as a moral
tonic. His philosophy and that of Omar represent as wide a contrast as
could easily be found. Walt Whitman, the strange American poet
(1819-1892), whose famous _Leaves_ _of Grass_ (1855) excited an uproar
in America, and gave the author a much more serious reputation in
Europe. Stevenson's interest in him was genuine, but not partisan, and
his essay, _The Gospel According to Walt Whitman (The New Quarterly
Magazine_, Oct. 1878), is perhaps the most judicious appreciation in
the English language of this singular poet. Job, Omar Khayyam, Carlyle
and Whitman, taken together, certainly give a curious collection of
what the Germans call _Weltanschauungen_.]

[Note 13: _A vapour, or a show, or made out of the same stuff with
dreams_. For constant comparisons of life with a vapour or a show, see
Quarles's _Emblems_ (1635), though these conventional figures may be
found thousands of times in general literature. The latter part of the
sentence refers to the _Tempest_, Act IV, Scene I.

"We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep."]

[Note 14: _Permanent Possibility of Sensation_. "Matter then, may be
defined, a Permanent Possibility of Sensation."--John Stuart Mill,
_Examination of Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy_, Vol. I. Chap. XI.]

[Note 15: _Like the Commander's Statue_. In the familiar story of Don
Juan, where the audacious rake accepts the Commander's invitation to
supper. For treatments of this theme, see Moliere's play _Don Juan_,
or Mozart's opera _Don Giovanni_; see also Bernard Shaw's paradoxical
play, _Man and Superman_.... _We have something else in hand, thank
God, and let him knock_. It is possible that Stevenson's words here
are an unconscious reminiscence of Colley Cibber's letter to the
novelist Richardson. This unabashed old profligate celebrated the
Christmas Day of his eightieth year by writing to the apostle of
domestic virtue in the following strain: "Though Death has been
cooling his heels at my door these three weeks, I have not had time to
see him. The daily conversation of my friends has kept me so agreeably
alive, that I have not passed my time better a great while. If you
have a mind to make one of us, I will order Death to come another
day."]

[Note 16: _All the world over, and every hour_. He might truthfully
have said, "every second."]

[Note 17: _A mere bag's end, as the French say. A cul de sac._]

[Note 18: _Our