Perhaps in the long run they get the most out of Emerson who read him not for stimulus, for his militant optimism, for the shock his fine-phrased audacities give their humdrum opinions, for his uplifting idealism (all of which they are sure to get and profit by), but who read him for literary pleasure, for downright good-fellowship, and for the humor that is in him. That he attracts a large audience of this (seemingly) unimportant class is enough to show how little danger there is that Emerson will be handed over to the keeping of the merely erudite and bookish part of the public. It is well to remember that he had no intention of being so disposed of. When he said, ‘My own habitual view is to the well being of students or scholars,’ he was careful immediately to explain that he used the word ‘student’ in no restricted sense. ‘The class of scholars or students ... is a class that comprises in some sort all mankind, comprises every man in the best hours of his life.’ He pictures the newsboy entering a train filled with men going to business. The morning papers are bought, and ‘instantly the entire rectangular assembly, fresh from their breakfast, are bending as one man to their second breakfast.’ This was Emerson’s student body, this was the audience he aimed to reach. Did he reach this body? It is believed that he did, if not always directly, then vicariously. He was compelled as a matter of course to speak in his own way--the impossible thing for him was to do violence to his genius. Emerson invented the phrase, ‘the man in the street.’ Now it is notorious that the man in the street cares little about the ‘over-soul.’ The mere juxtaposition of the two expressions is comic. But Emerson did not talk of the over-soul all the time. He had a Franklin-like common-sense and a pithiness of speech which are captivating. Perhaps in magnifying his idealism we have neglected to do justice to his mundane philosophy. FOOTNOTES: [19] Ellen (Tucker) Emerson was but twenty years of age at the time of her death. Emerson first saw her in December, 1827. They were married about two years later. [20] Cabot: _Emerson_, i, 244. [21] G. W. Cooke: _An Historical and Biographical Introduction to accompany_ THE DIAL _as reprinted in numbers for The Rowfant Club_ [Cleveland], 1902. [22] Emerson to Carlyle, Oct. 30, 1840. [23] ‘The Poet,’ printed in the appendix of the definitive edition of Emerson’s _Poems_. [24] Richard Garnett. VII _Edgar Allan Poe_ REFERENCES: =R. W. Griswold=: ‘Memoir of the Author’ prefixed to the _Works of Edgar A. Poe_, vol. iii, 1850. =E. C. Stedman=: _Edgar Allan Poe_, 1881. =J. H. Ingram=: _Edgar Allan Poe, his Life, Letters, and Opinions_, 1880. =G. E. Woodberry=: _Edgar Allan Poe_, ‘American Men of Letters,’ fourth edition, 1888. =J. A. Harrison=: _Life and Letters of Edgar Allan Poe_ [1902–03].