LETTERS
AND
SOCIAL AIMS.

BY

BOSTON:
JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY,

LATE TICKNOR & FIELDS, AND FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO.

1876.

COPYRIGHT, 1875.

BY RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & CO.,
CAMBRIDGE.

CONTENTS.

[Pg 1]

POETRY AND IMAGINATION.

THE perception of matter is made the common-sense, and for cause. Thiswas the cradle, this the go-cart, of the human child. We must learn thehomely laws of fire and water; we must feed, wash, plant, build. Theseare ends of necessity, and first in the order of nature. Poverty, frost,famine, disease, debt, are the beadles and guardsmen that hold us tocommon-sense. The intellect, yielded up to itself, cannot supersede thistyrannic necessity. The restraining grace of common-sense is the mark ofall the valid minds,—of Æsop, Aristotle, Alfred, Luther, Shakspeare,Cervantes, Franklin, Napoleon. The common-sense which does not meddlewith the absolute, but takes things at their word,—things as theyappear,—believes in the existence of matter, not because we can touchit, or conceive of it, but because it agrees with ourselves, and theuniverse does not jest with us, but is in earnest,—is the house ofhealth and life. In spite of all the joys of poets and the joys ofsaints, the most imaginative and abstracted person never makes, withimpunity, the least mistake in this particular,—never tries to kindle...