a great work for his generation; he has written poetry of the purest
and finest quality. Is not that enough? I cannot understand the mere
credit we give to work, without any reference to the object of the
work, or the spirit in which it is done. We think with respect of the
man who makes a fortune, or who fills an official post, the duties of
which do nothing in particular for any one. It is a kind of obsession
with us practical Westerners; of course a man ought to contribute to
the necessary work of the world; but many men spend their lives in work
which is not necessary; and, after all, we are sent into the world to
live, and work is only a part of life. We work to live, we do not live
to work. Even if we were all socialists, we should, I hope, have the
grace to dig the gardens and make the clothes of our poets and
prophets, so as to give them the leisure they need.

I do not question the instinct of my hero in the matter; he lives
eagerly and peacefully; he touches into light the spirits of those who
draw near to him; and I admire a man who knows how to stop when he has
done his best work, and does not spur and whip his tired mind into
producing feebler, limper, duller work of the same kind; how few of our
great writers have known when to hold their hand!

God be praised for great men! My poet to-day has made me feel that life
is a thing to be lived eagerly and high-heartedly; that the world is
full of beautiful, generous, kindly things, of free air and sunshine;
and that we ought to find leisure to drink it all in, and to send our
hearts out in search of love and beauty and God--for these things are
all about us, if we could but feel and hear and see them.

October 12, 1888.

How absurd it is to say that a writer could not write a large, wise,
beautiful book unless he had a great soul--is it almost like saying
that an artist could not paint a fine face unless he had a fine face
himself. It is all a question of seeing clearly, and having a skilled
hand. There is nothing to make one believe that Shakespeare had a
particularly noble or beautiful character; and some of our greatest
writers have been men of unbalanced, childish, immature temperaments,
full of vanity and pettiness. Of course a man must be interested in
what he is describing; but I think that a man of a naturally great,
wise, and lofty spirit is so disposed as a rule to feel that his
qualities are instinctive, and so ready to credit other people wi