounded by the sensational psychology of Locke and Hume. He rejected this philosophy, but had no where to turn for there was no help even in the church. Unitarianism had become orthodox, as narrow as the old theology. "In a time of rationalism," said

Christy, "men who cared for the spirit but rejected the proof were naturally driven to revolt. When they came into contact with the catholicity of the Indian scriptures and the emphasis these books placed on the inner spiritual resources, they naturally read them avidly.

Another reason was the adoption, consciously or unconsciously, of the eclectic method of the French philosopher, Victor Cousin by the Transcendental thinkers. Christy described eclecticism as 85

the method of the truce-maker with a sound head and a feeling heart,

sympathetic with points of view of passionate adversaries and

desirous of bringing about reconciliation and peace. Electicism best

suited men who wished to dip into the whole span of human thought,

accepting what they thought would be profitable and rejecting

those that were unsuited for their purpose. The end product was,

hence, cosmopolitan in nature. Christy asserted that the composite

Orientalism of Concord was itself a result of an eclectic synthesis.

He said:

Emerson and his friends read the Hindus for their idealistic philosophy, a philosophy naturally congenial to the Transcendental mind. But they were also practical Yankees facing the demands of a work-a-day world; so they read Confucius, a sage as shrewd as any Yankee, and found in him effective precepts whereby to regulate their affairs with men. The Mohammedan Sufis provided poetry for their urbane and artistic needs. These three Oriental cultures were eclectically blended, despite their inherent contradictions, into a composite which in miniature is an excellent representation of that larger Transcendentalism composed of borrowings from Greek, French, English, German and native thought. 0

Once Emerson tasted Hindu philosophy he could not turn away from it. He extracted the best from the ancient religion which became the kernel of his own beliefs. It was the concept of the

Over-Soul. Prom this concept sprang all his important theories of art and poetry, and his rules and conduct of life. To help explain the Transcendental doctrine of the Over-Soul, Christy used the words of Deussen, who wrote:

The Brahman (Over-Soul), the power which presents itself to us materialized in all existing things, which creates, sustains, preserves, receives back into itself 86

again all worlds, this eternal infinite divine power is identical with the Atman (individual's soul), with that which, after stripping off everything external, we discover in ourselves as our real most essential being, our individual self, the Soul.H

Emerson’s Over-Soul and the Hindu Brahma may be the same in

essence, but they have differences. As Christy pointed out, the

chief difference between Over-Soul and Brahma was that there

was a Christian flavor in the former. It was available to all

who were sincerely engaged in moral endeavor. Like the Hindus,

Emerson never stated his doctrine in precise terms. He preferred

to remain vague about his beliefs.

In his poem "Brahma," Emerson did attempt to express the

essence of his doctrine of the Over-Soul. Sanskrit scholars

considered this poem the most remarkable epitome of Brahmanism.

Leyla Goren in her thesis quoted the Indian scholar Maitra

who said:

The doctrine of absolute unity finds perhaps its most striking expression in Sanskrit, but nowhere, neither in Sanskrit or in English, has it been presented with more vigor, truthfulness, and beauty of form than by Emerson in his famous lines (of "Brahma") paraphrazing the Sanskrit passage. 3

In the poem, as Leyla Goren has shown, the impersonal creative

force of the universe was represented as the speaker; as the

source of energy of the creation it told us that nothing ever died, the energy that it contains merely changed form. In 1844 _ 14 Emerson wrote in his Journals:

Then I discovered the Secret of the World; that 87

all things subsist, and do not die, but only retire a little from sight and afterwards return again.

The idea of the poem "Brahma" came to Emerson from this passage

from the Vishnu Purana: "What living creature slays, or is slain?

What living creature preserves or is preserved? Each is his

own destroyer or preserver, as he follows evil or good."

With this brief background of the central link of Hinduism

and Transcendentalism it is possible to study the relevant articles

on Hindu philosophy which appeared in the Arena. A word of

caution here would be profitable. New England Transcendentalism

should not be coupled completely with classical Hindu philosophy,

nor, of course, should it be described as a result of Hindu

idealism. This does not mean a summary dismissal of all the existing

contacts and sympathies: it is rather a conclusion based on

the simple fact that none of the Transcendentalists ever adopted

the specific tenets of Hindu idealism as, for example, they were adopted and elaborated later in Germany by the Sanskrit scholar,

Max Muller. The Transcendentalists were mainly looking for corroboration of their faith. They found such reinforcement in

Hindu philosophy. However, their faith was deeply rooted in their minds and in their own spiritual ancestry.

But while the Transcendentalists looked for corroboration, there were others who were convinced that Jesus himself was pro­ foundly influenced by Indian religions, and that what he preached was nothing but a borrowed doctrine, one which was already familiar 88

in the Far East. Representative of this trend, was an article by

Dr. Felix L. Oswald called "Was Christ a Buddhist?" which appeared

15 in the Arena of January 1891. J

Dr. Oswald, interestingly enough, introduced his article with a quotation from Emerson which said: If the right theory should

ever be proclaimed, we shall know it by this token—that it will 16 solve many riddles," Dr. Oswald, set out to solve the riddle of Christianity once and for all, for the debate had gone on for a long time. He attacked the Christian traditionalists and said that the danger of orthodox tenets or customs being traced to their pagan sources had ever stimulated the inventiveness of ecclesiastical apologists to its highest pitch. When the opponents of the doctrine of exclusive salvation by faith called to the sublime ethical precepts of pagan philosophers, those precepts were promptly ascribed to plagiarisms from the Old and New

Testaments. The ethics of Plato were attributed to the instruction of the prophet Jeremiah, Homer’s poetry to the inspiration of the

Psalms, the eloquence of Demosthenes to the controversial writings of Isaiah and Ezekiel. In other words, the Bible was the source and inspiration of all wisdom.

But artifices of that kind, said Dr, Oswald, would prove unavailing against the impressive accumulation of evidence demonstrating the East Indian origin of the New Testament, In

1844 Father Regis Hue made an extensive study of Buddhist mono-

17 theism in the capital of Tibet. Soon after, Eugene Burnouf, one 89

of the most distinguised orientalists of the time, published his 18 Introduction to the History of Buddhism. Professor Lassen of

Bonn traced the progress of Buddhist missions to the shores of 19 the Mediterranean; Rudolf Seydel demonstrated the similitude

of not less than fifty-two traditions of the Buddhist scriptures 20 to as many passages of the New Testament, and since the publication of Spence Hardy’s Manual of Buddhism, the significance of those 21 facts has been an open secret to all unprejudiced investigators.

Granting the circumstance that the appearance of the first

Buddhist apostles preceded that of the Christian evangelists by at least four hundred years, Dr. Oswald discussed the analogies between Buddha and Christ under three sections: A, Traditional analogies; B. Dogmatic analogies and C. Ceremonial analogies.

