Title THE RELIGIOUS BACKGROUND OF W. D. HOWELLS

Author(s) Akamine, Kenji

Citation 琉球大学語学文学論集(26): 55-74

Issue Date 1981-12

URL http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12000/7528

Rights

THE RELIGIOUS

OF W. D.

BACKGROUND

HOWELLS·

Kenji Akamine

Throughout his life and long literary career, Wi liam Dean

Howells (1837-1920) had a great interest in rer gion, as attested

by the numerous opinions on religious topics h expressed

in his etters, memoirs, essays and fiction. Howells' interest in

religion was social and ethical, rather than purely theological,

and he elieved that religion had much to do with the welfare

of mankind. While believing that material and economic factors

in the social environment were important in determining l1).an's

character, Howe 115 could not disregard the strong influence of

intellectual and r,el"gio s factors which entered man's life. 1

His views of religion supplied powerful motives not only for

his religious criticism but also for his literary, soc'al and

economic criticism; they were a constituent part of his

attitudes toward life and literature. The purpose o-f this study

is to see what kind of religious background and beli fs

Howells had, mainly through an examination of his letters,

memoirs and 5say • so a to obtain a basi for analyti

tudie of hi Ii rary theory nd pr ti M uri th ff

of Howe 1 ' religiou bac r und on hi fi ti n

and 0 r writing ou id of hi pr nt tudy,

n Ii! tim, ow

T fir t of

wa tron ly influ n

m w hi

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d Y tw

th r,

William Cooper Howells (1807-1894), who presided over

Howells' religious training and taught him how to become a

moral individual. To some extent, Howells in his Ia ter years

grew away from the theology of his father, but he kept many

of the attitudes fa tered by his Swedenborgian upbringing. 2­

Ho ells writes in A Boy's Town ( 1890). an autobiographical

sketch of th il' life in Hamilton, Ohio, in the eighteen -forties,

that his grandfather was a .fervent Methodist. but that his

fathet:, after many years of skepticism, became a believer in

the doctrine of Emanuel Swedenborg in 1834. and that the

childr n were brought up in that faith. Swedenborgianism was

not only their faith, but their life. The Howe I1s family did not

o to church, be'cause Swedenborgians in the community were

so that th re were no services of the U ew Church:' But

family lived according to the teachings of their religion. 3

How 11s' father concei ed all tangible and visible creation

a an adumbration of spiritual reality, and accepted revelation as

ma k of interior meanings. He regarded the soul as its own

k· p rand th overeign chooser of heaven or hell, but always

m r of th rea t happiness possible to it. And he thought of

him If n thing in himself. and only something from moment

to moment through influx from the Lord. 4 Howells as a boy

once heard his father explain to one of their neighbors that

the New Church people believed in a hell, whicheach cast himself into if he loved the evil ratherthan the good, and that no mercy could keep him outof without destroying him, for a man's love was hisvery self. It made his blood run cold, and heresolved that rather than cast himself into heU, he

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would do his poor best to love the good.:I

It seems dear that to the Swedenborgians, the essential aspect

of religion was an ethical life, especially man's acquisition

of habits of good behavior tow.ards his neig hOOrs. During

Howells' entire upbringing, the stress was on behaving rather

than on believing. 6

That his family belonged to a minority religious group

undoubtedly gave the young Howells freedom to observe and

discuss objectively the estahlished religious organizations around

him. He also had many occasions to discuss religion with

oth·er young people of the community. At his father's printing

office in Jefferson, Ohio, which became a popular g,athering

place after it was opened in 1852, HoweBs, as a boy, enj,oyed

8. great deal of talking with the young people of the town.

