SOURCE: "Poetry and Imagination," in Christian Examiner, Vol. 42, March, 1847, pp. 250-701.

In this excerpt from his review of Emerson's Poems, Bartol offers a theological evaluation determining that Emerson's religious beliefs weaken his poetry.

… The heart in [Emerson's] poetry is less than the head, and this causes a deficiency for which nothing else can fully atone. Only a transcendent splendor and wealth of intellect could redeem many of his pieces from condemnation and forgetfulness, as being frigid and unfeeling. These are sad flaws in such noble workmanship. Did a fellow-feeling for human nature in all its varieties equal and fill out his other traits, we might think the great poet of America had been born, to bring on our flourishing Augustan age. But, as yet, our hearts acknowledge a more genial and enlivening influence from several of our other native bards. Would that one whom we unfeignedly respect might...