Book II: The Mind of the Middle East

A product of two centers: Philadelphia, New York. Lack of intellectual backgrounds 183

I. The Old Capital

I. Philadelphia the capital of the older American culture. Its contributions to the Revolutionary debates. Its economic prospects curtailed by topography. Its decline with the removal of the national capital 185

II. Brockden Brown and French liberalisms--influence of Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft. Explanation of their appeal. _Alcuin; A Dialogue._ _Arthur Mervyn_, a study in Godwinianism. _Wieland_ and the “blood-pudding” school. Influence on later fiction in America 188

III. Robert Montgomery Bird: His contributions to the romantic drama. _Nick of the Woods_--a realistic treatment of the Indian. A contribution to the myth of western humor 190

II. The New Capital

I. New York an economic rather than a cultural capital. Reasons for its rise. The older Knickerbocker world disintegrating. Stephen Van Rensselaer and John Jacob Astor 193

II. Intellectual backgrounds: Lack of creativeness. Political divisions. Emergence of the boss--Martin Van Buren and Thurlow Weed 195

III. James Kent: The last of the old Federalist school. His political theory--a disciple of Fisher Ames. His _Commentaries on American Law_ 197

IV. Beginnings of the renaissance: _Salmagundi_; _The Croaker Papers_. Fitz-Greene Halleck. His views--attitude towards the proletariat. _Connecticut_; _Fanny_. The last of the Wits 199

III. Two Knickerbocker Romantics

I. Washington Irving: His detachment. A _flâneur_. His years abroad. Reaction to the Reform Bill. An incipient liberal. Rediscovery of America. The mission to Madrid. Contrast with Cooper. Political principles--drift towards the middle class. _A Tour of the Prairies_, _Astoria_, _Life of Washington_. His early and late work contrasted 203

II. James Kirke Paulding: His origins--a son of the people, distrustful of the middle class. Defense of America against the English critics. His idealism. _The Backwoodsman_; _The Puritan and his Daughter_. His rejection of English “blood-pudding” romantic. A Jeffersonian: _Letters from the South_ an echo of John Taylor’s agrarianism; opposed Clay’s American Plan; satirized Clay in _Koningsmarke_. _Westward Ho!; The Dutchman’s Fireside._ An amateur in letters 212

IV. James Fenimore Cooper--Critic: The problem of Cooper. A barometer of his generation. Troubled by the transition from an aristocratic to a capitalistic order--lingered between worlds. His Tory origins--Judge William Cooper. Abandoned Federalism yet ill content with Democracy. Effect of his European travels. Likeness to John Adams--hated all cant. Two phases of his criticism: the older Federalist theories; the fallacies of capitalism. _The Monikins_--an attack on the stake-in-society theory. _The Redskins_--an attack on capitalistic exploitation. A romanticized eighteenth century his refuge against the vulgarities of Jacksonianism and capitalism. _Home as Found_ and _The Redskins_ as studies in social criticism. His love of the wilderness and hatred of the frontier. The anti-rent trilogy. Picture of the squatter. His growing realism--_Wyandotté_. His later political philosophy--an ethical interpretation of sovereignty. Failure of the critics to understand Cooper 222

V. Some Contributions of New England

I. William Cullen Bryant--Puritan Liberal: Injustice done him by neglect of his journalistic work. An original mind. Transition from Federalist to Democrat. Influence of the English economists--an English liberal. Never a Jeffersonian, but anti-Whig. Influence of William Leggett and Parke Godwin. Attitude towards the labor movement. Defense of free speech. A critic of the rising capitalism 238

II. Horace Greeley--Yankee Radical: A practical man seeking a way out of the confusions of the times. His early life; defense of protectionism. His working back to Jeffersonianism. Interest in Fourierism. Champion of the farmer and the wage-earner. His “Vote Yourself a Farm” policy. Interest in the proletariat--interpretation of slavery. Coöperation. An idealist 247

III. Herman Melville--Pessimist: The source of his pessimism in life itself--effect of frustrations. His ancestry: the Gansevoort strain; the Melville strain. Contrast between mother and son; effect of his marriage. Stages toward pessimism marked by _Typee_, _Mardi_, _Moby Dick_, _Pierre_. Transcendentalism and reality. His democracy. A critic of America. Spiritual dissatisfactions--_Clarel_ 258