God to man.  But these lamps are held to measure out some of the moments of eternity, to divide the history of God’s operations in the birth and death of nations, of worlds.  It is a goodly name for our notions of breathing, suffering, enjoying, acting.  We personify it.  We call it by every name of fleeting, dreaming, vaporing imagery.  Yet it is nothing.  We exist in eternity.  Dissolve the body and the night is gone; the stars are extinguished, and we measure duration by the number of our thoughts, by the activity of reason, the discovery of truths, the acquirement of virtue, the approval of God.”

Miss Mary Emerson showed something of the same feeling towards natural science which may be noted in her nephews Waldo and Charles.  After speaking of “the poor old earth’s chaotic state, brought so near in its long and gloomy transmutings by the geologist,” she says:—­

“Yet its youthful charms, as decked by the hand of Moses’ Cosmogony, will linger about the heart, while Poetry succumbs to science.”—­“And the bare bones of this poor embryo earth may give the idea of the Infinite, far, far better than when dignified with arts and industry; its oceans, when beating the symbols of countless ages, than when covered with cargoes of war and oppression.  How grand its preparation for souls, souls who were to feel the Divinity, before Science had dissected the emotions and applied its steely analysis to that state of being which recognizes neither psychology nor element.”—­“Usefulness, if it requires action, seems less like existence than the desire of being absorbed in God, retaining consciousness....  Scorn trifles, lift your aims; do what you are afraid to do.  Sublimity of character must come from sublimity of motive.”

So far as hereditary and family influences can account for the character and intellect of Ralph Waldo Emerson, we could hardly ask for a better inborn inheritance, or better counsels and examples.

* * * * *

Having traced some of the distinguishing traits which belong by descent to Mr. Emerson to those who were before him, it is interesting to note how far they showed themselves in those of his own generation, his brothers.  Of these I will mention two, one of whom I knew personally.

Edward Bliss Emerson, who graduated at Harvard College in 1824, three years after Ralph Waldo, held the first place in his class.  He began the study of the law with Daniel Webster, but overworked himself and suffered a temporary disturbance of his reason.  After this he made another attempt, but found his health unequal to the task and exiled himself to Porto Rico, where, in 1834, he died.  Two poems preserve his memory, one that of Ralph Waldo, in which he addresses his memory,—­

  “Ah, brother of the brief but blazing star,”

the other his own “Last Farewell,” written in 1832, whilst sailing out of Boston Harbor.  The lines are unaffected and very touching, full of that deep affection which united the brothers in the closest intimacy, and of the tenderest love for the mother whom he was leaving to see no more.