Spencer Heath Archive

Item 3093

Root Correspondence – to, from and about E. Merrill Root, 3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

1955-1957

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2423

Carbon of letter from Heath to E. Merrill Root, 120 S.W. 8th Street, Richmond, Indiana

October 22, 1955

 

Dear Mr. Root:

     I am again enthused by you. Your review of Gordon Harrison’s book in the September FREEMAN is only another example of your marvelous poetic imagination adorning and energizing a crystal clear rationality. It would be a great thing, amid all the current foggy emotionalism, if you exhibited only the operation upon human affairs of an incisive, well balanced mind, but it is a greater thing to have it united with a luminous, poetic imagination springing from esthetic sensibilities. (Pardon me for going purple; I am ordinarily almost allergic to it, but we all must have our lapses when the provocation is severe.)

     I have enjoyed your Ulysses to Penelope very much — had difficulty in getting extra copies through the usual channels — and would like to see more of your poetic work, which of course must be harder to publish and circulate even than your prose material.

     Are you in good standing with your academic associates? I would like to know if there are any colleges where creative inspiration can find a happy home.

     Take a look at my little “Inspiration of Beauty” for what it may be worth.

Sincerely,

SH/m

ENC: “Inspiration of Beauty”

     “Trojan Horse of ‘Land Reform’”

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 3037

Carbon of letter to Heath from E. Merrill Root, 120 S.W. 8th Street, Richmond, Indiana

October 29, 1955

 

Dear Mr. Heath:

Again I am indebted to you for winged words of true appreciation, and also for your own fine, rare, original art. I feel shame that I did not write you long ago, when you wrote me and sent your own fine work; it was a time, however, when I had gone East for a “free” year of the most intense work of my life — on my present tome, just out, COLLECTIVISM ON THE CAMPUS. I found that work made me, as Dante says of his incomparably greater work, “lean.” I was so weighted and whole-seas-under that I had no time for the amenities and grace notes of life, or the friends whose spirits are nearest mine. Do forgive me.

     I am delighted that you liked my review. I had felt that it was very good; but not one single word (except Helen Cartier’s, the review editor of THE FREEMAN, who is always most appreciative) had come to say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” It is a dreadful vacuum of loneliness in which to move, and wait, and wonder. Then your fine and gracious word. “Thanks” is too pallid a term.

     I’m so glad, too, that you liked ULYSSES. I am to have a new volume — OUT OF OUR WINTER — sometime this fall, to be published by the same firm under a new name — The Golden Quill Press, Francistown, New Hampshire. I hope and believe it is my best. I discovered this firm literally by God’s Providence; they believe in me, publish me, and do so at their own risk and my royalty. I don’t make anything; but so far they haven’t lost anything.

     Academically, I am and always have been a bird among fish, or a fish among birds (look at it as you will). I don’t take to profess­ors (I have only an A.B.); and even my good friends among them look at me as an odd being. Now with my exposé of their hypnosis with collect­ivism, I live dangerously (as Nietzsche bade us do) and marvel at mere survival. Earlham is the best college I know; our president is all for me; I have good friends. But, at best, I am an alien. At Amherst, the late George Whicher — who was my early teacher and encouraged me to write — blasted my FRANK HARRIS, and said that, since I criticized profs, I should not be one but resign.

     Your own latest work, like all your work, is true vintage, true beauty that (as Shakespeare puts it) “Nature’s own sweet and cunning hand laid on. … True beauty, truly blent …”

     Your “The Inspiration of Beauty” is wise and sound and finely written. Such insight, such feeling of the essence behind and yet within the appearance, is (as you know) rare in this day; and as precious as it is rare. How much is it per copy? I may be able to use about 18 in an evening class I am teaching. It is wonderful doctrine for students today; and for the few of us who are lonely in the waste lands of today’s superficialities, profound and living. Thanks for it, and also for the other booklet.

     I enclose an announcement of my latest prose book, just to show you what I have been wrestling with, night and day, for the last two years. The academic world in general will hate me for it today, but will thank me for it in ten years. The Saturday Evening Post had an editorial on it (issue of October 29th).

     Again, many thanks for your fine letter. It is good to know that a friend and fellow poet is working too and to such gracious ends.

Most cordially yours,

/s/ E. Merrill Root

 

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2427

Carbon of letter to Arthur C. Holden,

57 E. 78^th Street, New York City

October 30, 1955

 

Dear Mr. Holden:

 

It was pleasant to talk with you at the Unitarian Church today.

