A reputation for wit may be as injurious to a poet as to a would-be bishop. People could hardly be persuaded to take Sydney Smith seriously, and the world has been slow in recognizing the solid qualities, the keen insight, the imagination, and poetic feeling of Holmes. It is only one of the facets of his brilliant mind.
At the dinner where the twelve original contributors of the _Atlantic Monthly_ met, the part which Holmes was to take was a matter of lively anticipation. The magazine had been projected for the purpose of uniting the literary forces of the North in favor of universal freedom; but Holmes had no part in its direction. Lowell prophesied at the time that the doctor would carry off the honors. In the first number there was an article by Motley, a fine poem by Longfellow, one by Whittier, a piece of charming classic comedy by Lowell, a group of four striking poems by Emerson, some short stories, articles on art and finance, and the "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table." What would not modern philosophers give for a similar combination to-day! Still, the enterprise might have failed but for the immediate interest awakened by the original thought and style of Holmes. The sensation was new, like that of a sixth sense. The newspapers quoted from the "Autocrat;" it was everywhere talked about, and in a short time its fame went through the nation.
The "Autocrat" was succeeded by the "Professor" and the "Poet." The talk of the "Professor" was somewhat more abstruse, though equally interesting to cultivated readers. The "Poet" attacked the dogma of the endless duration of future punishment. The "Autocrat" was easily superior in freshness as in popularity.
Two novels also appeared--"Elsie Venner" and "The Guardian Angel." They have undoubted merits, showing the keen thought, the descriptive power, and the play of fancy which are so characteristic of the author, and each has a subtle motive to which the characteristic incidents are made subservient. But Dr. Holmes is not great as a novelist as he is great in other things. The stories in one aspect are ambulatory psychological problems, rather than fresh studies of characters conceived without favoritism, with blended good and evil, wisdom and weakness--as God creates them. To produce new types, of universal interest, is given to few novelists. There have been scarcely more than a score of such creators since Cadmus.