The laird of Balnamoon had been at a dinner where they gave him cherry-brandy instead of port wine.  In driving home over a wild tract of land called Munrimmon Moor his hat and wig blew off, and his servant got out of the gig and brought them to him.  The hat he recognized, but not the wig.  “It’s no my wig, Hairy [Harry], lad; it’s no my wig,” and he would not touch it.  At last Harry lost his patience:  “Ye’d better tak’ it, sir, for there’s nae waile [choice] o’ wigs on Munrimmon Moor.”  And in our earlier days we used to read of the bewildered market-woman, whose Ego was so obscured when she awoke from her slumbers that she had to leave the question of her personal identity to the instinct of her four-footed companion:—­

  “If it be I, he’ll wag his little tail;
  And if it be not I, he’ll loudly bark and wail.”

I have not lost my reverence for Emerson in showing one of his fancies for a moment in the distorting mirror of the ridiculous.  He would doubtless have smiled with me at the reflection, for he had a keen sense of humor.  But I take the opportunity to disclaim a jesting remark about “a foresmell of the Infinite” which Mr. Conway has attributed to me, who am innocent of all connection with it.

The mystic appeals to those only who have an ear for the celestial concords, as the musician only appeals to those who have the special endowment which enables them to understand his compositions.  It is not for organizations untuned to earthly music to criticise the great composers, or for those who are deaf to spiritual harmonies to criticise the higher natures which lose themselves in the strains of divine contemplation.  The bewildered reader must not forget that passage of arms, previously mentioned, between Plato and Diogenes.

* * * * *

Emerson looked rather askance at Science in his early days.  I remember that his brother Charles had something to say in the “Harvard Register” (1828) about its disenchantments.  I suspect the prejudice may have come partly from Wordsworth.  Compare this verse of his with the lines of Emerson’s which follow it.

  “Physician art thou, one all eyes;
  Philosopher, a fingering slave,
  One that would peep and botanize
  Upon his mother’s grave?”

Emerson’s lines are to be found near the end of the Appendix in the new edition of his works.

  “Philosophers are lined with eyes within,
  And, being so, the sage unmakes the man. 
  In love he cannot therefore cease his trade;
  Scarce the first blush has overspread his cheek,
  He feels it, introverts his learned eye
  To catch the unconscious heart in the very act. 
  His mother died,—­the only friend he had,—­
  Some tears escaped, but his philosophy
  Couched like a cat, sat watching close behind
  And throttled all his passion.  Is’t not like
  That devil-spider that devours her mate
  Scarce freed from her embraces?”