The topics of the discussion ranged from politics and literature

to rehgion. They disputed ov,er such ques.tions as the existence

of God and the immortality of the soul, which were, Howells tells,

openly doubted among many of them.. 7 t was also at his father's

printing office that the young Howells became acquainted with

the writings of Thomas Paine, who had, in rus Age of Reason

(1794 -95), attacked the excess and wrong of the Biblical

religion represented by the organized churches. 8 About the same

time, How 11 r ad lio ran • ti n (184 ) of TAt

Life of ].e.ros the 0 n vid

it "d troy d what v r f d (I Ii i n

Ho II "" R ivin h infl

ingly k pti al about r l' gion h

parti ldarly in 1 rant of th do 1)-

ized hur HOWl U' k pti i m of hi rli r y v n

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caused him to cast doubts upon the doctrine of Swedenborg,

which he had been following faithfully, together with his

parents, brothers and sisters.

In 1860, Howells p __rtly referred to his loss of faith in his

poem, titled "Lost Beliefs."

One after one they left U5;

The sweet birds of our breastsWent flying away in the morning;

Win they come again to their nests?

Will they come again at nightfall,With God's breath in their song?

Noon is fierce with the heats of summer,And summer days are long!

o my Life, with thy upward liftingsThy downward- striking roots,

Ripening out of thy tender blossomsBut hard and bitter fruits! -

In thy boughs there is no shelterFor the birds to seek again.

The desola te nest is brokenAnd torn with storms and rain. 10

In addition, Howells' letter of January 28, 1872, addressed

to hi father, reveals his growing skepticism toward Sweden­

borgianism, and casts a light upon the concept of religion

Nch he had formed under his father's influence.

In Swedenborg I'm disappointed because I find hemakes a certain belief the condition of entering thekingdom of heaven. I always tho't [sic] that it wasa good life he insisted upon, and I inferred fromsuch religious training as yeu gave me that it madeno difference what I believed about the trinity, orthe divinity of Christ, if only I did right from alove of doing right. Now it appears to me from theTestament that Christ was a man directly, instead of

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indirectly, begotten by a divine father; and for thisp,eJrsuasion, which lowe. to the, reason given me ofGod, Swedenoorg tells me I shall pass my eternallife in an insane asylum. This i.s hard. and I ,can'thelp revolting from i.t. I ,am lOOt such a £'001 a,s tothink I ,can do the highest good from myself or that,I am anything in myself; but] don't see why Icannot be humMe and true and charitable, withodtbelieving that Christ was God. lam greatly disa,p­pointed, and somewhat distressed in this matter. Attimes ['m half-minded never to read another word oftheology; but to cling blilndly to the moral teachingsof the gospels. I should like extrem.ely to talk withyou. ll

But ne'vertheless Howells seems to have kept what he had

obtained from his {,ather's religious training intact, for to the

How'leUs of the eighteen-eighties, religion" described 1n a state

of ide,al perfection, was 8l II force which makes for better men

and for better conditions of living" 12 in the world. And he bad

ne~ver lost faith in the "spiritual. vahle,s of altrui,Sffi, love,

morality, n 13 which were real to him, and whilch he believed

might be found in any true religion.

nThe other person who strongly influenced Howells was the

Russian nov lelist Leo Tol toy (1828 -1910). Tot toy' humanit T­

iam' m caused HoweU to undergo a gr at r ligioUi. r aw k-

ning late in the eighte n-eighti . when How 11 w forty-

,eight. Th a,cquaintance with Tol toy' book brought ow 11

II 'lin w awarene of th ' po sibilia of hri Ii nhy if it

could be aClcept -d literally 8 a, way of hf ".4. ow U r ading

of Tolsmy be'g n in 0, tober, 1885, with The CosS'acks( 18163) ,

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,and continued with Anna Karen-ina (1873-76 ). and shortly

C()vered all of such theological writings as My Religion ( 1884),

which last is Tolstoy's sincere testament of the firm reig ious

conviction he had reached after his litera] re.ading of Christ's

message.

