If you bring the warmth of the sun to them, they will open and bring form, color, perfume, to you, If you become the aliment and the wet, they will become fruits, tall branches and trees. The significance of Whitman, even as he himself conceives it, is what awakes in the individual reader as the result of contact with this germinal personality. It is his express desire and purpose to carry us beyond himself. "He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher." However deep our gratitude to Whitman for what he may have done for us along life's way, however intense our loyalty to his person and name, we should not mistake the man for his message. It is an error to worship Whitman. We reap the full fruits of his teaching in the measure that we worship what Whitman worshiped and what he was sent into the world to show forth. Life spreads before us, an open road. Walt Whitman is one of the Great Com"Allons! whoever panions along the way. you are, come travel with me!" We may accept his example as suggestive and illuminating. We may acknowledge his sustaining influence. Finally, we must travel the road, each for himself. At the last and best, Whitman is a comrade in the soul's adventure. As he reaches a genial hand to us in token of comradeship, he beams the assur ance, Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged, |