"We were left alone for a little while, and he introduced the subject of his nearness to death. He said, 'The National Academy has raised $40,000, the interest of which is for myself and family as long as any of us live [he has daughters only], and in view of my death it is a great comfort to me.' I ventured to ask him if he feared death at all. He said, 'Not in the least; I have thought of it a great deal, and have come to feel it a friend. I cherish the belief in immortality; I have suffered much, at times, in regard to that matter.' Scientifically considered, only, he thought the probability was on the side of continued existence, as we must believe that spirit existed independent of matter.
"He went to a desk and pulled out from a drawer an old copy of 'Gregory's Astronomy,' and said, 'That book changed my whole life—I read it when I was sixteen years old; I had read, previously, works of the imagination only, and at sixteen, being ill in bed, that book was near me; I read it, and determined to study science.' I asked him if a life of science was a good life, and he said that he felt that it was so.
"… When I was travelling with Miss S., who was near-sighted and kept her eyes constantly half-shut, it seemed to me that every other young lady I met had wide, staring eyes. Now, after two years sitting by a person who never reasons, it strikes me that every other person whom I meet has been thinking hard, and his logic stands out a prominent characteristic.
"Aug. 27, 1879. Scientific Association met at Saratoga. … Professor Peirce, now over seventy years old, was much the same as ever. He went on in the cars with us, and was reading Mallock's 'Is Life Worth Living?' and I asked, 'Is it?' to which Professor Peirce replied, 'Yes, I think it is.' Then I asked, 'If there is no future state, is life worth living?' He replied, 'Indeed it is not; life is a cruel tragedy if there is no immortality.' I asked him if he conceived of the future life as one of embodiment, and he said 'Yes; I believe with St Paul that there is a spiritual body….'
"Professor Peirce's paper was on the 'Heat of the Sun;' he considers the sun fed not by impact of meteors, but by the compression of meteors. I did not think it very sound. He said some good things: 'Where the truth demands, accept; what the truth denies, reject.'
"Concord, Mass., 1879. To establish a school of philosophy had been the dream of Alcott's life; and there he sat as I entered the vestry of a church on one of the hottest days in August. He looked full as young as he did twenty years ago, when he gave us a 'conversation' in Lynn. Elizabeth Peabody came into the room, and walked up to the seat of the rulers; her white hair streamed over her shoulders in wild carelessness, and she was as careless as ever about her whole attire, but it was beautiful to see the attention shown to her by Mr. Alcott and Mr. Sanborn.
"Emerson entered,—pale, thin, almost ethereal in countenance,—followed by his daughter, who sat beside him and watched every word that he uttered. On the whole, it was the same Emerson—he stumbled at a quotation as he always did; but his thoughts were such as only Emerson could have thought, and the sentences had the Emersonian pithiness. He made his frequent sentences very emphatic. It was impossible to see any thread of connection; but it always was so—the oracular sentences made the charm. The subject was Memory.' He said, 'We remember the selfishness or the wrong act that we have committed for years. It is as it should be—Memory is the police-officer of the universe.' 'Architects say that the arch never rests, and so the past never rests.' (Was it, never sleeps?) 'When I talk with my friend who is a genealogist, I feel that I am talking with a ghost.'
"The little vestry, fitted perhaps for a hundred people, was packed with two hundred,—all people of an intellectual cast of face,—and the attention was intense. The thermometer was ninety in the shade!
"I did not speak to Mr. Emerson; I felt that I must not give him a bit of extra fatigue.
"July 12, 1880. The school of philosophy has built a shanty for its meetings, but it is a shanty to be proud of, for it is exactly adapted to its needs. It is a long but not low building, entirely without finish, but water-tight. A porch for entrance, and a recess similar at the opposite end, which makes the place for the speakers. There was a small table upon the platform on which were pond lilies, some shelves around, and a few busts—one of Socrates, I think.