"Emerson,_Ralph_Waldo_-_An_Address" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emerson Ralph Waldo)

contemporaries, a true orator, an upright judge, a dear friend; when
I vibrate to the melody and fancy of a poem; I see beauty that is to
be desired. And so lovely, and with yet more entire consent of my
human being, sounds in my ear the severe music of the bards that have
sung of the true God in all ages. Now do not degrade the life and
dialogues of Christ out of the circle of this charm, by insulation
and peculiarity. Let them lie as they befel, alive and warm, part of
human life, and of the landscape, and of the cheerful day.

2. The second defect of the traditionary and limited way of
using the mind of Christ is a consequence of the first; this, namely;
that the Moral Nature, that Law of laws, whose revelations introduce
greatness, -- yea, God himself, into the open soul, is not explored
as the fountain of the established teaching in society. Men have
come to speak of the revelation as somewhat long ago given and done,
as if God were dead. The injury to faith throttles the preacher; and
the goodliest of institutions becomes an uncertain and inarticulate
voice.

It is very certain that it is the effect of conversation with
the beauty of the soul, to beget a desire and need to impart to
others the same knowledge and love. If utterance is denied, the
thought lies like a burden on the man. Always the seer is a sayer.
Somehow his dream is told: somehow he publishes it with solemn joy:
sometimes with pencil on canvas; sometimes with chisel on stone;
sometimes in towers and aisles of granite, his soul's worship is
builded; sometimes in anthems of indefinite music; but clearest and
most permanent, in words.

The man enamored of this excellency, becomes its priest or
poet. The office is coeval with the world. But observe the
condition, the spiritual limitation of the office. The spirit only
can teach. Not any profane man, not any sensual, not any liar, not
any slave can teach, but only he can give, who has; he only can
create, who is. The man on whom the soul descends, through whom the
soul speaks, alone can teach. Courage, piety, love, wisdom, can
teach; and every man can open his door to these angels, and they
shall bring him the gift of tongues. But the man who aims to speak
as books enable, as synods use, as the fashion guides, and as
interest commands, babbles. Let him hush.

To this holy office, you propose to devote yourselves. I wish
you may feel your call in throbs of desire and hope. The office is
the first in the world. It is of that reality, that it cannot suffer
the deduction of any falsehood. And it is my duty to say to you,
that the need was never greater of new revelation than now. From the
views I have already expressed, you will infer the sad conviction,
which I share, I believe, with numbers, of the universal decay and
now almost death of faith in society. The soul is not preached. The
Church seems to totter to its fall, almost all life extinct. On this