The past was distasteful to him and he seldom alluded to it; but as one puts his childhood and his age together, a steady development is seen to run through both. His could not be a cloudless day, but he went on from glory to glory. His age more than justified the promise of his youth. In his latter years he befriended aspiring young men; he made literature a power in America; he threw a dignity around toil; he associated knowledge with happiness, and rendered light and love harmonious. His favorite author was Goethe, the apostle of culture. His familiarity with Sainte-Beuve, the master of literary criticism, was so great, that on occasion of that writer's decease, he sat down and wrote an account of him without recourse to books. Though without knowledge of art, destitute of taste for music, and deficient in æsthetic appreciation, his sympathy was so large and true that these deficiencies were not felt. The intellectual sunshine was shed over the entire nature, and the book was so universal that it seemed to embrace everything. This is the property of pure mind, rarely seen in such perfection of lucidity. Such a mind is at once conservative and radical; conservative as treasuring the past, radical as anticipating improvement in the future. There is nothing like fanaticism, but a bright look in every direction, a place for all sorts of accomplishments, hospitality to each new invention, a radiant acceptance of all temperaments. The mind cannot be superstitious, for it cannot believe that divine powers are identified with material objects or occasional accidents; it cannot be ever sanguine as those are who indulge in abstract visions of good, for it knows that progress is very slow and gradual, and that the welfare of mankind is advanced by the process of civilization, by cultivation, acquirement, refinement, the gains of wealth, elegance, and delicacy of taste. It judges by rational standards, not by sentimental feelings, accepting imperfection as the inevitable condition of human affairs and bounded characters. It is not exposed to the convulsions that accompany even the most exalted moods, but calmly labors and quietly hopes for the future. I do not say that George Ripley was such a mind, merely that his tendency was in that direction. He was limited by traditions; he had too many prejudices. The axioms of the transcendental philosophy clung to him. The shreds of religion hung about him. He could not divest himself of the ancient clerical memories and ways, nor wholly throw off the mantle of personal sympathy he had so long worn. He was not completely secular.