To Rev. Convers Francis.
Northampton, December 22, 1838.
If I were to choose my home, I certainly would not place it in the Valley of the Connecticut.
It is true, the river is broad and clear, the hills majestic, and the whole aspect of outward nature most lovely.
But oh!
the narrowness, the bigotry of man!
To think of hearing a whole family vie with each other, in telling of vessels that were wrecked, or shattered, or delayed on their passage, because they sailed on Sunday!
To think of people's troubling their heads with the question whether the thief could have been instantaneously converted on the cross, so that the Saviour could promise him an entrance to Paradise!
In an age of such stirring inquiry, and of such extended benevolence — in a world which requires all the efforts of the good and wise merely to make it receptive of holy influences, what a pity it is that so much intellect should be wasted upon such theological jargon!
No wonder that the intelligent infidel, looking at mere doctrines and forms, should be led to conclude that religion had done more harm in the world than good.
The really inward-looking find in these no language by which they can give even a stammering utterance.to their thoughts and feelings; yet the incubus of forms, from which the life has departed, oppresses them, though they dare not throw them off. Something is coming toward us (I know not what), with a glory round its head, and its long, luminous rays are even now glancing on the desert and the rock.
The Unitarian, busily at work pulling down old structures, suddenly sees it gild some ancient pillar, or shed its soft light on some moss-grown
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altar; and he stops with a troubled doubt whether all is to be destroyed ; and if destroyed, wherewith shall he build anew?
He looks upward for the coming dawn, and calls it transcendentalism.
The Calvinist at work with strong arm and sincere heart at his fiery forge, fashioning the melted metal in time-honored moulds, sees a light, before which his fires grow dim, and the moulded forms seem rigid and uncouth.
Perplexed, he asks if the martyred fathers did die for a faith that must be thrown aside like a useless stove of last year's patent.
His grim iron forms return no answer, for there is not in them that which can answer the earnest questionings of the human soul.
He too looks upward, sees the light, and calls it Perfectionism.
Having accidentally fallen into this vein of thought brings Emerson to my remembrance.
How absurdly the Unitarians are behaving, after all their talk about liberality, the sacredness of individual freedom, free utterance of thought, etc. If Emerson's thoughts are not their thoughts, can they not reverence them, inasmuch as they are formed and spoken in freedom?
I believe the whole difficulty is, they are looking outwardly to what the logical opponents will say, not inwardly with calm investigation.
I am not at all disturbed by what any man believes, or what he disbelieves; and as for the Unitarian views, they arise from doubts too familiar to my own mind to be intolerant at this period of my life.
But I do like to have men utter their thoughts honestly, and not be afraid that it will not do to break down old forms.
Of the many who make an outcry about Emerson's scruples concerning the sacrament, what proportion do you suppose really regard that institution as sacred?
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“What can be more unprofitable than to see men struggling with their whole force and industry to stretch out the old formula and phraseology, so that it may cover the new, contradictory, entirely uncoverable thing?
Whereby the poor formula does but crack, and one's honesty along with it. This stretching out of formulas till they crack is, especially in time of swift changes, one of the sorrowfullest tasks poor humanity has.”
I by no means charge the Unitarians with being the only ones that strive to stretch out old formulas; but it is more observable in them, because so inconsistent with their own free theories. 