A. Traditional Analogies:

1. Both Buddha and Christ were of royal lineage. Both were born of a mother who, though married, was still a virgin.

2. A birth of the future Saviour is announced by a heavenly messenger. An apparition which Maya sees in her dream informs her: "Thou shalt be filled with highest joy. Behold, thou shalt bring forth a son bearing the mystic signs of Buddh, who shall become a sacrifice for the dwellers of the earth, a saviour who to all men shall give joy and the glorious fruits of immortality." (Rgya Cherrol-uan. 6l, 63.) The angel says unto Mary: "Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favor with God. Behold thou shalt bring forth a son and call his name Jesus. He shall be great and shall be called the son of the highest, and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David." (Luke i. 30, 31«) 90

3. At the request of Maya, King Sudodhana renounces his connubial rights till she has brought forth her first son. (Rgya 69, 82), "And Joseph knew her not till she had brought forth her first son." (Matt. i. 25; Luke i. 39-56.)

4. The immortals of the Tushita-heaven decide that Buddha shall be born when the "flower-star" makes its first appearance in the East, (Lefmann, 21, 124.) "Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the East." (Matt. ii. 2.)

5. A host of angelic messengers descend and announce tidings of great joy, "A hero, glorious and incomparable, has been born, a Saviour unto all nations of the earth! A deliverer has brought joy and peace to earth and heaven." (Lotus. 102, 104. Rgya 89, 97«) Cornu. Luke ii, 9.)

6. Princes and wise Brahmans appear with gifts and worship the child Buddha, (Rgya 97» 113«) "And when they were come into the house they saw the young child and worshipped him; ... and they presented unto him gifts, gold, and frankincense and myrrh." (Matt. ii. 11.)

7. The Brahmin Asita, to whom the spirit has re­ vealed the advent of Buddh, descends from his hermitage on Himalaya to see the new-born child. He predicts the coming Kingdom of heaven and Buddha's mission to save and enlighten the world. (Sutta Njpatha. iii, 11.) "And it was revealed to him by the Holy Ghost that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord Christ ... then he took him up in his arms and blessed God, and said, Lord, how lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." (Luke ii. 26.)

8,. The Allinish Kramana Sutra relates that the King of Magada instructed one of his ministers to institute an inquiry whether any inhabitant of his kingdom could possibly become powerful enough to endanger the safety of his throne. Two spies are sent out. One of them ascertains the birth of Buddha and advises the king to take measures for the extermination of his tribe. Cf, Matt. ii. 1-11.

9. The princes of the Sakya tribe urge the king to present (or introduce) his son in a public assembly of nobles and priests. Spirits accompany the march of the 91

of the procession; inspired prophets extol the future glory of the Messiah. A parallel story of Luke supplies the motive of the ceremony with the words: "As it is written in the law of the Lord." But diligent comparison of the sources of Hebrew law has revealed the fact that no such ordinance ever existed, ... the motive of the narrator’s fiction being evidently the necessity of fitting the incident into a frame of Hebrew customs.

10. Buddha’s parents miss the boy one day; and after a long search find him in an assembly of holy rishis, who listen to his discourse and marvel at his understanding. (Buddhist Birth Stories, 74.) Cf. Luke ii. 45-47.)

11. Buddha, before entering upon his mission, meets the Brahmin Rudraka, a mighty preacher, who, however, offers to become his disciple. Some of Rudraka’s followers recede to Buddha, but leave him when they find that he does not observe the fasts. (Rgya. 178, 214.) Jesus, before entering upon his mission, meets John the Baptist, who recognizes his superiority. Two of John’s disciples follow Jesus, who states his reasons for rejecting John’s rigid observance of the fasts. (John i, 37.)

12. Buddha retires to the solitude of Uruvilva and fasts and prays in the desert till hunger forces him to leave his retreat. (Rgya, 364; Olderburg's Mahavagga. 116,) Cf. Matt. iv. 1.

13. After finishing his fast, Buddha takes a bath in the river Nairanjana; when he leaves the water, purified, the devas open the gates of heaven and cover him with a shower of fragrant flowers, (Rgya, 259.) Cf. Mark, iii. 13.

14. During Buddha's fast in the desert, Mara, the Prince of darkness, approaches him and tempts him with promises of wealth and earthly glory. Buddha rejects his offer by quoting passages of the Vedas; the tempter flees; angels descend and salute Buddha. (Dhamm padam vii. 33)• "And said unto him: All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then Jesus saith unto him: Get thee hence, Satan; for it is written: Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only ... then the devil leaveth him, and behold, angels came and ministered unto him." (Matt, iv, 9-11») 92

15. During the transfiguration on the mountain, Christ is joined, by Moses and. Elias. Sakyamun has frequent interviews with the two Buddhas that precede him.

16. The shade of the sacred fig-tree that shelters the meditating Buddha is the scene of the conversion and ordination of the first disciples, formerly followers of Rudraka. Christ chooses his first disciples from among the former followers of the Baptist, and in John i. 48, his remark about a fig-tree appears wholly irrelevant to the context. In the answer of Nathanael the circumstance of having been seen under a fig-tree is accepted as a proof of Christ's messiahship.

17. Before Buddha appoints a larger number of apostles, he selects five favorite disciples, one of whom is afterwards styled the pillar of the faith; another the bosom friend, of Buddha. Before Christ selects his twelve apostles, he chooses five chief disciples, among them Peter, the "rock of the church," and John, his favorite follower. Among the disciples of Buddha there is a Judas, Devadatta, who tries to betray his master and meets a disgraceful death. (Koppen i. 9^5 Defmann, $1; Birth Stories, p. 113«)

18. The first words of Christ are the macarisms (blessings) in the Sermon on the Mount. When Buddha enters upon his mission, he begins a public speech (according to the French translation of Rgya, 355.) "Celui qui a entendu la loi, celui qui coit, celui qui se plait dans la solitude, il est heureux,"

19. Near a well Buddha meets a woman of the despised caste of the Chandalas. (Burnouf’s Divya Avakana.) Cf, John iv. 1-20,

20. Buddha walks on the Ganges; he heals the sick by a mere touch of his hand, and the Mayana-Sutra relates the miracle of the loaves and fishes. A transfiguration, speaking in foreign tongues, are additional parallels. Buddha descends to hell and preaches to the spirits of the damned.

21. At the death of Buddha, the earth trembles, the rocks are split, phantoms and spirits appear. (Koppen, i. 114, Seydel, 281.) "And behold, the earth did quake, and the rocks were rent ... and. many bodies of the saints which slept, arose." (Matt, xxvii. 51~53.) •93

B, Dogmatic Analogies

1. Belief in the necessity of redemption by a super­ natural mediator.

2. The founder's exaltation to the rank of a god, Buddha is equal to Brahms demons are powerless against him, Angels minister unto him.