In My Religion, which has also been translated into

English under the title What 1 Believe, Tolstoy redlliC'ed

Christ's teaching to hve commandments in the Sermon on the

Mount, especial y Matthew v. 21-48: (1) live at peace with

al men and never consider your anger against any men

·u tifed ... (verses 21-26); (2) do not make th'e desire for

s 'xual relations into ,an ,amusement ... (27-32): (3) never take

a oath to anyone, anywhere, about anything (33-37); (4)never

r ist th evJl- doer by force, do not meet violence with

viole nee (38- 42); and (5) do not consider the people of other

nations to be enemies ... but love them and do good to them (43

-48). And Tolstoy wrote:

The fuH ilment of Christ's teaching expressed in thefiv commandments, would ,establish the kingdom ofGod. Th kingdom of God on earth is the peace of

11 m n one with another. Peace among men is thehi h t ble sing attainable by man on earth .... AU fiveommandm n18 have but that one ai m - peace among

m n. n n d only trust Christ's teaching and obeyit and there will be peace on earth; and not suc~ apeace as men devise, temporary. accidental, andpartial, but a general peace, inviolable and eternal. 15

Deeply moved by the serenity and depth of Tolstoy's religious

conviction, Howells said: "[ Tolstoy's] books perpetually teach

me that the good prevails, and always will prevail whenever

men put seH aside, and strive simply and humbly to be good" 16

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The tone of the above passage is exactly the same ,as that

of HoweUs' letter previously quoted, and! shows that HoweUs

maintained his interest in men's striving toward goodness. It is

obvious that HoweUs was reawak,ened by Tolstoy"s t1estimony,

whkh caused HoweHs to become a ware of the possibiHties of

Christiamty. What moved Howells most was Tolstoy's fr,ank

acceptance of Christ's moral teachings in his steadfast conviction

that "Jesus Christ cam~ into the world to teach me how to

live in it, and that He meant literally what He said when He

forbade us luxury, war, liItigation, unchastity, and hypocrisy. "1'1

Declaring that Tolstoy showed him a new way. Howells said

that now he knew rationaHy wlllat he had known instinctively

be fore. 18 Howells was stimu~,ated to seek to find the counterpart

of his ,earlw,er beliefs in Christianity. The result of his search

he reveals in his revirew of Tolstoy's My Religion in an

U Editor's Study," w herein he displays a sign of agreement. and

admiration for Tolstoy. who, How'ells writes, "does not rele­

gate the prac6,ce of the Christian life to some future period, bUit

himself attempts it here and now. 'JIg

In short. Tolstoy~s influence caused HoweUs to accept the

ethical aspect of Christianity with frankness; and it became

thenceforth a great moral force in Howell' literatur a w 11

as in his life. Increasingly unhappy OV' r th in;u ti h

encounter d, How U 1 ok d ho fuHy' to r ligion as for

that could Hectiv Iy "t medy tin vii

Howells was r, awak n d by Tol toy' han ty Bnd sin rity,

determin d to make con ciou {for toward th ppli tion

of the tru teachings of hrist in v, ryd y lif H wr to

his friend, Howard Pyl.,e, on Apra 30, 1895, II hri t y 'l

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believe in; he is here and bas always been bere···."21 Further­

more, Howens confess'ed that ne could never look at life in

the mean and sordid way that be had done' before he read

Tolstoy.22 Thus, in this period of life. the great ethical force

of Tolstoy made Christian~ty quicken into life 1n Howells'

heart for the' first rime since his boyhood. 23 Howens wrote:

Tolstoy ga ve' me heart to hope that the world mayyet be made over in the image 'of Him who diedfor it, when an Caesars [sic] things shan be finallyrendered unto Caesar. and men shall ,come into theirown, into the right to labor and the right to ,enjoythe fruits of their labor 1 each one master of himselfand servant to ,every otl1el'. He taught me to see lifenot 8S a chase of a forever impossible personalhap,piness. but as a field for end,eavor towards thehapp~ness of the whole human family.; and cannever 10se this vision, however 1 close my eyes, andstrive to see my own interest as the highest good.He gave me new criterions, new principles, which,after aU, were those that are taught us in our earliestchildhood, before we have come to the evil w~sdom

