Chapter II: His Character

Cooper was a democrat in theory but not in practice. The rude ‘feudalism’ in which his boyhood was passed fostered the aristocratic sentiment. A residence abroad, in the obsequious atmosphere with which the serving classes invest any one who has the appearance of wealth, aggravated it. No one could have been more heartily ‘American’ than Cooper; but he made distinctions and his countrymen abhorred the distinctions.

Pride of this not unreasonable sort may go hand in hand with genuine modesty. Cooper was more unpretentious than his enemies were willing to allow. With a reputation that would have opened many doors he made no capital of it; he had no mind ‘to thrust himself on all societies.’

He was never slow to make use of the inalienable American privilege of speaking one’s mind. In 1835 the theory of the entire perfection of the American character was seldom challenged, at least by a native writer. That Cooper should entertain doubts on the subject was thought monstrous. It was resented in him the more because of his manner. Opinions quite as radical might have been uttered wittily and the end accomplished. Cooper had little wit. His touch was heavy and he was in dead earnest. He lacked neither courage, nor honesty, nor highmindedness, nor generosity, nor yet judgment (if his temper was unruffled), but he was entirely wanting in tact, and largely wanting in geniality of the useful, if superficial, sort, which lessens the wear and tear of human intercourse.

A philosopher divides famous men into two classes: those who are admired in their own homes (as well as in the world), and those who are admired anywhere but at home. Cooper belonged to the first class rather than the second. This proud, irascible, contentious, dogmatic man of letters enjoyed the unswerving loyalty and deep affection of every member of his family. And from this his biographer argues an essential sweetness of nature.

Cooper somewhere says: ‘Men are as much indebted to a fortuitous concurrence of circumstances for the characters they sustain in this world, as to their personal qualities.’ It was his ill-luck to have the accidents of his character often mistaken for the character itself.