3. Demerit of wealth. "It is difficult to be rich and keep the way."

4. The moral merit of celibacy. Its enforcement in Buddhist convents.

5. Rejection of ancient rites, sacrifices, etc.

6. Vanity of earthly joys,

7. Depreciation of labor and industry, of worldly honors.

8. Inculcation of patience, submission, and self abasement; neglect of physical culture, of the active and manly virtues.

9. Love of enemies; submission to injustice and tyranny.

10. Depreciation of worldly affections; merit of abandoning wife and children.

G. Ceremonial Analogies

Monasteries; nunneries; popery; the Thibetan Lama is worshipped as God's vice-regent upon earth; oecumenical councils; processions; worship of relics; strings of beads; incense; litanies, holy water, shaven polls, priests going bareheaded, weekly and yearly fasts, exorcisms, candlemas, feasts of the Immaculate Con­ ception; masses for the repose of the soul; bell­ ringing; auricular confession of sins.

In light of these analogies, Dr. Oswald concluded that Jesus delivered his gospel as a pre-recorded doctrine. Not one of the early fathers (before Irenaius, 5th c. A.D.) ever quoted a single 94

passage of the New Testament in its present form. The committee

of the church council that made the four gospels the conona

of their faith had to select them from fifty-four contradictory

versions. Contemporary writers were silent about the stupendous

events alleged to have attended the appearance of the new prophet.

The historian Josephus, who described the reign of King Herod in

its minutest details, never mentioned the miracles of Bethlehem,

the appearance of a new star, the massacre of the innocents, or

the prodigies of the crucifixion,

Felix Oswald regarded the question of the comparative ethical

merit of the two religions as belonging to an entirely different

province of inquiry. Christianity certainly surpassed its parent

creed in adapting itself to the purposes of a cosmopolitan mission,

and. there was no doubt that its westward progress has emancipated

its doctrine from many Oriental prejudices.

Dr. Oswald’s article initiated a spate of commentaries, some 'I sympathetic and some critical, and they appeared not only in the

Arena, but also in other magazines like the Catholic World and the

New Englander. Among those appearing in the Arena were C, Schroder’s

"What is Buddhism?" and "Christianity and Buddhism," and Julian

T. Bixby’s "Buddhism in the New Testament." 23 Julian Bixby’s article appeared in April, 1891» three months after that of Dr. Oswald, Bixby protested vigorously against Oswald’s assumptions and hoped to expose their fallacies.

To begin with, Bixby pointed out that the differences between 95

the New Testament run deeper and are more positive than the

likenesses. In his definition, Christianity has, as its central

doctrine, the Fatherhood of a personal God, with whom the human

soul comes into communion, and with whom it looks forward to dwell

in an eternal life in the mansions of heaven. In Buddhism,

on the contrary, there is no belief in a personal Supreme Being,

And. therefore Bixby called it agnostic, if not atheistic.

Moreover, Bixby claimed that Christianity takes a cheerful

view of life, bidding men rejoice. Buddhism, on the contrary,

is a pessimism which proclaims the universal reign of sorrow, and that life is an evil in itself, and that men ought so absolutely to extinguish all desires, that in Nirvana, the doom of rein­ carnation and continued existence may be escaped. The true

Buddhist must withdraw from the world and live as a monk,

Christianity looks upon marriage as honorable, whereas Buddhism preaches celibacy to its disciples, Buddhists were forbidden to work, and were to beg for a living; Christians were encouraged to work.

These contrasts were enough for Bixby to conclude that if

Christ had been a Buddhist or the New Testament of Buddhistic origin, it was incredible that the chief doctrines of Buddhism should thus have been contradicted in the gospels and epistles, which came from it.

Bixby then went on to refute the four most striking analogies presented by Dr. Oswald, In the first of the traditional analogies, 96

Oswald, had. stated: "Both Buddha and Christ were of royal lineage and horn of a mother who, though married, was still a virgin."

Bixby said, that Buddha was not born of a virgin. For his support, he turned to what he called the most reliable of the lives of

Buddha known in China, the Fo-sho-king-tsan-king, dating from

420 A.D., where it is expressly stated that the king was Buddha's father. In the Lalita Vistara it was taught very distinctly that

Buddha's mother lived, with her husband, as his wife in ordinary marital relations, for many years, only childless, until the con­ ception of Buddha. Thus, said Bixby, collapses analogy No. 1.

Dr. Oswald's eighth analogy dealing with extermination of the newly born, also disappeared for Bixby, when he found out from the Abhinishkramana Sutra that the fear of the King of Magadha took pla.ce when Buddha was over twenty years old,—not before the birth of the child, as with Herod,

In refutation of Dr. Oswald’s thirteenth analogy, Bixby stated that Buddha's bath in the river was no religious baptism, but the daily oriental washing, and no more to be compared with

John's baptism of Jesus than the legend of the shower of flowers, dropped by the divas, was to be likened, to the descent of the Holy

Spirit as a dove.

It was the same with No. 14, in which Dr. Oswald compared

Buddha's temptation to that of Jesus, as a temptation of offers of wealth and earthly glory, Bixby believed that Oswald's authority must have been a late and unreliable one, for in the earlier accounts, 97

such as the Maha-paranibbana Sutta. the temptation described is

that of entering Nirvana before Buddha had published his doctrine

to the world.

Thus, concluded Bixby, there were discrepancies in every analogy, more noticeable than the resemblances. He took great pains to show that Christ was untouched by any of the Far Eastern

influences. Moreover, he projected the theory that Buddhism may have Christian origins itself« His final words were these:

The secret of the curious analogies between the story of Buddha and the story of Christ is an open secret. Its source is, first in the homogeneity of human nature, the common working of human faith and human imagination under every sky.,.. And secondly, it was due to the common subsoil on which both Buddhism and Christianity, after it went forth out of Judea into the Gentile world, developed;—the soil of an older Pantheism and nature religion, in which the idea of hero worship and incarnations was familiar and popular, and where national hopes were excited by the expectation of the coming of a great liberator and conqueror, a favorite of heaven, under whom a new and better age should dawn,

Bixby’s refutation of Dr. Oswald’s starling analogies did. not satisfy the readers of the Arena. They wanted to know more about

Buddhism and its relationship to Christianity. The result was the publication of two articles in 1892, both written by C. Schroder and called "What is Buddhism?" and "Christianity and Buddhism."