of the world. 24

owen wrote iliat Tobtoy's literature Ii both in its ethics

and a . thetics,. or its union of them, was an experience for

me Born what comparable to the old-fashioned religious experi­

ence of people converted at revivals." 25 But it was, strictly

speaking, a re -awakening of the ideas and sentiments

fostered by his father which had remained latent in tum,

rather than the CI turning of a pagan to the good news of

Christ. "26 The Toistoyan influence gave Howells a new

awareness of the criteria and principl,es of novel writing in the

old f'eld of literature which he had been cultivating sinc,e his

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early manhood. ell need never again look for a theme of

fiction;" wrote HoweUs, U I saw life swarming with themes

that filled my imagiD81tion and pr,essed into my hands. "21 And

one of the immediate effects of Tolstoy wa,s evid'ent in

Howells' readiness to accept literally the "example of Christ,

who provid,eda standard of ,conduct on earth toward which

man must strive even, though he win neve,r attain it., nilS And

now Howells wished to be a "good Christian" as well as a, good

citizen. 2SI After his reawakening experi,en,ce under Tolstoy's

influenc,e, Howells regarded the teachings of Christianity, with

its principles of altruism, essential to his aspirations for the

race, and' conducive to the highest good which he hoped for

humanity. so In his firm conviction that the moral doctrine of

Christ alone could bring love and peace on earth, and show a

new direction to modern society, Howells now looked hopefully

to Christianity. 31

ill

Therefore, Howe Is was gready troubled when he came to

notice the obvious cleavage between his idea of Christianity

and the doctrines of the Christian churcbes in tle,ality.

Especially, he was disappointed to find dogm.as, creeds, and

schism in th Christian Ihurclh Howell f It th t th

on id r d

am n , h r

diU r nt fr m what

th y d priv d p

mind by do m li l1y

lilt rin th Kin do'mondition of

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making ertain bemief

Chri tian hurch war far r mov d from wlh t h

th true ground of hri ciani y.. 32 In th

r v I d r ligio ' 8IpP ar 'd to ow

,a tru r 1ig ion 0 ght to

of th lov of n i,ghbor nd p ,ac of

of Heav,enj and consequently, they set peo1ple astray, instead

of guiding them into the right avenue of life. Moreover, the

activities of such religious organizations tended to become

remote from people's everyday affairs. Hanna Belcher, in her

article on Howells' attitude toward religion, writes that

Howells

appe'ared always to associate the institution of religionwith cf,eeds, dogmas, theologies, for aU of whilch hepossessed small patience, and he did not think ofchurches as eHectivle agencwes for correcting theevils of society. 33

Thus the two major religious ,experiences, i. e., his educa­

tion and traimng in the doctrine of Swedenborgiamsm and his

reli,gioUis reawakening under the inHuence of Tolstoy, made it

impossible for Howells to become a "Christian1" in the ordinary

sense. ccording to Edwin H. Cady, who sums up trus point

of Howells' character, Howells "never became, in the ordinary

hurchly sense, a Christi,an. Theologic.ally, metaphysically,

int lIec'tlllaUy, even perhaps spiritually, be remaind an agnostic. "M

But 'that d tachment, Cady adds, gave Howells certain

advantag both in life and art, because it kept him from

s intly rrogan , the fanati,c pride of formal humility, and

b lut kn wl dg , while keeping him focused on people and

their troubles, and tol,erant and humane. 35

Howells, then, never embraced the religious doctrines of

established churches t and his religion was, to put it in a few

words, "simple and hereditary." 36 He believed in a religion

that gave wisdom, goodness, comfort, and peace of mind

to all mankind. Oscar W. Firkins puts Howells' religious

beliefs in strikingly symbolic words:

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[The belief to which Howell dung] consistedmainly in the double hope... of a pilotage in thiserrant universe u iog wi dom a d goodne a ifinal compass and 'ode tar and of a harbor offeringreunion to tho e whom tne OOrm has divided andpeace to those whom it ha buffeted and mi I d. YT

