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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/13435-0.txt b/13435-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..353c559 --- /dev/null +++ b/13435-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3862 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13435 *** + + ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS + + THOMAS CARLYLE + + _WITH A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR_ + +[Illustration: _No_. 5 _Great Cheyne Row. + +The Residence of Mr. Carlyle from_ 1834 _until his Death_] + + _A NEW EDITION_ + + CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY + +[Illustration] + + + + CONTENTS. PAGE + BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION 7 + + ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY, APRIL 2, 1866 125 + + THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY 189 + + FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS 192 + + BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE 195 + + INDEX 201 + +[Illustration] + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION. + +There comes a time in the career of every man of genius who has +devoted a long life to the instruction and enlightenment of his +fellow-creatures, when he receives before his death all the honours +paid by posterity. Thus when a great essayist or historian lives to +attain a classic and world-wide fame, his own biography becomes as +interesting to the public as those he himself has written, and by +which he achieved his laurels. + +This is almost always the case when a man of such cosmopolitan +celebrity outlives the ordinary allotted period of threescore years +and ten; for a younger generation has then sprung up, who only hear +of his great fame, and are ignorant of the long and painful steps +by which it was achieved. These remarks are peculiarly applicable +in regard to the man whose career we are now to dwell on for a short +time: his genius was of slow growth and development, and his fame was +even more tardy in coming; but since the world some forty years ago +fairly recognised him as a great and original thinker and teacher, +few men have left so indelible an impress on the public mind, or +have influenced to so great a degree the most thoughtful of their +contemporaries. + +Thomas Carlyle was born on Tuesday, December 4th, 1795, at +Ecclefechan, a small village in the district of Annandale, +Dumfriesshire. His father, a stone-mason, was noted for quickness of +mental perception, and great energy and decision of character; +his mother, as affectionate, pious, and more than ordinarily +intelligent;[A] and thus accepting his own theory, that "the history +of a man's childhood is the description of his parents' environment," +Carlyle entered upon the "mystery of life" under happy and enviable +circumstances. After preliminary instruction, first at the parish +school, and afterwards at Annan, he went, in November, 1809, and when +he was fourteen years old, to the University of Edinburgh. Here +he remained till the summer of 1814, distinguishing himself by his +devotion to mathematical studies then taught there by Professor +Leslie. As a student, he was irregular in his application, but when he +did set to work, it was with his whole energy. He appears to have been +a great reader of general literature at this time, and the stories +that are told of the books that he got through are scarcely to be +credited. In the summer of 1814, on the resignation of Mr. Waugh, +Carlyle obtained, by competitive examination at Dumfries, the post of +mathematical master at Annan Academy. Although he had, at his parents' +desire, commenced his studies with a view to entering the Scottish +Church, the idea of becoming a minister was growingly distasteful to +him. A fellow-student describes his habits at this time as lonely and +contemplative; and we know from another source that his vacations +were principally spent among the hills and by the rivers of his +native county. In the summer of 1816 he was promoted to the post of +"classical and mathematical master" at the old Burgh or Grammar School +at Kirkcaldy. At the new school in that town Edward Irving, whose +acquaintance Carlyle first made at Edinburgh, about Christmas, 1815, +had been established since the year 1812; they were thus brought +closely together, and their intimacy soon ripened into a friendship +destined to become famous. At Kirkcaldy Carlyle remained over two +years, becoming more and more convinced that neither as minister nor +as schoolmaster was he to successfully fight his way up in the world. +It had become clear to him that literature was his true vocation, +and he would have started in the profession