Letters of Lydia Maria Child, with a biographical introduction by John G. Whittier and an appendix by Wendell Phillips.

100 LETTERS.
more pure? I have no sympathy with the doctrine
that
"The body, not the soul,
Governs the unfettered whole."
Then I am tempted full strongly enough to believe
Emerson's axiom, "We only row, we're steered by
Fate," without having Buckle write a bulky volume
to convince me; for when I think I am steered, I
immediately become tired of rowing. But there is
no help for it. I must read every word of Buckle.
It seems to me the most remarkable book of the age;
bold, clear, strong, comprehensive, candid, and, above
all, free. He pulls out all the linch-pins from the
wheels of Juggernaut without any sign of hesitation.
" Some think it will spoil the old cart; and they pretend to say there are valuable things in it which may
get hurt. Elope not —hope not." The fact is, I
shall never be easy till you read it, and write me your
opinion of it. It delights me, with none of the modern affectations of style; no resuscitated words, whose
only merit is their obsoleteness; no inverted sentences; no parentheses within parentheses; no clouds
of language between the reader and the subject; no
vague Orphic sayings, which may mean one thing, or
another thing, or no thing. " Which things I hate,"
as saith the apostle. I get so vexed with writers
that send me to the dictionary a dozen times an hour
to decipher my own language! It's the fashion nowadays. I suppose it was in ancient times also, for
doth not Aristophanes say, "I hate their peacock
trains, their six-foot words, and swell of ostentation "?
None of this in Buckle. He is a full, deep river,
showing clearly every pebble over which it flows.
But I don't agree with all his statements. He says