The first, published in the Arena of January, 1892 2 7*5 was an attempt at a better, objective understanding of the Indian religion. The material in the article was condensed and trans­ lated by C. Schroder for the Arena from the book by Subhadra Bickshu

The aim of Buddhism, said Schroder, was the release or emancipation 98

from the Samsara or the world of error, guilt, suffering, death

and birth. The expression of re-birth, in the Buddhistical sense,

had nothing in common with the Christian idea of new birth or

being born again. The Buddhist doctrine of re-birth, that is,

the continued re-incorporation of our real spiritual being, formed

the fundamental principle of the great Asiatic religions. Death

was no annihilation, but only the passing over from one feeble

form into another. Man's real fate depended solely on his inward

being, on his own will, and he had the prospect of countless re­

births, in which he would earn the fruits of both his good and his

evil deeds. Only by abandoning this will to live, and by totally

suppressing the desire for an individual existence, in this or in

some future world, could man ever be freed and redeemed, and reach

eternal peace.

The road to this release, to Nirvana, can be found through the recognition of four healing truths, namely: the truth of suffering, the truth of the cause of suffering, the truth of the cessation of suffering, and the truth of the way which will lead to cessation from suffering.

Together with the awareness of the four truths, a Buddhist should be guided by the following ten declarations:

I. Not to kill or injure any living being.

II. Not to steal,

III. Not to pursue any illicit pleasures; i.e., to abstain from all forbidden sexual intercourse. 99

IV. Not to lie, to cheat, or to bear false witness.

V, Not to drink any intoxicating beverages.

VI, To eat only at stated times.

VII. To abstain from dancing, from the singing of worldly songs, from attending public performances and. musical exhibitions, in fact, to avoid all worldly pleasures.

VIII, To abstain from vanity, give up the use of jewels and ornaments of every description, as well as that of perfumed clothing, soaps, salves, and oils.

IX. To avoid the use of luxurious, soft-beds, and to sleep on a hard and low couch,

X. To always live in voluntary poverty.

The Nirvana, according to the explanation of the Buddhist scholar was a condition of holy peace, accompanied by the indestructible certainty of obtained freedom and release. Nirvana meant, literally, to be extinguished. The will to live, the longing for earthly joys, here or somewhere else, was extinguished. The false idea, that material goods can have any value, or be lasting, evaporated. Gone was the flame of sensuality and selfishness.

The religion of the Buddhists was dominated by a spirit of purest tolerance. It knew no miracles, as such, and it did not consider prayer, sacrifices, and other usages necessary to reach salvation. The principle differences between Buddha’s religion and those of other teachers were stated by Subhadra Bickshu in the following words, as translated by Schroder:

Buddhism teaches the highest wisdom and goodness without a personal God; a continuation of being without an immortal soul; an eternally blessed state without a local heaven; a possibility of salvation without a 100

vicarious saviour; a redemption where each is his own redeemer, and which can be reached without prayer, sacrifices, self-torture, or other usages; without priests and the mediumship of saints; without divine grace, and solely through one’s own will and power; and finally a highest perfection which may be enjoyed already in this life and on this earth,26

In his other article, "Christianity and Buddhism" which

27 appeared in the Arena in March 1893 ' Charles Schroder began by

saying that both religions had, in practice, greatly degenerated.

Buddhism, even before Christ’s appearance, had become mixed with

idol-worship-and fanaticism, with the result that all attempts at making converts were abandoned. Christianity, too, had departed from the original teachings. The churches were largely to be blamed for this. Jesus came to establish the brotherhood of man on earth. But, said Schroder, any one found advocating brotherhood was looked upon as a dangerous socialist.

Since, both the religions had degenerated, Schroder was right in basing his comparison between them on an examination of the doctrines, as originally taught by respective masters.

He began by assessing the comments on Buddhism of Subhadra’s

Bickshu quoted above. Schroder discovered that Subhadra’s comments were equally applicable to Christ's teachings. Discarding the creeds and dogmas of the Church, Schroder said that the Christian

God was not a person but spirit; that there was no local heaven, but that, as Jesus said, heaven was within us; that the mission of Jesus was simply to teach, through words and deeds, and to point out the way to us, just as Buddha had done; also that a 101

Christian could reach perfection already in this earthlife, for

Jesus had reached it himself.

In light of the above, Schroder said, the real teachings of

Christ, were not materially, or in essence, different from those

of Buddha. There were however, in Schroder’s opinion, two differences,

the one real, and the other only apparent.

In Buddhism, if one recognized and followed the four healing

truths, his will to live finally ceased, no more rebirths would

take place, and one achieved Nirvana, In this teaching Schroder

saw two radical defects. The first was: If man accepted and

lived up to Buddhism in one birth, he was, of course, totally

unconscious of such acceptance in the next. He might not, said

Schroder, in the new birth, be converted to, or even hear any­

thing of Buddhism.

The other defect was found in the ten declarations mentioned

above. According to Schroder, they were certainly most excellent

and their observance highly conducive to morality, but, like the

laws of Moses, they contained nothing but outward forms and

practices, and did not reach the interior man.

On the other hand, there was one supreme and central law in

the teachings of Christ. That law was Love. But it existed before Jesus and, hence, it was a universal law, belonging to no religions, beliefs, or peoples. It was the divine in man, which

only needed to be called out to do infinitely more for man than all

Buddha’s teachings could for the Buddhist. Jesus taught it, lived 102

it and. died, for it and, therefore, he was the perfect man, and

this perfection could he gained by anyone, who followed this uni­

versal law.

This was the real difference between the two doctrines: the

one, with all its beauty and excellence, had defects, because it

depended on the conception of one man; the other was perfect,

because it depended absolutely and solely on the law of God,

or as the Buddhists called Him, Eternal Justice,

The other difference, which Schroder saw as only an apparent

one, related to the doctrine of re-birth or reincarnation, which was absent from Christianity, but was the fundamental principle of

Buddhism.

Schroder believed that as time passed, more and more Christians would start believing in reincarnation, especially since the concept of a local heaven and a local hell had been discarded by the enlightened. It became, therefore, necessary to reconcile Christ's allusions to a future state of bliss or punishment with some stronger theory. Reincarnation, said Schroder, offered the only rational and possible explanation for this inexplicable earth- existence. And, therefore, it became a vital principle of the

Christian religion. This left only one real difference between the two doctrines, and, it was, according to Schroder, in the recognition by Jesus of the law of Love as the law in which all others were included and without which they would be insufficient.

