dig up a natural inspiration, art's air might be a little clearer—a little freer from certain traditional delusions: for instance, that free thought and free love always goes to the same café—that atmosphere and diligence are synonymous. To quote Thoreau incorrectly: "When half-Gods talk, the Gods walk!"[1] Everyone should have the opportunity of not being over-influenced. But these unpopular convictions should stop—"On ne donne rien si liberalement que ses conseils
A necessary part of this part of progressive evolution (for they tell us now that evolution is not always progressive) is that every one should be free as possible to encourage every one, including himself, to work and be willing to work where this interest directs, "to stand and be willing to stand unprotected from all the showers of the absolute which may beat upon him, to use or learn to use, or at least to be unafraid of trying to use, whatever he can of any and all lessons of the infinite which humanity has received and thrown to him, that nature has exposed and sacrificed for him," until the products of his labor shall beat around and through his ordinary work—shall strenghten, widen and deepen all his senses, aspirations, or whatever the innate power and impulses may be called, which God has given man.
Everything from a mule to an oak which nature has given life has a right to that life, and a right to throw into that life all the values it can. Whether they be approved by a human mind or seen with a human eye is no concern of that right. The right of a tree, wherever it stands, is to grow as strong and as beautiful as it can whether seen or unseen, whether made immortal by a Turner, or translated into a part of Seraphic architecture or a kitchen table. The instinctive and progressive interest of every man in art, we are willing to affirm with no qualification, will go on and on, ever fulfilling hopes, ever building new ones, ever opening new horizons, until the day will come when every man while digging his potatoes will breathe his own epics, his own symphonies (opera if he likes); and as he sits of an evening in his backyard and shirt sleeves smoking his pipe and watching his brave children in their fun of building their themes for their sonatas
- ↑ See the reference on p. 94. Still another source for this "misquote" is Emerson's poem, "Give All To Love," (IX, 83) which reads: "When half-gods go,/The gods arrive."