To sum up, the core of Howell' religion r sided in ruconcept of true religion a a force which makes for Letter

men and better conditions of living in the world. and that

concept furnished the ba is for his ociat theorie M Th r i,

in Howell' opinions on religion, no mention of th tight

relationship between man and a per onal God. Hann Belch r

urn up Howells' religion:

Cbristiani ty horn of its creeds, its dogma, ittheologies,' it ritual, and its superstitions; Chri ti­anity reduced to the teachings and pra tic of Je u ;Chri tianity as a way of building a better orid fora nobler humani ty - that wa t real r i ion ofHowells. 30

Notes

• Tb:i:s, is an ex.pa:nded version of a section of my unpub­lished . .1\,. thesis on '{Wilham Dean Howells' Criticism ofR.eligi()n~ His Motive R'nd Method, ,., submitted to the Universityof Colorado in 1962. The thesis was directed and read byP'rofesson Frands C. Robinson and Charles H. Nilon.

Pr,ofe'ssor.s Chotoku Higa and Kozen Nakachi of theUoive'fsity of the Ryukyus have kindly read' the paper and givenme v,alusble su,ggestions for improvement..

1 Olov W. Fryckstedt~ In Quest of America; A Study ofHowt:lls' Early Devt:lopmtnt as a Novelist (Cambridge~

Ma,s.: Harvard Urn.v. Pr~ss. 1958), p. 218.

2 In 1900. when he was sixty-three. How'ens canedSwedenborgia, .. sm his U inherited faith. '" See his Lite1'TLryFri,n4s and Acqua.intance, ed. David F. Hiatt and Edwin H.Cady (BloomingtoD~ I'ndiana Univ. Press, 1968 )" p. 192'..

lJ See William Dean Howells. A Boy's Town (New York:HarT & Brothers, 1890), pp. 11-12. For the date of William

': Ho e,ns' ofhcial conversion to the principles of Sweden­borg' lew Church, i. e'... 1834, see Kenneth S. Lynn, 'William.Dean Howells: An American Life (New York: Harcourt BraceJovanovich, 1971)" p .. 34. William Cooper Howells wrote twoSw d nbori n tracts, The Science of Correspondences, andl 't'eewill of an and the Origin of Evil, published as

6 mpl:d' by th .ew Church Press of LondonA See i.ifp. in.Lett,Pffs of ,William D,ean Howells, ed. Mildred Howells (GardenCity, N. J.: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1928 ), I, 165- hereahercited as Life in Letter:r. Emanuel Swedenborg (1688 - 1772 )was born in Stoclkholm and became a noted and 'V,ersatilescientist, publishing extensively in such fields as mathematica,as,tronomy, physics, ,chemistry, geology, mineralogy, anatomy,and physio.ogy. After a long ,career as a civil ser'Vant, hewas retired in 174'7 and devoted bis remaining years to thespiritual revelation that he said bad come to him in 1745. Hecontinued to w rite on religion until his death in London. After

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his death, the New Jerusalem Church based on his teachingswas or,ganiz,ed in England (London) in 1787 and in the UnitedStates (Baltimore) in 1792. The doctrines of Swedenborg andthe ew Church may be briefly oudined as follows:

(1) There is one God. the Center of the Universe, actingthrough the spiritua world into the natural world.Jesus Christ is a manifestation in time of God himself.

(2) The spiritual world is in the natural world as the soulis in the body. Just as the soul is the ,center andsource of all human activity, so ~s the spiritual worldthe source and center of all natural growth and life.

(3) Every natural object is conceived to be the effect,and therefore the expression. of spiritual causes.Those effects u correspond" to those causes; hencetheir capacity, when properly understood, to revealthe sp,iritual meaning contained in the m.

(4) When an individual dies, he is raised in h~s spiritualbody to the spiri tuat world. There he lives, eitber inheaven or in hen. depending on the character be hadachieved on earth.

(5) All religion is. related to life and the ife of religionis to do good.

