Earlier in the same year in which he retired from his church at Boston,
Emerson had lost his young wife. Though we may well believe that he bore
these agitations with self-control, his health suffered, and in the
spring of 1833 he started for Europe. He came to be accused of saying
captious things about travelling. There are three wants, he said, that
can never be satisfied: that of the rich who want something more; that
of the sick who want something different; and that of the traveller who
says, Anywhere but here. Their restlessness, he told his countrymen,
argued want of character. They were infatuated with 'the rococo toy of
Italy.' As if what was true anywhere were not true everywhere; and as
if a man, go where he will, can find more beauty or worth than he
carries. All this was said, as we shall see that much else was said by
Emerson, by way of reaction and protest against instability of soul in
the people around him. 'Here or nowhere,' said Goethe inversely to
unstable Europeans yearning vaguely westwards, 'here or nowhere is thine
America.' To the use of travel for its own ends, Emerson was of course
as much alive as other people. 'There is in every constitution a certain
solstice when the stars stand still in our inward firmament, and when
there is required some foreign force, some diversion or alteration, to
prevent stagnation. And as a medical remedy, travel seems one of the
best.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25