He fancied
that the Germans were like the Chinese, only less graceful and refined
and more brutish. But neither had he any particular affection for any
relic of Europe. "Never again will we trust the moral sense or abstract
friendliness of a single _Government_ of the Old World." He accepted
selections from its literature for the new American Adam. But even its
greatest poets were not America's, and though he might welcome even
Juvenal, it was for use and not for worship. We have to learn, he
insists, that the best culture will always be that of the manly and
courageous instincts and loving perceptions, and of self-respect. In our
children rests every hope and promise, and therefore in their mothers.
"Disengage yourselves from parties.... These savage and wolfish parties
alarm me.... Hold yourself judge and master over all of them." Only faith
can save us, the faith in ourselves and in our fellow-men which is of the
true faith in goodness and in God. The idea of the mass of men, so fresh
and free, so loving and so proud, filled this poet with a singular awe.
Passionately he pleads for the dignity of the common people. It is the
average man of a land that is important. To win the people back to a
proud belief and confidence in life, to rapture in this wonderful world,
to love and admiration--this was his burning desire.
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