special references in prayer.' 'It's a very poor rule, and the sooner you change it the better!' he shouted in answer. I told Mr. Frost that, so long as Dr. Ripley lived, I must decline going into that pulpit again."

"He seemed," said Emerson of Dr. Ripley, who died in 1841, "in his constitutional leaning to their religion, one of the rearguard of the great camp and army of the Puritans; and now, when all the platforms and customs of the church are losing their hold in the affections of men, it was fit that he should depart; fit that, in the fall of laws, a loyal man should die."

William Emerson, the father of Ralph Waldo, was born in the Old Manse in 1769. He was six years old when the shuddering family gazed upon the Concord fight beneath their windows. He was an only son, and at eleven years of age, by his mother's marriage with Dr. Ripley, came under the care of that kindly old minister. The Old Manse was the seat of a fine hospitality, and William was able to listen to the best conversation. His career, which would probably have added a shining name to American letters had he not died prematurely, singularly coincides with that of his son Ralph. He graduated at Harvard at seventeen with a similar reputation for excellence in composition, rhetoric, and classical studies. He taught school, studied theology irregularly, and as a preacher made a strong impression. He was the most liberal preacher who had yet appeared in Boston, when he was installed there over the First Church (1799), and devoted himself to what was universal and ethical in Christianity.

He is described as a blond, handsome man, graceful and benignant, with a melodious voice, and in every respect simple and scholarly. In a sketch of William Tudor, in Duyckinck's "Cyclopædia of American Literature," we have a remarkable anticipation of the time of the Transcendental Club and the "Dial." This journal, which bore the name of "The Monthly Anthology," was originally commenced in November, 1803, by Mr. Phineas Adams, a graduate of Harvard, and at the time teacher of a school in Boston. At the end of six months it fell into the hands of the Rev. William Emerson, who, joining a few friends with him, laid the foundation of the "Anthology Club." The magazine was then announced as edited by a society of gentlemen." By the theory of the club every member was to write for the "Anthology," but the rule was modified, as usual, by the social necessities of the company, and the journal was greatly indebted to outsiders for its articles. The members, however, had the privilege of paying its expenses, which in those days could hardly have been expected to be met by the public. In giving an account of this work subsequently, Mr. Tudor remarks: "Whatever may have been the merit of the Anthology,' its authors would have been sadly disappointed if they had looked for any other advantages to be derived from it than an occasional smile from the public, the amusement of their task, and the pleasure of their social meetings. The publication never gave enough to pay the moderate expense of their suppers, and through their whole career they wrote and paid for the pleasure of writing." Whereon we may reflect in the saying of one born in the

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same year as his father's "Anthology"-"Sport is the sign of health." The magazine enlisted the best pens, John Quincy Adams, Channing, George Ticknor, Richard H. Dana, Andrews Norton, and Buckminster. It died in 1811, when its editor died, his son, Ralph Waldo Emerson, being then eight years old.

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III.

THREE FATES.

FINE copy of the famous picture long ascribed to Michael Angelo, the "Parcæ," hung over the fireplace in Emerson's study, a work of art mystically associated with him by his friends. Sometimes he wove the thread spun and clipped by the old women into his conversation. It meant many things to him, and it used to warn some of his friends not by any idle visit to clip the golden thread of thought which ran through the morning that always shone in that study. But gradually, as I learned the story of Emerson's early life, the three formidable faces softened to those of the young and fair women who had presided over his destinies, and who remained young and fair even in old age.

The mother of Emerson, who had been Ruth Haskins of Boston, was a lady of refined culture, of gracious and religious nature, with the blended sweetness and dignity of manner so characteristic of the son. She builded her household in beauty and wisdom when it was left to her on her husband's death. Five sons were thrown upon her care, of whom Ralph was the second. He was born in that happy and cultured home in Boston, and was eight years old when his

father died. Mary Emerson was second of the fostering Fates, having devoted herself to the assistance of her brother's widow in bringing up her children. Besides being of an earnest and conscientious nature, she must be described as a woman of some genius. With a rather formidable eye for all social shams and pretences, a lively interest in all large subjects, and an individuality that verged on eccentricity, her influence was a stimulant to self-reliance. She was almost passionately fond of philosophical studies and well acquainted with the chief European works of that character. There was a considerable survival of the ascetic temper in her, and of theological bias, though she did not accept traditional views in the traditional way. In the discussion of metaphysical problems she had few equals, and her criticisms were often quoted in the controversies which attended the development of heresy in New England. She used to claim that she was in arms at the battle of Concord," being two years old at the time, and held up by her mother to see it; but in the theological struggles of a later period her share was less equivocal.

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The third of Emerson's Parce was Saralı Bradford. She was as fine a Greek scholar as America has produced, an accomplished mathematician, and possessed scientific attainments of which professors were glad to ask aid. Of this wonderful woman not less admirable for her simplicity and womanly charm than for her scholarship-more will be said hereafter; it may be mentioned here, that when Emerson, just after his father's death, entered the grammar school, and afterward when he was studying in the Latin School at