Every campaign that we have seen for eighty years has been, on
each side, a pursuit of bugaboos, a denunciation of heresies, a snouting
up of immoralities.
But it was during the long contest against slavery, beginning with the
appearance of William Lloyd Garrison's _Liberator_ in 1831 and ending at
Appomattox, that this gigantic supernaturalization of politics reached
its most astounding heights. In those days, indeed, politics and
religion coalesced in a manner not seen in the world since the Middle
Ages, and the combined pull of the two was so powerful that none could
quite resist it. All men of any ability and ambition turned to political
activity for self-expression. It engaged the press to the exclusion of
everything else; it conquered the pulpit; it even laid its hand upon
industry and trade. Drawing the best imaginative talent into its
service--Jefferson and Lincoln may well stand as examples--it left the
cultivation of belles lettres, and of all the other arts no less, to
women and admittedly second-rate men. And when, breaking through this
taboo, some chance first-rate man gave himself over to purely aesthetic
expression, his reward was not only neglect, but even a sort of
ignominy, as if such enterprises were not fitting for males with hair on
their chests.
Pages:
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236