"August 16, 1846.
"My dear Thoreau,—Believe me when I say that I mean to do the errand you have asked of me, and that soon. But I am not sanguine of success, and have hardly a hope that it will be immediate, if ever. I hardly know a work that would publish your article all at once, and 'to be continued' are words shunned like a pestilence. But I know you have written a good thing about Carlyle,—too solidly good, I fear, to be profitable to yourself, or attractive to publishers. Did'st thou ever, O my friend! ponder on the significance and cogency of the assurance, 'Ye cannot serve God and Mammon,' as applicable to literature,—applicable, indeed, to all things whatsoever? God grant us grace to endeavor to serve Him rather than Mammon,—that ought to suffice us. In my poor judgment, if anything is calculated to make a scoundrel of an honest man, writing to sell is that very particular thing.
"Yours heartily,
Horace Greeley.
"Remind Ralph Waldo Emerson and wife of my existence and grateful remembrance."
On the 30th of September Mr. Greeley again wrote, saying,—
"I learned to-day, through Mr. Griswold, former editor of 'Graham's Magazine,' that your lecture is accepted, to appear in that magazine. Of course it is to be paid for at the usual rate, as I expressly so stated when I inclosed it to Graham. He has not written me a word on the subject, which induces me to think he may have written you.[10] Please write me if you would have me speak further on the subject. The pay, however, is sure, though the amount may not be large, and I think you may wait until the article appears, before making further stipulations on the subject."
From the tenor of this I infer that Thoreau had written to say that he might wish to read his "Thomas Carlyle" as a lecture, and desired to stipulate for that before it was printed. He might be excused for some solicitude concerning payment, from his recent experience with the publishers of the "Boston Miscellany," which had printed, in 1843, his "Walk to Wachusett." At the very time when Thoreau, in New York, was making Greeley's acquaintance, Mr. Emerson, in Boston, was dunning the Miscellaneous publishers, and wrote to Thoreau (July 20, 1843):—
"When I called on ——, their partner, in their absence, informed me that they could not pay you, at present, any part of their debt on account of the Boston 'Miscellany.' After much talking all the promise he could offer was, 'that within a year it would probably be paid,'—a probability which certainly looks very slender. The very worst thing he said was the proposition that you should take your payment in the form of Boston Miscellanies! I shall not fail to refresh their memory at intervals."