Page:Sir Walter Raleigh by Thoreau, Henry David,.djvu/41

 rather, with that collection of literary essays with which the bulk of his narrative of The Week is so increased, and its qualities so much enriched. But it shows how early his profound conceptions got a striking expression, and how even earlier his far-reaching judgments on men and things entitled him to the name of scholar and sage.

Few youths of New England ever exhibited sooner in life, or practised more seriously and effectively, the arts and gifts that produce works of permanent literary value. Such is every completed essay of Thoreau that I have seen; and I must now have seen them nearly all. The revelations of his unprinted Journals are now to be tested, upon their publication; but they will not decrease or check his growing fame.