The lecture was printed in 1849 _Æsthetic Papers_, edited by Miss Elizabeth P. Peabody. Although the chronicles of the campaigns and acts of prowess of the masterly soldiers were always attractive reading to Mr. Emerson,—much more acts of patriotic devotion in the field,—and he was by no means committed as a non-resistant, he saw that war had been a part of evolution, and that its evils might pave the way for good, as flowers spring up next year on a field of carnage. He knew that evolution required an almost divine patience, yet his good hope was strengthened by the signs of the times, and he desired to hasten the great upward step in civilization. It is evident from his words and course of action during the outrages upon the peaceful settlers of Kansas, and when Sumter was fired upon and Washington threatened, that he recognized that the hour had not yet come. He subscribed lavishly from his limited means for the furnishing Sharp’s rifles to the “Free State men.” In the early days of the War of the Rebellion he visited Charlestown Navy-Yard to see the preparations, and said, “Ah! sometimes gunpowder smells good.” In the opening of his address at Tufts College, in July, 1861, he said, “The brute noise of cannon has a most poetic echo in these days, as instrument of the primal sentiments of humanity.” Several speeches included in this volume show that at that crisis his feeling was, as he had said of the forefathers’ “deed of blood” at Concord Bridge,— Even the serene Reason says It was well done. But all this was only a postponement of hope. [119] _Page 152, note 1._ With regard to schooling a man’s courage for whatever may befall, Mr. Emerson said: “Our culture therefore must not omit the arming of the man. Let him hear in season that he is born into the state of war, and that the commonwealth and his own well-being require that he should not go dancing in the weeds of peace, but warned, self-collected and neither defying nor dreading the thunder, let him take both reputation and life in his hand, and with perfect urbanity dare the gibbet and the mob by the absolute truth of his speech and the rectitude of his behavior.”—“Heroism,” _Essays, First Series_. “A state of war or anarchy, in which law has little force, is so far valuable that it puts every man on trial.”—“The Conservative,” _Nature, Addresses and Lectures_. [120] _Page 156, note 1._ Mr. Emerson used to take pleasure in a story illustrating this common foible of mankind. A returned Arctic explorer, in a lecture, said, “In this wilderness among the ice-floes, I had the fortune to see a terrible conflict between two Polar bears—” “Which beat?” cried an excited voice from the audience.