[205] "Cosmic Philosophy." (Amer. 19th cent.)
[206] "Rational Cosmology, or the Eternal Principles and Necessary Laws of the Universe." (U. S., 19th cent.)
[207] Scottish Philosophy. (U. S., 19th cent.)
[208] Theologico-politico-moral, voluminous dissertations. (Amsterdam, 17th cent.)
ESSAYS.
Next to Shakspeare's Plays, Emerson's Essays and Lectures are to me the richest inspiration. At every turn new and delightful paths open before the mind; and the poetic feeling and imagery are often of the best. Only the music and the power of discriminating the wheat from the chaff were lacking to have made one of the world's greatest poets. To pour into the life the spirit of Emerson, Bacon, and Montaigne is a liberal education in itself. Addison's "Spectator" is inimitable in its union of humor, sense, and imagination. A number of eminent men, Franklin among them, have referred to it as the source of their literary power.
Read these essays: R. D. C. G.
[209] Emerson's Essays and Lectures certainly deserve our first attention in this department, because of their poetic beauty and stimulating effect upon the imagination and all that is pure and strong and noble in the character. (Amer., 19th cent.)
[210] Nowhere can be found so much wit and wisdom to the square inch as in Bacon's Essays. (Eng., 1600.)