ecognizes in the nursery when
he makes war upon Johnny, who has knocked down his ten-pins. The law of
compensation and the existence of evil and consequent suffering are
actual entities to him. And yet these men do not belong to the same
school. The resemblance is on the surface. Emerson dabbles delicately,
yet, let it be conceded, energetically, with theories: his hands are
not the nervy, sinewy hands of the Viking of English literature; he
lacks his keen discernment of life, his quick comprehension of the
mutual relations of men and their times; he often wants his fine
analytical power. Carlyle sees in the life of a man his actions,
associations, aspirations, disappointments, successes, what deep
principles swayed him, what noble or ignoble nature provided his
impulses, and wrought his manhood: Emerson tests him by the great
problems of the universe, as he understands them, and educes from their
application to certain circumstances the character of the man. The one
is sagacious, argus-eyed; the other oracular, sibylline. And yet
Emerson, perhaps unconsciously, through admiration of the liberal views
and unquestioned bravery of his contemporary, adopted something like his
peculiarities of style and domesticated foreign idioms, that yet, like
tamed tigers, are not to be relied on in general society. As Carlyle was
the rhinoceros of English, Emerson aspired to be its hippopotamus,--both
pachyderms, and impenetrable to the bullets of criticism.

We have called Cousin an eclecticist. His Philosophy is a positive one
compared with that of Emerson. Here are scraps of Plato and Hegel, of
Porphyry and Swedenborg, of AEschylus and De Stael. Like the _Lehrer zu
Sais_, 'he looks on the stars, and imitates their courses and positions
in the sand.' In the obscurity that proves him great, for 'To be great
is to be misunderstood,' (is this the true 'misery of greatness' of
Milton?) it is hard to grasp his individuality. His haughty assertions
meet us at every turn. We no more dare to question them than so many
'centaurs or sphinxes or pallid gorgons' in a nightmare. But he relieves
our perplexity and gives us the key to that enigma himself. 'I unsettle
all things. No facts to me are sacred, none are profane. I simply
experiment, an endless seeker, _with no past at my back_.' What is this
but another version of Brahma? 'Far or forgot to me is near.' It is a
reflection of the Veda. 'I myself never was not, nor thou, nor all the
princes