 

I am enclosing the little brochure on Father McGlynn that I spoke of. I wish I could refer you to the book a friend of mine wrote some years ago about Father McGlynn and all the  excitement he created in New York some years ago, under the title, Rebel, Priest and Prophet. It is published by the Schalkenbach Foundation, 50 E. 59^th St., N.Y.C. 21. But the author’s name escapes me for the time being. He was editor of one of the financial journals in Wall Street.

     I shall be most happy to see those sonnets you told me about. It is extraordinary to treat of economic topics in the sonnet form.

     The sonnet writer to whom I referred is E. Merrill Root, Professor of English at Earlham College, Lafayette, Indiana. He is in my view a very marvelous poet-philosopher with a flare for economic freedom and poetic artistry. I have in mind his sonnet sequence entitled, Ulysses to Penelope, published by Marshall Jones Co., Francistown, N.H. The publisher says, “Mr. Root makes the great wanderer the symbol of man’s adventure towards his highest dreams …… and Edwin Markham has said his poetry is the greatest since Emily Dickinson.”

 

Sincerely,

 

SH/m

Encl: “The Trojan Horse of ‘Land Reform’”

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2429

Letter to E. Merrill Root,

3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

November 14, 1955

 

Dear Mr. Root:

Worlds of appreciation for your kind letter of October 29^th. I feel sure I hardly need tell you how much it means to me. I am intensely occupied with preparation of a book-length manuscript — a research engineer’s report on what he found by some years’ investigation of the functioning of human life in non-political society. So, more later on.

I am happy to send you twenty-four copies of my “Inspiration of Beauty” and two or three copies of the Lord’s Prayer in monosyllables. I am having a better edition of these printed and will be glad to send you practically any number you may desire. Also as many more of the ”Inspiration of Beauty” as you think you could make good use of if you let me know. There is no charge for any of this.

     What have you written about Frank Harris? As I remember his autobiography, he took much pride in being the scoundrel that he was — or is that another Frank Harris?

Sincerely,

SH/m

Separate cover:  24 “The Inspiration of Beauty”

                3 “Plea to the Lord”

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 712

Thoughts recollected by Spencer MacCallum from conversation

with Heath after writing a letter to poet E. Merril Root.

October 17, 1956

 

/Poetry and science come both from the same source, but poetry is of the heart, and science of the head. Spirit works through human nature. When it works through the heart of man, it expresses itself as art. When it works through the head of man, it expresses itself as science. Both are of one source. But of the two, the heart is more fundamental, because the spirit communicates with the head only through the heart. That is what makes poetry the mother of science. You must be a poet before you can be a scientist. You cannot be a scientist until you have been a poet./

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2535

Letter to E. Merrill Root,

3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

March 27, 1957

 

Dear Prof. Root:

I was happy at the opportunity of seeing you during your visit in New York, but sorry not to contact you for a more personal visit before you left your hotel. I think of you very warmly at all times, and I have been wondering how I could get a copy of that philosophic book of yours which I believe is entitled, The Way of All Spirit, that was mentioned from the platform when you were in New York. It doesn’t seem to be available through the usual sources. I shall be very happy if you can give me the right clue to finding it.

     With every good wish, I remain

Sincerely yours,

Sh/m

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 1616

Extract from pencil notes for a letter of transmittal of Citadel, Market and Altar to E. Merrill Root which never was sent (but another went in its place)

May 1957

 

My Citadel, Market and Altar … will help, I hope, towards a greater consciousness of the power and the beauty, the transcendent potentialities with which mankind in their reciprocal relationships are divinely endowed.

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2579

Letter to E. Merrill Root,

3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

June 4, 1957

 

Dear Prof. Root:

I am wondering if I could be mistaken about one of your books being entitled, “THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT,” this being a philosophic rather more than a poetical one. I think this title was announced at the Alliance Meeting in New York at which you spoke, but I have not been able to find it in any of the bookstores. Please drop me a line about it as soon as you can, for I am anxious to obtain it.

     Meantime, I am sending you copy of a paper which I read before a recent Annual Meeting of the Christian Freedom Foundation. I hope you will find it congenial to your own feelings and general point of view.

     I hope the coming vacation time will bring you some of the good recreation and leisure which I am sure you must have earned.

     With my best compliments and personal regards,

Cordially yours,

Spencer Heath

SH/m

Encl.

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 2600

Letter to Heath from E. Merrill Root,

R.R. #1, North Grosvenordale, Connecticut

June 7, 1957 (June 7?)

