Brook Farm | Page 4

aspirations, Mr.
Ripley heard these words ringing out: "A truer life, a more honest life,
a juster life--accomplish it!"
It was at the Club that he again urged the realization of his plan. There
gathered together were the brightest intellects, the highest minded, the
most sympathetic, thoughtful and talented young men that New
England contained. Preaching was good, but more than preaching was
wanted--the Christian life; could it not be commenced? Could they not
educate the young in practical duties as well as in books, and by their
own good example so surround them that the interior life could be
awakened--the soul's inward goodness and the power to discern the true
destiny of man?
Encouraged by the sympathy of his wife, sister and a few earnest spirits,
Mr. Ripley started on his project. He was in his fortieth year. He was
neither too young nor too old. A few years of life he could possibly
spare for the experiment. He would then be only in his prime. He had
no children to embarrass his movements. He could give all his strength
of body and mind to it. He loved the country life. It was to be the
fulfilling of what he had preached so long and what is, alas, still
preached to-day with not much attempt to realize it--the Christian life.
People would laugh at him! I doubt if that gave him one disturbing
thought. It _was right_; as it was right he would do it. But maybe in his
secret heart he thought that more of those who seemed to have been
awakened, as he had been, to the divine call, would follow and join
with him than did; for, singularly enough, not one of the members of
the Transcendental Club, who first met together, joined Mr. Ripley's
movement. They were all radical to the prevailing theology, stiff, rigid
as it was, and never, in America, was there a group assembled who
aimed higher, or did more, first and last, to elevate humanity; for the
Club contained a galaxy of mental talent.
Mr. Ripley led them all in practical endeavor to form the Christian
commonwealth that many of them had preached.

William Ellery Channing, in whose veins ran the blood of one of the
signers of the Declaration of American Independence, a beloved
preacher, was there, full of earnestness, tenderness, faith and love. With
vigor he poured out his eloquence to awaken thoughts for an enlarged
theology, and with a sympathizing heart criticised chattel slavery,
social slavery and domestic servitude, and afterward became one of the
acknowledged leaders of liberal Christendom.
Young Ralph Waldo Emerson was there, very late from the ministry,
known better as poet, philosopher and essayist; and James Freeman
Clarke, talented writer and preacher; and faithful and independent Rev.
Cyrus A. Bartol. Rev. Theodore Parker, son of a Lexington hero,
doughty, bold and brave, on whose head fell the anathemas of the
orthodox and the curses of the slaveholders at a later day, showed his
ever calm, pleasant and earnest face at the board.
Rev. F. H. Hedge, Convers Francis, Thomas H. Stone, Samuel D.
Robbins, Samuel J. May and another Channing--William Henry--were
there; Christopher P. Cranch, divinity graduate, but now well known as
painter, poet and story teller; and beloved John S. Dwight, famed
mostly as writer on music, and musical critic; and Orestes A. Brownson,
prominent essayist, who was, by turns, a Radical, Unitarian,
Universalist, Presbyterian and Roman Catholic.
All these above named persons were attached to the clergy. There were
others who, like A. Bronson Alcott, were teachers, and sometimes
lecturers. There was Henry D. Thoreau, a charming writer who spent
two years in a hut in Walden woods; and Nathaniel Hawthorne, the
writer of many familiar romances; also George Bancroft, the historian,
Dr. Charles T. Follen, Samuel G. Ward, Caleb Stetson, William Russell,
Jones Very, Robert Bartlett and S. V. Clevenger, sculptor. As an
innovation in clubs there were lady members, among whom were
Elizabeth P. Peabody, and her sister Sophia, who became the wife of
Hawthorne; Miss S. Margaret Fuller, remarkable for her intellectual
capacity, and who became the wife of Count D'Ossoli, of Italy; Miss
Marianne Ripley, sister, and Mrs. Sophia Ripley, wife, of Rev. George
Ripley.

Or if those persons were not all members of the Club, of which there
seems to be no list extant, nearly every one was, and they can all be
classed as belonging to the coterie or Transcendental circle; all at times
attended the meetings, participated in the discussions, and wrote
articles for the Dial and for what in those days were called the radical
journals and magazines.
The winter of 1840 had been the time of talk. Early in the spring of the
year 1841 it was announced that a location was chosen at Brook