And, therefore, Schroder ranked Buddhism as second to the teachings of Christ.28 103

More extensive than the comparative analysis of Buddhism was

the discussion of Brahmanism or Vedantaism in the Arena. In the

early 1890’s a number of Hindu swamis or scholars visited the

United States, mainly in connection with World Conference on

Religions sponsored by the Chicago Exposition of 1893« Anna

Josephine Ingersoll wrote an article called "Swamis in America,"

published in October 1899» in which she described for the American

readers the role or status of these scholars, called Swamis or

Sanyassins. She explained the concept of division in a Hindu

life which had four phases: 1. that of student or brahmacharin;

2. that of householder or grhestha: 3» that of retirement for

meditation or vanaurastha and 4, that of the wandering sage or

sanyassin or bhiksu. In this fourth stage a Hindu lived alone and

became a Rishi or seer of truth. Max Muller, the German Sanskrit

Scholar, as quoted by Ingersoll, explained that the Buddhist

revolt against Hinduism was mainly based on the fact that if

spiritual freedom was the highest goal on earth it was a mistake

to wait for it till the very end of life, and, hence, the Buddhists declined to pass through the years of Hindu discipline. To a

Hindu family, however, to have a son become a monk without first passing the prescribed periods of student life and of marriage was considered a calamity. The ideal of the Hindu was that he should first experience life in its different phases; that first the mind circled forward to the senses, then back again to the spiritual.

Miss Ingersoll saw the value of Hinduism in its assertion of the same 104

values found in other systems. The command of the Greek philoso­ pher, "Know thyself;" the words of Jesus "lo, the kingdom of God is within you;" and the highest teaching of the Vedas, "tat tvam asi," "that thou art," "see the self by the self,"—these are all one and the same. "If the Hindu helps us to level the uninhabitable peaks of dogma, and to recognize the one essential in religion, which is realization, if he helps one man in this materialistic age to praise and to listen to the ‘still, small voice,’ his coming to America has not been in vain," concluded 30 Miss Ingersoll.

The first really interpretative article on Hindu philosophy appeared in the Arena immediately following that of Anna Ingersoll.

Written by Horatio W. Dresser, it was called "An Interpretation of the Vedanta,"731 Vedanta means the study of the Vedas, the

Hindu scriptures. Dresser began his article with a meaningful chant from one of the Upanishads: "All this universe is Brahma; from him it proceeds, into him it is dissolved; in him it breathes."

Dresser displayed a fairly good understanding of the basic tenets of Vedantaism, The fundamental concept of this philosophy is that there is one existence. One cannot see this being, for it is that by which all seeing comes; one cannot formulate it, since it is beyond definition. It is ekam advaitiyam. one without a second. If you try to define it as this or that, to describe this ultimate entity, the invariable reply is, niti. niti. not this, not this. Yet sooner or later, the mind turns again to the 105

finite to ask, what of that? Granting that reality is One, in­

divisible and indefinable, what is this world we see, and what are

we who perceive it? These were questions which baffled any

Vi estern mind, as it did Dresser’s. The answer of Vedanta to these

queries posed by Dresser was that it is Maya, it is unreal, the

play of the Spirit, the "show" of the infinite. There was in

reality only one soul, sunk into seeming difference, only appear­

ing to be divided into souls of men and animals. In truth there were no finite individuals, for in reality they could not exist.

Vedanta said, how could it be that I am one, and you are one?

We are all one, and the cause of evil is this perception of duality, this failure to see the fundamental unity or oneness among souls.

Horatio Dresser admitted that it was difficult for a Western and Christian mind to accept the doctrine of Maya—and he betrayed his own weakness when he assumed that Maya meant illusion. Two articles published in the Arena of February 1900 picked up where

Dresser ran into difficulties. In the first, called "Teachings of the Vedas"82 E, C. Farnsworth repeated some of the tenets already mentioned by Dresser, However,

Farnsworth threw more light on the fundamental conception of

Vedanta as found in the Bhagvad Gita. Lord Krishna said: "I establish the whole universe with a single portion of myself and remain separate," words which Farnsworth found similar to those of Plato: "The Universe is composed of the Same and the Other." 106

Farnsworth also highlighted, the Emersonian concept of the

Over-Soul. When a man united, himself with the Logos—that is., attained Nirvana—he experienced the feeling that he had absorbed the Logos within himself, Farnsworth quoted the great teacher

Swami Vivekanand, who visited the United. States in the 1890’s, who said: "I am neither body nor changes of body; neither am I senses nor object of the senses; I am Existence Absolute, Bliss

Absolute, Knowledge Absolute; I am It; I am It,"^ The quest of a mortal then was a Self-conscious recognition of his Atma or his higher Self. Said. Farnsworth "Man is the young Hercules of

Divine paternity, but born of Alcmena, or Mary, or Maya—born of illusion, the earth-mother. Trials many and harsh must test his every fiber before he as conqueror may worthily fill his place— 34 where sit the immortal gods."J

The second article, "Vedanta Philosophy: The Correct Inter- 35 pretation,was in the nature of a reply to Horatio Dresser by

Swami Abhedananda, official representative of the Vedanta phil­ osophy in America, According to him the Western man’s difficulty in understanding the Hindu philosophy was in the error in his conception of Maya, This term never meant "illusion" in the sense that the word was ordinarily used, but meant conditional, relative or phenomenal existence. The most beautiful definition of Maya was the one given by Sankarcharya, the great commentator and exponent of the Vedanta philosophy: 10?

Maya is the name of that Divine Energy which is inscrutable and. beginningless; which produces the phenomenal name and form, or, in other words, the mental and physical phenomenon, and contains the three properties of matter and force—inertia, activity, and equilibrium of various forces, and whose existence can be proved by the inductive method of logic. It is neither absolute reality nor absolute un­ reality; but it is the conditional, relative, or phenomenal reality,

Maya was also called Prakriti in the Upanishads and it was the same as procreatrix in Latin—the creative energy of the absolute

Brahman. Swami Abhedananda further explained that the purpose of the evolution of Maya, or eternal energy, was to help each

individual soul or ego to attain to the highest state of spiritual perfection through the realization of its divine nature.

The Swami then clarified the difference between the Self and the Ego, Not only did Dresser confuse the two, but even Emerson committed the mistake of identifying the Self and the Ego as one.