See L B. De Beaumont, 'Swedenborg," Encyclopaedia ofReligion and Ethics, ed. James Hastings (New York: CharlesScribner's Sons, n. d.). XII, 129 -132; The Rev. Thomas Child,"The ,ew Church, Commonly CaBed Swedenborgian, II ReligiousSystems of the. World. rev. ed. (New York: E. P. Dutton,1906), pp. 652 - 656; Benson Y. Landis, Religion in the UnitedStates. Everyday Handbooks, o. 294 (New York: Barnes &

able, 1965). pp. 50-51; and I J son, II w d nb rEm nue," Tlu ncyclopedia 0/ Philo ophy, ul ' w r

( ew York: Macmillan and r, 1967), VIII, 48 -51.

William 0 an How II , In ad.,hio from ] 13 to 1 40, by Willi m

rpt. D Imar, '. hal r ' imilp. vi.

ow 11, A. Boy's Town, p. 12.

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R ollections of Life inprow 11 (1895 ;

rin, 1 63 ),

6 Howard M. Munford, "The Genesis and Ear y Develop­ment of the Bas'c Attitudes of William Dean Howells," Diss.Hanard 1950, as quoted in Fryckstedt, p. 220, n. 18.

7 See William Dean HoweBs, Years of My Youth ( ewYork: Harper & Brothers, 1916), pp. 89-106.

8 William Dean Howells, Impressions and Experiences(New York: Harper & Brothers, 1896). p. 23.

9 Owen Wister. "William Dean Howells, " AtlanticMonthly, 160 (Dec., 1937), 713. Strauss held the view that"rehgion- Christianity in particular - is an expression of thehuman mind's capacity to generate myths and! treat them astruths revealed by God to man." See Hayden V. White," Strau s, David Friedrich (1808 -1874), " The Encyclopediaof Philosophy, VIII, 25.

10 William Dean Howells, "Lost Beliefs, ,. Atlantic Monthly,5 ( pril, 1860), 486, as quoted in Arnold B. Fox, "Howellsa a Religio s ritic." Ne.w England Quarterly, 25 ( June,1952), 202.

U Life in Letters, I, 165-166.

12Hanna . Betcher, "Howells's Opinions on the Religiousoo£1i of His Age 8S Exh:i hited in Magazine Articles,"mencan L tterature. 15 ( OV., 1943), 274.

13 Belcher. p. 274.

14 Fox, p. 204.

15 See Leo Tolstoy, A Confession,and What I Believe, trans. AylmerClassics, 229 (London: Oxford Univ.406.

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The Gospel tn BriefMaude, The World's

Press, 1940), pp. 370-

1~ William Dean Howens. "Lyof Tolstoi. '" Ha.rper ~$' Weekly,31 (April 23. 1887). 300~

16 William De.an Howens. ,t Lyof . r. Tolstoy.. n NortA Am.~rican.

Revi~wt 188 (Dec' f 19(8). 852.

808.

20 Belcher. pp. 214- 275.

'llLi/e in Letters. n. 61.

tt \ViUiam Dean HoweUs. My Literary PassioM / Criticism& Fiction (1895/1891; tpt. ew York: Kraus Reprint Co.,

1968 ) ~ p.. 188.

23Edwin H. Cady, The Realist at if'izr; TAe A-l"a.tu.n Y~ar$.

18R5 -192(f.o! IFillia.m Dean Howells (Syracuse., N.Y.:SY1'8CUSe Univ. Press. 1958), p. 8.

2-4HoweUs. ;41"y LitimLry Passions, pp. 183 - 184.

2:5 HoweHs. '1 Lyof N. Tol toy." p. 851.

26See Cady.. TAe Realist -at ffl'a-r, p. 8.