at once, had it been +convenient for him to do so. + +[Footnote A: James Carlyle was born in August, 1758, and died January +23, 1832. His second wife (whose maiden name was Margaret Aitken), was +born in September, 1771, and died on Christmas Day, 1853. There +were nine children of this marriage, "whereof four sons and three +daughters," says the inscription en the tombstone in the burial-ground +at Ecclefechan, "survived, gratefully reverent of such a father and +such a mother."] + +He had already written several articles and essays, and a few of them +had appeared in print; but they gave little promise or indication of +the power he was afterwards to exhibit. During the years 1820--1823, +he contributed a series of articles (biographical and topographical) +to Brewster's "Edinburgh Encyclopaedia,"[1] viz.:-- + +[Footnote 1: Vols. XIV. to XVI. The fourteenth volume bears at the end +the imprint, "Edinburgh, printed by Balfour and Clarke, 1820;" and the +sixteenth volume, "Printed by A. Balfour and Co., Edinburgh, 1823." +Most of these articles are distinguished by the initials "T.C."; but +they are all attributed to Carlyle in the List of the Authors of the +Principal Articles, prefixed to the work on its completion.] + + 1. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu + 2. Montaigne + 3. Montesquieu + 4. Montfaucon + 5. Dr. Moore + 6. Sir John Moore + 7. Necker + 8. Nelson + 9. Netherlands + 10. Newfoundland + 11. Norfolk + 12. Northamptonshire + 13. Northumberland + 14. Mungo Park + 15. Lord Chatham + 16. William Pitt. + +The following is from the article on _Necker_:-- + +"As an author, Necker displays much irregular force of imagination, +united with considerable perspicuity and compass of thought; though +his speculations are deformed by an undue attachment to certain +leading ideas, which, harmonizing with his habits of mind, had +acquired an excessive preponderance in the course of his long and +uncontroverted meditations. He possessed extensive knowledge, and +his works bespeak a philosophical spirit; but their great and +characteristic excellence proceeds from that glow of fresh and +youthful admiration for everything that is amiable or august in the +character of man, which, in Necker's heart, survived all the blighting +vicissitudes it had passed through, _combining, in a singular union, +the fervour of the stripling with the experience of the sage_."[A] + +[Footnote A: "In the earliest authorship of Mr. Carlyle," says Mr. +James Russell Lowell, alluding to these papers, "we find some not +obscure hints of the future man. The outward fashion of them is that +of the period; but they are distinguished by a certain security of +judgment, remarkable at any time, remarkable especially in one so +young. Carlyle, in these first essays, already shows the influence of +his master Goethe, the most widely receptive of critics. In a +compact notice of Montaigne there is not a word as to his religious +scepticism. The character is looked at purely from its human and +literary sides."] + +Here is a passage from the article on _Newfoundland_, interesting as +containing perhaps the earliest germ of the later style:-- + +"The ships intended for the fishery on the southeast coast, arrive +early in June. Each takes her station opposite any unoccupied part of +the beach where the fish may be most conveniently cured, and retains +it till the end of the season. Formerly the master who arrived first +on any station was constituted _fishing-admiral_, and had by law the +power of settling disputes among the other crews. But the jurisdiction +of those _admirals_ is now happily superseded by the regular +functionaries who reside on shore. Each captain directs his whole +attention to the collection of his own cargo, without minding the +concerns of his neighbour. Having taken down what part of the rigging +is removable, they set about their laborious calling, and must pursue +it zealously. Their mode of proceeding is thus described by Mr. +Anspach, _a clerical person, who lived in the island several years, +and has since written a meagre and very confused book, which he calls +a_ HISTORY _of it_." + +To the "New Edinburgh Review" (1821-22) Carlyle also contributed +two papers--one on Joanna Baillie's "Metrical Legends," and one on +Goethe's "Faust." + +In the year 1822 he made a translation of "Legendre's Geometry," to +which he prefixed an Essay on Proportion; and the book appeared a +year or two afterwards under the auspices of the late Sir David +Brewster.[A] The Essay on Proportion remains to this day the most +lucid and succinct exposition of the subject hitherto published. + +[Footnote A: "Elements of Geometry and Trigonometry," with Notes. +Translated from the French of A.M. Legendre. Edited by David Brewster, +LL.D. With Notes and Additions, and an Introductory Chapter on +Proportion. Edinburgh: published by Oliver and Boyd; and G. and W.B. +Whittaker, London. 