Dear Mr. Heath:

I am sorry and ashamed to have been delayed in answering your fine letter and thanking you for your splendid book. Those last weeks and days in Richmond, with exams and grades, plus Commencement, plus packing to come East, etc., were too drastic for gracious living. I simply had to ignore my correspondence.

     Now, here at last, we are just getting settled. We are not, as yet, adjusted or acclimatized; and so not really ourselves. This hot weather — which my hot blood does not endure gracefully — has exacerbated the chore of the many things that have to be done before we can get to natural living.

     First, however, your splendid speech for THE CHRISTIAN FREEDOM FOUNDATION. It is deep and wise, nobly spiritual and soundly practical, and a work of art in its beautiful prose and poetry. I wish I might have heard it! I am sure it was a great experience for those who did.

     Second, thanks for your splendid book. I have not yet had a chance to read it, or to read even a daily paper; so I shall have to write you in detail later. Meanwhile, thanks for what I know will be an artistic delight and an intellectual quickening.

     Third, I myself have on hand all remaining copies of THE WAY OF ALL SPIRIT. I would send you a free copy, were they mine, but I am obligated still to the publishers to sell the books for them. The price postpaid is §2.00.

     Nature here is free and wild. Just today, as I came down to our lonely little pond where is the little house where I write, two plump saucy little fawns went crashing and splashing off through the brook and the thickets. And a small woodchuck actually disputed my passage around the pond, facing me with grunty little growls and bared teeth. And our fish swim lavish in the cool clear waters.

     I will write you about the book later. Meanwhile, thanks for it, and for yourself. Such men as you are mighty fortresses of the spirit in a time when the world rushes gladly toward illusions and death.

                        Most cordially,

                               /s/ E. Merrill Root

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 3037

Letter from Heath to E. Merrill Root,

R.R. #1, North Grosvenordale, Connecticut

June 26, 1957

 

Dear Mr. Root:

I am glad to learn that a copy of your “THE WAY OF ALL SPIRIT” can be obtained directly from you. I am sending you the two dollars herewith.

     Many thanks for your fine compliments. I only hope the content of my “CITADEL, MARKET AND ALTAR” can live up to some of your anticipations.

     Rose Wilder Lane has sent me a very lovely appreciation right out of the blue.

     My grandson and I are attending a two-weeks Seminar at
The Foundation for Economic Education, Irvington-on-Hudson, which will continue for two more days.

     Trusting you are finding much refreshment in your nature resort for the summer.

Cordially yours,

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Spencer Heath Archive  (11)

Item 2574

Letter to Miss Stead, Heath’s secretary for a time after Spencer MacCallum had gone to the University of Washington for his graduate work in anthropology, from E. Merrill Root, 3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

November 15, 1957

 

Dear Miss Stead:

 

I am ashamed and sorry to have been so long in writing about the book of my dear friend, Spencer Heath. I was so terribly busy with intensive and intense work on a book of my own, last summer, and so overwhelmed with my college work and writing since my return here, that I have not had a day, it seemed, to recollect my emotions in tranquility and really write anything adequate. This may seem a poor excuse, but it is a too solid reason!

 

I think the book is a beautiful as well as a wise piece of work. The style of it is a joy to one who loves good writing. The wisdom is unique and original in emphasis, while universal in truth and scope. This is one of the finest books that uphold a conservative sanity and a libertarian dynamic.

.

You may quote any or all of this, as you wish.

 

Please tell Spencer Heath how much I admire and approve of the book, and communicate also my chagrin at having been so delayed in relaying it.

 

The comments you enclose are excellent. I trust that they, and the book’s own inherent wisdom and beauty, have brought it great success.

 

Sincerely yours,

                     /s/ E. Merrill Root

 

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Spencer Heath Archive

Item 3037

Carbon of letter to E. Merrill Root,

3221 Berwyn Lane, Richmond, Indiana

No date

 

Dear Dr. Root:

     I often think very happily, even affectionately, of you. I admire the versatility of a man who can be so much of a poet and at the same time deal so trenchantly in matters of fact.

     I think that you will be happy to note that my CITADEL, MARKET AND ALTAR has met with some cordial reception both here and abroad, as indicated by the printed matter enclosed, although it has had but little general circulation yet. Your own comment is appreciated as among the most valuable of any that have been made, and I have accordingly taken the liberty of reproducing a portion of it, as you will observe.

     I hope the world-political situation has not been discouraging to you, in view of the long-term movements in history which constitute the general trend.

     Wishing you and all your house many, many happy new years,

Cordially yours,

Spencer Heath

SH/m

Encls.

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