A LYRIC OF THE GOLDEN AGE

New York: Partridge and Brittan, 1856. xxxiv,[4],[3]-381pp. Original cloth, stamped in gilt and blind. Endsheets a bit foxed and stained from affixed clippings, adhesion at gutter of front free endpaper with resultant small flaw, typical foxing with light occasional discolorations, but still a good, sound copy of a book seldom encountered any better. First edition of the third of Harris's major, extended poetic encapsulations of his evolving theories about the spiritual regeneration of humanity. Harris is best known for his establishment of the Brotherhood of the New Life, a religious/communistic utopian community, first located in West Virginia, then in Portland, NY, and finally at Fountain Grove, in Santa Rosa, California. Among the more notable figures he attracted to the Brotherhood was the English novelist, Laurence Oliphant, whose novel, ALTIORA PETO, took its base in his involvement in, and virtual enslavement to, the sect. Kunitz & Haycraft attribute to Harris's poems "considerable beauty of form and imagery, but they are too long and obscure." Sections of this work have particular reference to Coleridge, Shelley, Rousseau and Byron. (Inventory #: WRCLIT18151)