Page:Thoreau - His Home, Friends and Books (1902).djvu/256

226 Clearly, Emerson at no time regarded Thoreau as his imitator or unconscious reflector. He always emphasized the peculiar and original ability of his friend. If the maturity of Thoreau's life brought disappointment to Emerson, it never changed his belief in the possibilities of mind and literary power in the younger man. When at the request of Sophia Thoreau, Emerson read her brother's journals, the year after the death of their owner, he recorded, not in generous adulation, but in his own private journal, the words on Thoreau;—"In reading him, I find the same thoughts, the same spirit that is in me, but he takes a step beyond, and illustrates by excellent images that which I should have conveyed in a sleepy generalization. 'Tis as if I went into a gymnasium and saw youths leap, and climb, and swing, with a force unapproachable, though their feats were only continuations of my initial grapplings and jumps." Here is hint of the similitude and difference in the two minds, born and trained under the same intellectual influences. Emerson's trend was towards generic, soul-uplifting thoughts; Thoreau's towards the specific and illustrative, yet no less lofty.

A critic has said that during Thoreau's later life his relations with Emerson became "Roman and austere." These are extreme terms to apply to a