Some time after I had written the concluding chapter of this work, the interesting and powerful poems of Emerson were brought under my notice by one of the members of my class at the Working Men's College. There is much in some of these poems so like parts of the chapter in question, even in turn of expression, that though I do not usually care to justify myself from the charge of plagiarism, I felt that a few words were necessary in this instance.

I do not, as aforesaid, justify myself, in general, because I know there is internal evidence in my work of its originality, if people care to examine it; and if they do not, or have not skill enough to know genuine from borrowed work, my simple assertion would not convince them, especially as the charge of plagiarism is hardly ever made but by plagiarists, and persons of the unhappy class who do not believe in honesty but on evidence. Nevertheless, as my work is so much out of doors, and among pictures, that I have time to read few modern books, and am therefore in more danger than most people of repeating, as if it were new, what others have said, it may be well to note, once for all, that any such apparent plagiarism results in fact from my writings being more original than I wish them to be, from my having worked out my whole subject in unavoidable, but to myself hurtful, ignorance of the labours of others.