The second best or third best word sometimes
would make us appreciate his first best all the more. Even his god-
father Plato nods occasionally, but Emerson's good breeding will
not for a moment permit such a slight to the reader.
Emerson's peculiar quality is very subtle, but very sharp and firm
and unmistakable. It is not analogous to the commoner, slower-going
elements, as heat, air, fire, water, but is nearer akin to that
elusive but potent something we call electricity. It is abrupt,
freaky, unexpected, and always communicates a little wholesome
shock. It darts this way and that, and connects the far and the
near in every line. There is always a leaping thread of light, and
there is always a kind of answering peal or percussion. With what
quickness and suddenness extremes are brought together! The reader
is never prepared for what is to come next; the spark will most
likely leap from some source or fact least thought of. His page
seldom glows and burns, but there is a never-ceasing crackling and
discharge of moral and intellectual force into the mind.
His chief weapon, and one that he never lays down, is identical
with that of the great wits, namely, surprise. The point of his
remark or idea is always sprung upon the reader, never quietly laid
before him. He has a mortal dread of tameness and flatness, and
would make the very water we drink bite the tongue.
He has been from the first a speaker and lecturer, and his style
has been largely modeled according to the demand of those sharp,
heady New England audiences for ceaseless intellectual friction
and chafing.
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