scribes.  I have, however, found writers superior to their books, and I cling to my first belief that a strong head will dispose fast enough of these impediments, and give one the satisfaction of reality, the sense of having been met, and a larger horizon.”

Emerson carried a letter of introduction to a gentleman in Edinburgh, who, being unable to pay him all the desired attention, handed him over to Mr. Alexander Ireland, who has given a most interesting account of him as he appeared during that first visit to Europe.  Mr. Ireland’s presentation of Emerson as he heard him in the Scotch pulpit shows that he was not less impressive and attractive before an audience of strangers than among his own countrymen and countrywomen:—­

“On Sunday, the 18th of August, 1833, I heard him deliver a discourse in the Unitarian Chapel, Young Street, Edinburgh, and I remember distinctly the effect which it produced on his hearers.  It is almost needless to say that nothing like it had ever been heard by them before, and many of them did not know what to make of it.  The originality of his thoughts, the consummate beauty of the language in which they were clothed, the calm dignity of his bearing, the absence of all oratorical effort, and the singular directness and simplicity of his manner, free from the least shadow of dogmatic assumption, made a deep impression on me.  Not long before this I had listened to a wonderful sermon by Dr. Chalmers, whose force, and energy, and vehement, but rather turgid eloquence carried, for the moment, all before them,—­his audience becoming like clay in the hands of the potter.  But I must confess that the pregnant thoughts and serene self-possession of the young Boston minister had a greater charm for me than all the rhetorical splendors of Chalmers.  His voice was the sweetest, the most winning and penetrating of any I ever heard; nothing like it have I listened to since.

  ’That music in our hearts we bore
  Long after it was heard no more.’”

Mr. George Gilfillan speaks of “the solemnity of his manner, and the earnest thought pervading his discourse.”

As to the effect of his preaching on his American audiences, I find the following evidence in Mr. Cooke’s diligently gathered collections.  Mr. Sanborn says:—­

“His pulpit eloquence was singularly attractive, though by no means equally so to all persons.  In 1829, before the two friends had met, Bronson Alcott heard him preach in Dr. Channing’s church on ’The Universality of the Moral Sentiment,’ and was struck, as he said, with the youth of the preacher, the beauty of his elocution and the direct and sincere manner in which he addressed his hearers.”

Mr. Charles Congdon, of New Bedford, well known as a popular writer, gives the following account of Emerson’s preaching in his “Reminiscences.”  I borrow the quotation from Mr. Conway:—­