27Howel1s, ., Lyof • Tols oy,' p. 852.U profoundly aff d ow 11, in 11 u ly,mora Ily, and 1 d to hi formul tin thand hi writing t:h . 0- all d •

nnie ilbum (1889), BaULrrL ofTIt.e QlUJ,tity of Mercy (1892). a( 1893). It i 'ignifi ant th 'ow nhad n d riv d 'n part from S d nbSmith a illiam 'b D, d, .,Lett rs ( ambridge. Ma .: 1

- 69-

R, adin

th tif

Univ. Press, 1960). II, 5917 and 651.

28 GeoTge . Bennett, William Dean Howletls ': The Develop-mmt of a Novelist ( Norm,an: Univ. of Okl,ahoma Press,1959), p. 164. Tolstoy wrote: " .... the perfection pointed out to

Chri tians is infinite and can never be attained; and Christdelivers his teacmng with the fact in view that completepe'rfection will ne'ver be attained, but that striving towardsfun and infinite perfection will constantly increase the good ofmen, and so that good can be endlessly increased." Leo Tolstoy,

Th.e Kingdom of God and Peace EsJY.lys, trans. Aylmer Maude.The World's Classics, 445 (London: Oxford Univ'. Press, 1936),p.116.

29 Howens" Impressions and Erpme:n-ces. p. 151.

~'Bel.cher, p. 212.

31 uChristianity is to [Howells,] mot the water and wine,th loav1e ,and fishes. the emp'ty tomb, the harps and crowDS,bu.t a rule of lif,e which can neither be given nor taken ,awayby ,any of these, and which is real whatever becomes ofth m." H len T.and Wilson Follett, ~'ContempOI',ary Novelists:William Dean HoweUs" U Atlantic Monthly. 119 (March, 1917),370.

2 With the political economist Richard T. Ely, who wrotebo k lied ocial Aspects of Christianity (]889), Howells

gf d that hristian churches' work was "primaray to makejustice and peace and love at home upon the earth, andsecondarily to save souls for heaven ther,eby. ""Editor's Stu.dy."

Harper's Monthly, 80 (Feb.• 1890), 484, as quoted in Belcher,p. 274.

33 Belcher, p., 292.

34 Cady, Tlte Realist a t War, p. 9.

55 Cady, TM Realist at War. p. 9.

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~ Oscar W. Firkins, William Dean Howells: A Study(Cambridge, Mass.: H,arvard Umv. Press, 19124), p. 23.

37 Firkins , p. 24.

38 Belcher, p. 214.

39 Belcher, p.277.

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Bib' ography

Belcher, Hanna Graham. II HoweUs's Opinions on the ReligiousConflicts of His Age as Exhibited in Magazine Articles."American Literature, 15 ( ov., 1943), 262 - 278.

Bennett, George N. William Dean Howells: TAe D,evelopmentof a ouelist. Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma Priess, 1959.

Budd, Louis 1. U Willia.m DeanAmerican Slavic and East1950 ), 292 - 301.

Howells' Debt toEuropean Review,

Tolstoy. '"'9 (Dec.,

Cady, Ed in H. Th-e Realist at War: The Mature Years, 1885-1920, of William D,ean Howells. Syracuse, N. Y.:Syraeu e Univ. Press, 1958.

Th.e Road to' Realism: The Early Years, 1837­1885, of William Dean Howells. Syracuse, N .. Y. : SyracuseU Wv. Pre s, 1956.

Ch:Hd, T Rev. Thomas. II The ew Chur,eh, Commonlyn d Swedenborgian." Religious Systems of the World.

R v. ed. N w York: E. 'P. Dutton, 1906, pp. 652 - 656.

aumcmt, L. B. II Swedenborg.·' Encyclopaedia of Religionand Ethic's. Eel. James Hastings. ew York: Charles

ri r', OIlS" n. d., XII 129 - 132 .

Firkins, Oscar W. William Dean Howells: A Study. Cambridge,Mass.: Harvard Dniv. Press, 1924.

Follett, Helen T. and Wi son Follett. UContemporary Novelists:William Dean Howe Us." Atlantic Monthly, 119' (March,1917 ), .362 - 372 .

Fox, Arno d B. U Howells as a Religious Critic." New England

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