the 1855 Leaves of Grass is the most probable of effect upon the individual sensibility. It wants no less. We study it as literature, but like all great literature it has a deeper design: it would be a book for men to live by. It is obsessively affirmative. It is foolishly, childishly, obsessively affirmative. It offers a way to live, in the religious sense, that is intelligent and emotive and rich, and, dependent only on the individual—no politics, no liturgy, no down payment. Just: attention, sympathy, empathy. Neither does Whitman speak of hell or damnation; rather, he is parental and
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