, in some sort, a counterpart of Carlyle's _Hero Worship_. But
in temper and style the two writers were widely different. Carlyle's
pessimism and dissatisfaction with the general drift of things gained
upon him more and more, while Emerson was a consistent optimist to the
end. The last of his writings published during his life-time, the
_Fortune of the Republic_, contrasts strangely in its hopefulness with
the desperation of Carlyle's later utterances. Even in presence of the
doubt as to man's personal immortality he takes refuge in a high and
stoical faith. "I think all sound minds rest on a certain preliminary
conviction, namely, that if it be best that conscious personal life
shall continue it will continue, and if not best, then it will not; and
we, if we saw the whole, should of course see that it was better so."
It is this conviction that gives to Emerson's writings their serenity
and their tonic quality at the same time that it narrows the range of
his dealings with life. As the idealist declines to cross-examine
those facts which he regards as merely phenomenal, and looks upon this
outward face of things as upon a mask not worthy to dismay the fixed
soul, so the optimist turns away his eyes from the evil which he
disposes of as merely negative, as the shadow of the good. Hawthorne's
interest in the problem of sin finds little place in Emerson's
philosophy. Passion comes not nigh him, and _Faust_ disturbs him with
its disagreeableness. Pessimism is to him "the only skepticism."

The greatest literature is that which is most broadly human, or, in
other words, that which will square best with all philosophies. But
Emerson's genius was interpretative rather than constructive. The poet
dwells in the cheerful world of phenomena. He is most the poet who
realizes most intensely the good and the bad of human life. But
Idealism makes experience shadowy and subordinates action to
contemplation. To it the cities of men, with their "frivolous
populations,"

"are but sailing foam-bells
Along thought's causing stream."

Shakespeare does not forget that the world will one day vanish "like
the baseless fabric of a vision," and that we ourselves are "such stuff
as dreams are made on;" but this is not the mood in which he dwells.
Again: while it is for the philosopher to reduce variety to unity, it
is the poet's task to detect the manifold under uniformity. In the
great creative poets, in Shakespeare and Da