r, who, I later ascertained, was Thomas
Wentworth Higginson.

These two examples could be multiplied at length. There were many
reviewers from Harvard and Yale; and undoubtedly other Eastern colleges
were well represented. The University of Wisconsin furnished at least
one contributor, as probably did the University of Michigan and other
Western colleges. Men in Washington, New York, and Boston, not in
academic life, were drawn upon; a soldier of the Civil War, living in
Cincinnati, a man of affairs, sent many reviews. James Bryce was an
occasional contributor, and at least three notable reviews came from the
pen of Albert V. Dicey. In 1885, Godkin, in speaking of _The Nation's_
department of Literature and Art, wrote that "the list of those who have
contributed to the columns of the paper from the first issue to the
present day contains a large number of the most eminent names in
American literature, science, art, philosophy, and law."[214] With men
so gifted, and chosen from all parts of the country, uniformly
destructive criticism could not have prevailed. Among them were
optimists as well as pessimists, and men as independent in thought as
was Godkin himself.

Believing that Godkin's thirty-five years of critical work was of great
benefit to this country, I have sometimes asked myself whether the fact
of his being a foreigner has made it more irritating to many good
people, who term his criticism "fault-finding" or "scolding." Although
he married in America and his home life was centered here, he confessed
that in many essential things it was a foreign country.[215] Some
readers who admired _The Nation_ told Mr. Bryce that they did not want
"to be taught by a European how to run this republic." But Bryce, who in
this matter is the most competent of judges, intimates that Godkin's
foreign education, giving him detachment and perspective, was a distinct
advantage. If it will help any one to a better appreciation of the man,
let Godkin be regarded as "a chiel amang us takin' notes"; as an
observer not so philosophic as Tocqueville, not so genial and
sympathetic as Bryce. Yet, whether we look upon him as an Irishman, an
Englishman, or an American, let us rejoice that he cast his lot with us,
and that we have had the benefit of his illuminating pen. He was not
always right; he was sometimes unjust; he often told the truth with
"needless asperity,"[216] as Parkman put it; but his merits so
outweighed his defects that he