[Footnote 86:  William Wordsworth (1770-1850).  By many considered the greatest of modern English poets.  His descriptions of the ever-varying moods of nature are the most exquisite in the language.  Matthew Arnold in his essay on Emerson says:  “As Wordsworth’s poetry is, in my judgment, the most important work done in verse in our language during the present century, so Emerson’s ‘Essays’ are, I think, the most important work done in prose.”]

[Footnote 87:  Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881).  A famous English essayist, historian, and speculative philosopher.  It is scarcely too much to say that no other author of this century has exerted a greater influence not merely upon the literature but upon the mind of the English nation than Carlyle.  Emerson was an intimate friend of Carlyle, and during the greater part of his life maintained a correspondence with the great Englishman.  An interesting description of their meeting will be found among the “Critical Opinions” at the beginning of the work.]

[Footnote 88:  Alexander Pope (1688-1744).  The author of the “Essay on Criticism,” “Rape of the Lock,” the “Essay on Man,” and other famous poems.  Pope possessed little originality or creative imagination, but he had a vivid sense of the beautiful and an exquisite taste.  He owed much of his popularity to the easy harmony of his verse and the keenness of his satire.]

[Footnote 89:  Samuel Johnson (1709-1784).  One of the eminent writers of the eighteenth century.  He wrote “Lives of the Poets,” poems, and probably the most remarkable work of the kind ever produced by a single person, an English dictionary.]

[Footnote 90:  Edward Gibbon (1737-1794).  One of the most distinguished of English historians.  His great work is the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.”  Carlyle called Gibbon, “the splendid bridge from the old world to the new.”]

[Footnote 91:  Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772).  A great Swedish theologian, naturalist, and mathematician, and the founder of a religious sect which has since his death become prominent among the philosophical schools of Christianity.]

[Footnote 92:  Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827).  A Swiss teacher and educational reformer of great influence in his time.]

COMPENSATION

[Footnote 93:  These lines are printed under the title of Compensation in Emerson’s collected poems.  He has also another poem of eight lines with the same title.]

[Footnote 94:  Documents, data, facts.]

[Footnote 95:  This doctrine, which a little observation would confute, is still taught by some.]

[Footnote 96:  Doubloons, Spanish and South American gold coins of the value of about $15.60 each.]

[Footnote 97:  Polarity, that quality or condition of a body by virtue of which it exhibits opposite or contrasted properties in opposite or contrasted directions.]