The Vedanta philosophy never taught the birth, or death, or re­ birth of the Atman (Self), or the divine nature of man. It was the individual ego, or soul, that reincarnated, or manifested its latent powers through the different stages of evolution—to fulfil its desires and to gain experience until perfection was reached and the highest state of spiritual realization was at­ tained. The doctrine of reincarnation was not a mere "working hypothesis," it was as true and demonstrable as the doctrine of evolution, said Abhedananda, and he quoted Professor Huxley as saying: "None but hasty thinkers will reject it (the doctrine of reincarnation) on the ground of inherent absurdity. Like the 108

doctrine of evolution itself, that of transmigration has its roots

in the world of realities."'5

To the charge that the Hindu philosophy was pessimistic,

Swami Abhedananda said, that from ancient times, the Vedanta taught neither pessimistic nor fatalistic doctrines. Its philosophy had inspired such thinkers as Emerson, Thorea.u,

Schopenhauer, Paul Deussen, and Max Muller, who said:

Indian philosophers are by no means dwelling forever on the miseries of life. They are not whining and protesting that life is not worth living. That is not their pessimism. They simply state that they received the first impulse to philosophic reflection from the fact that there is suffering in the world, They evidently thought that in a perfect world suffering had no place; that it is sometimes anomalous, something that ought at all events to be accounted for, and if possible overcome. Pain certainly seems to be an im­ perfection, and, as such, may well have caused the question why it existed and how it could be annihilated. But this is not the disposition which we are accustomed to call pessimism. Indian philosophy contains no outcry against divine in­ justice, and in no way encourages suicidal ex­ pedients.-^

Swami Abhedananda restated the fundamental concept of the

Hindu philosophy which had attracted and inspired Emerson,

Thoreau and Whitman - it was the enjoyment of eternal happiness in this life, by living the life of perfection and spiritual realization. As regards the fatalistic doctrines, the Swami said, that the true student knew very well that the Vedanta taught that we create our own fate, our own destiny, by our own works.

This doctrine was different from the pessimistic ideas of Buddhism,

Abhedananda tried to clarify another source of confusion - 109

the concept of Self, In the Hindu teachings the Self had three

qualities: it is; it perceives; it rejoices. Emerson, the

practical Yankee that he was, was not satisfied with these

three attributes and added two more, namely, the Self acts and

it progresses. The source of confusion was explained by Max

Muller in these words:

When we speak of the Self - in Sanskrit Atman - we should always remember that it is not what is commonly meant by the Ego, but that it lies far beyond it. What we commonly call our Ego is determined by space and time, by birth and death, by the environment in which we live, by our body, our senses, our memory, by our language, nationality, character, prejudices, and many other things. All these make up our Ego, or character^ but they have nothing to do with our Self.

And, therefore, what could really ‘act’ and ’progress,' in the

Emersonian concept, would be the character or ego, and not the

Self or Atman. In Hinduism the ego was dynamic, but the Self was constant, one with Brahman, or the Divine Spirit of the

Universe. This oneness was a difficult concept to understand since men were surrounded by different kinds of imperfections which tempted them to lead a life of worldliness, selfishness and physicality. These distracted them from achieving that spiritual and non-dualistic state that enabled Jesus to declare

"I and my Father are one," and a Vedanta sage to say, "I am

Brahman," and "I am one with the absolute Spirit divine," In other words, the doctrine taught that the divine essence in

Man was the same as the divine essence of the Universe. It was this concept that Horatio Dresser had called: "... pure monism, 110

or pantheism, that absolute identification of subject and object,

with no room for the splendidly elaborate system of Nature as the

39 realm of divine manifestation." Abhedananda felt that Dresser,

once again, had difficulty in understanding the difference

between what he called "pure monism" and "pantheism." According

to the Swami, the purely monistic Vedanta did not teach that

everything was God, but that the reality of every phenomenal

object in the universe was one absolute existence. He again

quoted from Professor Max Muller: "It is easy for us to call

those ancient explorers reckless adventurers, or dispose of them with the help of other names, such as mystic or pantheist - often but half understood by those who employ them."^

Regrouping again the main concepts of the Vedantic philosophy,

the Swami said that it taught that everything in the universe lived and had its existence in God. It believed that the divine reality manifested itself through the various stages of the evolution of Nature, or Prakriti, or Maya, or Divine.

The essence of the subject and the essence of the object were one on the highest spiritual plane alone, the fundamental principle being unity in variety of manifestations. And, therefore, the absolute monism of the Vedanta was not the same as pantheism, which taught that everything was God, or that God had become matter and force.

The Swami concluded his article by saying that the one theme of the Hindu scriptures was to establish, through reason, logic, Ill

and science, the divine origin of self-consciousness and to bring every individual soul back to its divine Source and make it realize its true divine nature. Frederick Schlegel said:

The divine origin of man (as taught by the Vedanta) is continually inculcated to stimulate his efforts to return, to animate him in the struggle, and incite him to consider a reunion and reincoi'poration with divinity as the one primary object of every action and reaction, ... Even the loftiest philosophy of the Europeans, the idealism of reason as it is set forth by Greek philosophers, appears in comparison with the abundant light and vigor of Oriental idealism like a feeble Promethean spark in the full flood of heavenly glory of the noonday sun - faltering and feeble and ever ready to be extinguished. 1

And Victor Cousin said:

When we read with attention the poetical and philosophical monuments of the East, above all those of India which are beginning to spread in Europe, we discover there many a truth and truths so profound, and which make such a contrast with the meanness of the results at which the European genius has sometimes stopped, that we are constrained to bend the knee before the philosophy of the East, and to see in this cradle of the human race the native land of the highest philosophy.

Benjamin Orange Flower was aware of the richness of the

Indian philosophy and he encouraged publications of studies dealing with the Eastern religions. He found in them a gospel which strengthened his own outlook towards life. The divinity of the individual preached by Hinduism was used by Flower to serve his purposes of social reform. The message of Hinduism which said that the white man and the black man were in essence 112

of the same Brahman, helped Flower in his fight for racial equality.

Above all, these Eastern religions were free from creeds and dogma and preached the sanctity of individual freedom together with an optimism for better things to come. Flower turned hungrily to these preachings just as Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman had done half a century before him. 113

CHAPTER VI

CONCLUSION

"I believe the dawn to be breaking," said Flower in an 1 editorial. He knew that the future had to be better than the present. He had grown up in a period in which material and in­ dustrial progress was glorified and in its name everything ethical was sacrificed. Individual freedom was crushed by the machine; the millionaires were the new gods. The resultant positivism of the nineteenth century had not only changed the face of western civilization, but had also shifted the center of gravity in the thought world from the lofty idealism and splendid altruism to materialistic egoism, in which, believed

Flower, the mastership of moral principles and reverence for lofty spiritual ideals more and more gave way to the worship of externals - wealth, power and personal ease. Men who, half a century before, had been enthusiastic idealists became mere opportunists. But this materialistic ascendency had to subside and give way to a return of idealism.

Flower had faith in man’s mind. With the beginning of the twentieth century, he hoped that the secrets of power, happiness, progress and victory were empearled in the mind and the soul of man. Religious thinkers looked forward to a reinterpretation and restatement of Christian theology. Emerson was no longer 114

the mid-century pagan, "but had become the leading exponent of a

non-creedal theology. The whole of the Transcendental movement

received a fresh assessment and Flower described a growing

hunger among the masses for a return of ethical and moral life:

Happily there are everywhere signs of a change. On every side one sees evidences of a growing heart-hunger. Men are finding out that marble palaces are not necessarily homes, and that unlimited wealth, while it may give temporary power and buy flattery, does not feed the soul. Great material riches never have and never will afford other than pseudo or ephe­ meral pleasure to the human heart. ... Only g as we help others can we truly help ourselves.

