My Friends at Brook Farm | Page 7

world.
Dr. Ripley was, as said, the leader of the Transcendental coterie and he had all the vitalizing enthusiasm that a leader must necessarily possess. He was a solidly built man of medium height with brown hair and beard and the kindest eyes in the world. He was a Unitarian clergyman, a scholar learned in all the learning of the Egyptians and all the other learned peoples of every age and clime, and a gentleman of the most engagingly courteous address; his good manners rested on bed rock foundations, too, and could not be corrupted by evil communications. I saw him more than once in straits harsh enough to try the patience of a saint, and noted with surprised admiration that his perfect poise was not in the least disturbed.
It was Dr. Ripley who, having the courage of his convictions, bravely suggested putting in practice the principles he and his Transcendental friends advocated in theory. "We talk well," he said, in effect, "why not try to do the thing which we say?" And he did. With a few of these friends, like-minded, he went out to West Roxbury; six miles from Boston, and bought a farm of 200 acres. Being unusually bright folk, remarkably intelligent, highly educated and, as may be said, brilliantly enlightened, they succeeded, almost beyond belief, in making a woefully bad bargain. I do not know how much they paid for the land but whatever the price it was too high. The property was picturesque to look at but its best herbage was sheep-sorrel. Next the brook, which gave the name, Brook Farm, there was a fair bit of meadow, with a rounded hill called the Knoll rising sharply on the north. The land rolled unevenly on, one-eighth of a mile or so, to higher ground and then fell off again to a level plateau covered with pine woods, beyond which were two or three fields of plow-land. The soil was thin, sandy where it was not rocky, and rocky where it was not sandy. It was a poor place, indeed, and had been poorly farmed until it was as lean as Pharaoh's second herd of kine. It speaks well for these unsophisticated philosophers that in four years they made this desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose; cultivating the finest market gardens and flower-gardens in Roxbury, planting orchards and vineyards, and growing pasturage for a profitable dairy.
If the amateur farmers were dismayed on finding what a hard row they had to hoe on this impoverished estate, they never complained, so far as I have heard, but resolutely set about the work they had to do. They came out to try a certain social experiment; an experiment in living a higher kind of life than that of their day and generation, resting on the faith that such a life can be lived here and now as well as heretofore in the legendary "Golden Age" of the past, or as hereafter in the "good time coming" of the future. The one purpose they entertained was to dwell together in unity "near to the heart of nature," a phrase attributed to Margaret Fuller. All other considerations, whether of hardship, or bad beginnings or disappointments were but secondary if they could succeed in demonstrating the practicability of their high ideals.
Perhaps it is not a matter of much interest to the present generation but to us it has always seemed that these Brook Farmers deserve to be favorably remembered. They were not martyrs, being, on the contrary, an unusually joyous and happy company, but, all the same, they gave the best of their lives to the service of humanity. They honestly and earnestly believed they could demonstrate the practicability of their theories, to the advantage of their fellow-beings, and they faithfully tried to accomplish that purpose. If the Pilgrims of Plymouth deserve honor for unselfish devotion to religious reform, why should not the Brook Farm pioneers of social reform receive correspondingly suitable recognition. It is true they did not immediately attain the ends they sought but neither did the Pilgrims; and the end is not yet.
It should be said that not all the Transcendentalists joined Doctor Ripley in his Utopian undertaking. Ralph Waldo Emerson for example was not of our company. Indeed, he was not of any company. An inspiring preacher he gained early fame as a pulpit orator in the First Unitarian Church of Cambridge, Mass., but even the liberal communion of that free congregation was too close for his independent spirit, and he abandoned a career of brilliant promise in the ministry, as he said, "for his soul's peace." Sui generis, to be himself he must stand alone, and alone he stood during the remainder of his life.
A stanza of his poem, "The Problem" doubtless expresses something of his