so thoroughly agreeing with _The Nation_
always," wrote Lowell, "that I am half persuaded that I edit it
myself!"[179] Truly Lowell had a good company: Emerson, Parkman, Curtis,
Norton, James, Eliot,--all teachers in various ways. Through their
lectures, books, and speeches, they influenced college students at an
impressible age; they appealed to young and to middle-aged men; and they
furnished comfort and entertainment for the old. It would have been
difficult to find anywhere in the country an educated man whose thought
was not affected by some one of these seven; and their influence on
editorial writers for newspapers was remarkable. These seven were all
taught by Godkin.

"Every Friday morning when _The Nation_ comes," wrote Lowell to Godkin,
"I fill my pipe, and read it from beginning to end. Do you do it all
yourself? Or are there really so many clever men in the country?"[180]
Lowell's experience, with or without tobacco, was undoubtedly that of
hundreds, perhaps of thousands, of educated men, and the query he raised
was not an uncommon one. At one time, Godkin, I believe, wrote most of
"The Week," which was made up of brief and pungent comments on events,
as well as the principal editorial articles. The power of iteration,
which the journalist possesses, is great, and, when that power is
wielded by a man of keen intelligence and wide information, possessing a
knowledge of the world, a sense of humor, and an effective literary
style, it becomes tremendous. The only escape from Godkin's iteration
was one frequently tried, and that was, to stop _The Nation_.

Although Godkin published three volumes of Essays, the honors he
received during his lifetime were due to his work as editor of _The
Nation_ and the _Evening Post_; and this is his chief title of fame. The
education, early experience, and aspiration of such a journalist are
naturally matter of interest. Born in 1831, in the County of Wicklow in
the southeastern part of Ireland, the son of a Presbyterian minister, he
was able to say when referring to Goldwin Smith, "I am an Irishman, but
I am as English in blood as he is."[181] Receiving his higher education
at Queen's College, Belfast, he took a lively interest in present
politics, his college friends being Liberals. John Stuart Mill was their
prophet, Grote and Bentham their daily companions, and America was their
promised land. "To the scoffs of the Tories that our schemes were
impracticable," he has writte