To feed this soul-hunger, Benjamin Orange Flower popularized

the major Transcendentalists and their beliefs with biographies,

personal recollections and analyses of their message. Editor

Flower was truly a revivalist. Like Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman,

he turned to other religious doctrines and found, particularly

in Hinduism and Buddhism, a re-affirmation of his own beliefs.

He discovered that "truth is one; the great ethical verities

are the same in all ages and lands."

Ralph Waldo Emerson emerged as the central figure and chief

exponent of, what was called, the New Thought Movement. This movement proclaimed (l) that the Universal Mind was open to all men and so an individual had the right to express his opinions; and (2) the great or representative man was one who was most capable of receiving truth, and, therefore, an intellectual and spiritual aristocracy was essential to true democracy. Emerson 115

was against the masses which choked and. stifled, an individual’s voice, Moreover, Emerson did not keep himself aloof of social reforms, He attended the first national convention for the political emancipation of women; he attended town meetings and pleaded for good roads and honesty in tax collections and the better use of public money. Above all, he championed the cause of the black man - a cause to which Flower himself had devoted his energies. The monthly appearance of the Arena became a useful pulpit for Flower and the other contributors to champion the very causes that had. been close to Emerson’s heart,

Thoreau stands out today as one who was more practical than

Emerson. His message to society to free the individual from the constraints of customs and. conventions found favorable hearing at the turn of the century. Thoreau was no longer a mere nature lover, but his Walden experiment came to be seen as his deliberate attempt to expose and renounce a society which was going down the road of blatant materialism. He stood up against this onslaught and tried to remain an individual.

Whitman, of course, was the super-democrat who championed the cause of the down-trodden, the economically and socially deprived. Flower was himself a career social reformer and., therefore, he encouraged extensive re-evaluation of Whitman’s works and message in the hopes of establishing a firm foundation for the growing reputation of the poet.

In the ancient doctrines of India, Emerson and Thoreau and. 116

Whitman had. found sympathetic corroboration and strength to pursue their idealistic beliefs. It was, therefore, no coin­ cidence that the Arena would hold extensive discussions on the merits of Hinduism and Buddhism. If these doctrines had inspired the leaders of the idealistic movement, surely then the modern man, too, would benefit from a first hand study of Indian religions. Among the contributors to the Arena who had discussed these religions, a number had visited India. The Columbian Ex­ position of 1893 had attracted a number of Indian scholars who stayed in the United States long enough to explicate the ancient doctrines to many appreciative audiences. This intercourse brought about an exchange of ideas which led to a better appre­ ciation of the different doctrines.

Together with his passion for social reform, Benjamin Orange

Flower felt a need for the return of those values which gave an individual his dignity and universality. He recognized the need for the individual to retain an independence of mind. The future of progress, of reform and the moral uplift of the masses depended on such an independence. It was for those reasons that he admired, and managed the revival, through the Arena, of that idealistic movement which had found fruition in New England

Transcendentalism. //7

NOTES 118

NOTES

CHAPTER I

1. "The Editors to the Reader," Dial. I (July, 1840), 3«

2. Dial. II (July 1841), 90.

3. Charles J. Woodbury, Talks with Ralph Waldo Emerson (New York, 1890), p. 110.

4. John Orr, "The Transcendentalism of New England," International Review. XIII (1882), 390.

5. Transcendentalism in New England (New York, I876), pp. 136, 302, 355.

6. "Transcendentalisms The New England Renaissance," Unitarian Review. XXXI, HI,

7. Studies in New England Transcendentalism (New York, 1908), pp. 189, 196.

8» Thoreau and Whitman: A Study of Their Esthetics (Seattle, 1961), p. iv,

9. Ibid.. pp. 39-40.

10, Gay Wilson Allen, Walt Whitman Handbook (Chicago, 1946), p. 458. 119

NOTES

CHAPTER II

1. David H. Dickason, "The Contribution of B, 0, Flower and the Arena to Critical Thought in America," Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 1940. Published in part in American Literature. XIV (Mar. 1942), 148-156.

2. Biographical information is from the Dictionary of American Biography (New York, 1931)» VI, 477-478.

3. Fred C, Mabee, Jr,, "Editor Benjamin Orange Flower and the Arena. I889-I896," Unpublished master’s thesis, Columbia University, p. 12.

4. H, F, Cline, "Benjamin Orange Flower and the Arena. 1889-1909»" Journalism Quarterly, XVII (June 1940), 139.

5* Arena. XXXI (May 1904), 550.

6. Cline, 141, 7. Cline, 142.

8. Benjamin Orange Flower, Progressive Men, Women and Movements of the Past Twenty-Five Years "(Boston, 191^» pp. 22-23.

9. Cline, 143.

10. Arena. V (Jan, I892), 48.

11. Cline, 150.

12. Arena. Ill (Jan. I891), 19.

13. Cline, 150.

14. Arena. Ill (Apr, 189l), 25.

15« Journalism Quarterly. XVII (Sept. 1940), 247-257.

16. Arena, III, 21.

1?• Arena. V (May I892), 53-5^.

18, Cline, 249. 19. Cline, 251. 120

20. Arena, XX (Nov.-Dec. 1898), 622.

21» Arena. XII (May 1895)» 70-71.

22. See note number 3»

23. See note number 1, 24, Ibid.. 1.

25. Ibid.f 3« Russell Blackenship, American Literature (New York, 193l), P* 19«

26. Dickason, 12-13.

27. American Literature. XIV (Mar. 1942), 148-156.

28. Ibid., 149.

29. Arena. XIII (Aug, 1895)» 51?»

30. Arena. XXVII (May 1902), 5^7-553-

31» American Literature. XIV, 156.

32. Roy P, Fairfield, "Benjamin Orange Flower: Father of the Muckrakers," American Literature. XXII (Nov. 1950), 272-282,

33. Coming Age. I (Jan. 1899), 95» 121

NOTES

CHAPTER III

1. Boston, 1914.

2, Progressive Men, p. 1?6.

3» Arena. XXXII (Aug. 1904), I5I-I65.

4. Tbid.. 154. 5. Ibid.. 154.

6. Ibid.. 154. 7. Ibid.. 154.

8, "Emerson," Arena. XV (Dec. 1895), 12-16.

9. Ibid.. 13. 10. Ibid.. I3-I5.

11. Ibid.. 16.

12«, "Emerson in His Home," Arena, XV (Dec. 1895), 16-18.

