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The Author will not deny that he is glad of an opportunity to present the
following Writings—the fruits, in part, of a five years' service in Literature—
in a connected form. If he has wrought to any purpose, it will appear, he
thinks, more clearly now that he is allowed to collect the scattered threads and
show them, many-colored, in one woof together. That he has labored with
heart and spirit, and with an eye at least upon the paths open to the American
writer—will perhaps occur to the reader when he finds himself, at one moment
nestling in the very bosom of smooth social life, and at the next hurried
abroad through the wilderness to confront the Forest and out-talk the Cataract;
companioned with Prairie Winds and Spectres a thousand years old. If the
author had brought no more than an obolus from each province into which he
has penetrated, his revenues would be (one might say) a quite sufficient reward.
Whether his own steps have been steady and well-chosen or not, he
might hope that his foot-prints would not be entirely lost upon such as may
journey forth on a similar adventure.

Two courses lie open to the young author, one of which will secure to him
repose, good-will, and the tranquillity of a sure, though not always a speedy,
oblivion; the other beset with doubt, clamorous with objection of all kinds,
and crowned, it may be, with a triumphant end. He is offered the opportunity
of going to school to Nature or to Books. There are innumerable Academies,
their doors wide-cast, where he will be welcomed and have promptly allotted
to him a form in the class of Historical Novel-writing, Melo-Dramatic Romance,
Dutch Humor, or Sentimental Poetry. If he consents to take his place,
quietly, under any one of the recognised Masters who preside over these departments,
all will go well with him. He shall possess his soul in peace, and enjoy
the privileges of good and sober citizenship, undisturbed. Notwithstanding
this tempting prospect, it will perhaps be as well for him, if his ear be at
all quick at detecting the suggestions and promptings of Nature—to pursue a
path of his own, and come to these honors in due course of time. He will
find, in obedience to his own heart and a conscientious use of his faculties,
a more genial pursuit and a kindlier reward than it is in the power of critical
fashion to bestow. That there are peculiar bars raised against him, here,

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there cannot be a doubt. A reputation rises with us like the voice of one shouting
for help from the midst of breakers and stormy seas. It stands, if it stand
at all, a sea-tower that rocks at every heaving of the mighty element which it
would fain master and over-awe. From a variety of causes (but chiefly one
which will be found urged at sufficient length hereafter), a Good Name in Literature
is the least stable of all things that take root in the human Mind in
this vast Republican Confederacy. Beyond this nothing can be less clearly
defined than the position which good men and bad men should occupy. They
are as vague as the shadows of a dream, and interchange, mingle, and part as
swiftly. In the great conflict of voices there are none to be heard above the
tumult, saying who shall be master and who man. There is scarcely a journal
in America of sufficient authority in criticism to have its word taken as a
warrant for the investment of a crown-piece. In this sceptreless anarchy the
country swarms with Pretenders, Prophets, False Critics, False Men.

Within the past five years the various causes tending to these results have
attained a fearful head. The lustrum just past has been the saddest and most
humiliating that has ever fallen upon any department of American Industry or
Genius. The manna which many, of a too sanguine faith, looked for from
Heaven, has fallen at last in a shower of moon-stones, with a copiousness and
fierceness that have stunned the prophets and astounded the people. Hardy
plants will they be indeed that can lift their heads from beneath entablatures
on which their everlasting deadness is written by order of Law. But let no
man despair for this. Let whoever can speak and write go on, in the stout
heart and hopeful spirit, writing and uttering what Nature teaches. He will
not, even in so great a din, be altogether unheard. There is something in the
utterance of what she prompts, calm, clear, and true, that—whisper though it
be—cuts its way through discords and clamors, like a clear, sharp note to the
heart, where it dwells reproachfully, until it urges to a better and higher
career.

The problem of a Literature in America—what it shall be, in what forms
and to what effect—is too well worth solving, too perplexing and glorious a
riddle, to be passed by indifferently by any hand that has ever raised a pen.
Many Moroccos and Arragons, with their boastful trains of followers, and
false eyes, will ask the favor of the World, before the true Bassanio. Some
will seek, like these, to win it in splendor, others to steal upon its affections
with a milder beauty, and others again will ask it, in the plainest aspect and
garb. Each one will perhaps demand the privilege of moralizing for a while—
in a Preface, like the present Author—over his separate chest of supposed
treasure in cunning glosses and self-deluding interpretations of the inscription
it bears. Each one may advance his claim, and each in turn be rejected as
a false and worthless suitor. The only claim the Author makes is that he has
been no truer to the soil than the green tree: that is, that he has not shown

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himself entirely insensible to the silent influences of Time and Country among
which he has grown to be an author at all. Whatever decision awaits these
humble labors, he cannot but hope that a cheerful and fruitful hour is at hand.
Literature, a patient youth, sits now on the verge of the horizon; in silence
and obscurity awaiting the summons to ascend the sky, and become a new dis
penser of blessed light to the World. Would that it soon might have and answer
such a call, and going up with a steady lustre to the zenith, assume there
a post whence its clear bright front and planetary mail, shining at every point,
might be discerned, with a new hope, by all true men in all quarters of the
Earth!