13. Ibid.. 15-16.

14. "Emerson, the Man," Arena. XXX (Oct. 1903), 359“376.

15. Ibid., 359-360. 16. Ibid.. 376.

17. Ibid., 3?6.

18. Arena, XXXIV (Julv 1905), 31-38.

19. Ibid., 31. 20. Ibid., 31-32.

21. Ibid.. 34. 22. Ibid.. 34.

23. Ibid., 3^-35. 24. Ibid., 35.

25. Ibid.. 35-37.

26. Arena, X (Nov. 1894). 736-'744.

27. Ibid.. 736. 28. Ibid.. 737.

29. Ibid., 737-739. 30. Ibid.. 740-741 122

31. Ibid.., 740-741. 32. Ibid.. 744.

33. Arena, XXXIX (May 1908), 538-544.

34. Ibid,, 540-541. 35. Ibid.. 544.

36. Arena, XXXIX (June I9O8), 665-674.

37. Ibid,. 668-669. 38. Ibid.. 670.

39. Ibid.. 671. 40. Ibid.. 672.

41. Ibid., 673. 42. Ibid., 673.

43. Ibid.. 674.

44. Arena, XXXIII (Jan. 1905), 38-43.

45. Ibid., 38. 46. Ibid.. 38.

47. Ibid., 39. 48. Ibid., 40-41

49. Arena, XXXVII (Apr. I907), 400-404.

50, Ibid,, 400. 51. Ibid.. 401-4(

52. Arena, XXX (Nov. 1903). 540-545.

53. Ibid.. 541. 54. Ibid.. 541.

55. Ibid.. 544. • 123

NOTES

CHAPTER IV

1. "A Golden Day in Boston's History,” Arena, XXXII (Aug. 1904), 151.

2« Arena, XXX (Nov, 1903), 489-498,

3. Ibid.,. 491. 4. Ibid.. 493.

5. Ibid., 495. 6. Ibid., 496,

7« Ibid.. 496. 8. Ibid.. 497.

9. The period in which the Arena appeared was not yet prepared to accept the civil disobedience of Thoreau, The goals that he projected were acceptable, but the means he employed were suspect.

10. Arena. XXVIil (Julv 1902). 61-65.

11. Ibid.. 6l. 12. Ibid,, 62.

13. Ibid,, 62. 14. Ibid.. Ill

15. Ibid.. 62-63. 16. Ibid.. 63.

17. Ibid.. 64. 18. Ibid.. 64.

19. Ibid.. 64-65. 20. Ibid.. 65.

21. Arena. XXXIII (Jan, 1905)» 55-58.

22. Arena. XXXIII (Mar. 1905), 318.

23. Ibid,., 318.

24. Arena, XXXIII, 55. 25. Ibid., 55.

26. Ibid., 55. 27. Ibid.. 56.

28. Ibid.. 56. 29. Ibid., 56.

30. Ibid.. 57. 31. Ibid,, 57. 124

32. Ibid... 58.

33. Arena, V (Jan. 1892), 228-236.

34. Ibid... 229. 35. Ibid,, 229-230

36. Ibid,, 230. 37. Ibid.. 231.

38. Ibid., 231. 39. Ibid., 232.

40. Ibid,. 236.

41. Arena, VI (Sent . I892) , 471-480.

42. Ibid,, 473. 43. Ibid., 473.

44. Ibid., 474. 45. Ibid,. 474.

46. Ibid.. 475. 47. Ibid., 475.

48. Ibid., 475. 49. Ibid., 477.

50. Ibid., 477. 51. Ibid., 478.

52. Ibid.. 480.

53. Arena, X (Sent. 1894), 433-452.

54. Ibid., 435-448, 55. Ibid., 449.

56. Ibid., 450. 57. Ibid., 452.

58. Arena, XV (Jan. 1898), 175-183.

59. Ibid.. 177. 60. Ibid.. 177.

6l. Ibid... 182. 125

NOTES

CHAPTER V

1. Arena. XXXII (July 1904), 76-78.

2. Ibid.. 78.

3. Boston, 1914, p. 76.

4. Progressive Men, p. 19.

5. "Editor Benjamin Orange Flower and the Arena. I889-I896," Unpublished master’s thesis, Columbia University, 1938.

Ibid., Appendix E,

7. Arthur Christy, The Orient in American Transcendentalism (New York, 19327» pp. vii-viii.

8. Ibid., ix. 9. Ibid., x.

10. Ibid.. xi-xii.

11» Ibid., 20. Paul Deussen, The Philosophy of the Upanishads (Edinburgh, 1906), 3.

12. Leyla Goren, "Elements of Brahmanism in Transcendentalism of Emerson," Emerson Society Quarterly, XXXIV (Supplement to I Quarter, 1964), I-69.

13. Ibid., 34-35.

14. Journals (Boston, 1914), VI, 494.

15. Arena. Ill (Jan. I89l), 193-201.

16. Ibid., 193.

17. Evariste-Regis Hue, Souvenirs d’un voyage dans la Tartarie. le Thibet. et la Chine pendant les années 1844-1846 Paris, 18507.

18. Eugene Burnouf, Introduction to the History of Buddhism (Paris, 1844). 126

19. Christian Lassen, Indische alterthumskunde (Bonn, 1847).

20. Rudolf Seydel, Die Budha-legende und das lehen Jesu nach den Eyangelien (Leipzig. 1884)".

21. Robert Spence Hardy, A Manual of Buddhism (London, 1853).

22. Arena, III 196-199.

23. Arena. Ill (Apr. I891),. 555-566.

24. Ibid., 565-566.

25. C, Schroder, "What is Buddhism?" Arena. V (Jan, 1892), 212-227.

26. Ibid.. 227.

27. Arena. V (Mar. 1892), 458-463.

28. It would be futile to argue how Schroder failed to see the concept of universal love in Buddha’s teachings. A case could be made for Love in Buddhism, which would rank it at par with Christian love.

29. Arena. XXII (Oct. 1899), 482-488.

30. Ibid.. 488,

31. Arena. XXII (Oct. 1899), 489-508.

32. Arena. XXIII (Feb. 1900), 212-218.

33. Ibid.. 217. 34. Ibid.. 217.

35« Arena. XXIII (Feb. 1900), 218-224.

36. Ibid.. 220. 37. Ibid.. 221.

38. Ibid.. 221-222.

39. Arena. XXII, 500,

40. Arena, XXIII, 223.

41. Ibid., 224. 42. Ibid.. 224. 127 y-

NOTES

CHAPTER VI

1. Arena« VII (Mar. 1893), 511.

2. "Editorial," Arena. XXXII (July 1904), 79• BIBLIOGRAPHY 128

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