1824, pp. xvi., 367. Sir David Brewster's +Preface, in which he speaks of "an Introduction on Proportion, by the +Translator," is dated _Edinburgh, August_ 1, 1822.] + +"I was already," says Carlyle in his _Reminiscences_, "getting my head +a little up, translating 'Legendre's Geometry' for Brewster. I still +remember a happy forenoon in which I did a _Fifth Book_ (or complete +'doctrine of proportion') for that work, complete really and lucid, +and yet one of the briefest ever known. It was begun and done that +forenoon, and I have (except correcting the press next week) never +seen it since; but still I feel as if it were right enough and +felicitous in its kind! I only got £50 for my entire trouble in that +'Legendre;' but it was an honest job of work, honestly done."[A] + +[Footnote A: _Reminiscences by Thomas Carlyle_, Edited by James +Anthony Froude. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1881, Vol. 1., pp. +198-199.] + +The late Professor de Morgan--an excellent authority--pronounced a +high eulogium upon this Essay on Proportion. + +In 1822 Carlyle accepted the post of tutor to Charles Buller, of whose +early death and honourable promise, two touching records remain to us, +one in verse by Thackeray, and one in prose by Carlyle. + +For the next four years Carlyle devoted his attention almost +exclusively to German literature. + +His Life of Schiller first appeared under the title of "Schiller's +Life and Writings," in the London Magazine. + + Part I.--October, 1823. + Part II.--January, 1824. + Part III.--July, 1824. + " August, 1824. + " September, 1824. + +It was enlarged, and separately published by Messrs. Taylor and +Hessey, the proprietors of the Magazine, in 1825. + +The translation of "Wilhelm Meister," in 1824,[A] was the first real +introduction of Goethe to the reading world of Great Britain. It +appeared without the name of the translator, but its merits were too +palpable to be overlooked, though some critics objected to the strong +infusion of German phraseology which had been imported into the +English version. This acquired idiom never left our author, even in +his original works, although the "Life of Schiller," written but a few +months before, is almost entirely free from the peculiarity. "Wilhelm +Meister," in its English dress, was better received by the English +reading public than by English critics. De Quincey, in one of his +dyspeptic fits, fell upon the book, its author, and the translator,[B] +and Lord Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review, although admitting Carlyle +to be a talented person, heaped condemnation upon the work. + +[Footnote A: Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship. 3 Vols., Edinburgh, +1824.] + +[Footnote B: Curiously enough in the very numbers of the "London +Magazine" containing the later instalments of Carlyle's Life of +Schiller.] + +Carlyle's next work was a series of translations, entitled "German +Romance: Specimens of the chief Authors; with Biographical and +Critical Notices." 4 vols. Edinburgh, 1827. The Preface and +Introductions are reprinted in the second volume of Carlyle's +Collected Works: the Specimens translated from Hoffmann and La Motte +Fouqué, have not been reprinted. + +"This," says Carlyle, in 1857, "was a Book of Translations, not of my +suggesting or desiring, but of my executing as honest journey-work in +defect of better. The pieces selected were the suitablest discoverable +on such terms: not quite of _less_ than no worth (I considered) any +piece of them; nor, alas, of a very high worth any, except one only. +Four of these lots, or quotas to the adventure, Musæus's, Tieck's, +Richter's, Goethe's, will be given in the final stage of this Series; +the rest we willingly leave, afloat or stranded, as waste driftwood, +to those whom they may farther concern." + +It was in 1826 that Mr. Carlyle married Miss Jane Welsh, the only +child of Dr. John Welsh, of Haddington,[A] a lineal descendant of John +Knox, and a lady fitted in every way to be the wife of such a man. For +some time after marriage he continued to reside at Edinburgh, but +in May, 1828, he took up his residence in his native county, at +Craigenputtoch--a solitary farmhouse on a small estate belonging to +his wife's mother, about fifteen miles from Dumfries, and in one of +the most secluded parts of the country. Most of his letters to Goethe +were written from this place. + +[Footnote A: Her father had been dead some seven years when Carlyle +and she were married, and the life interest of her inheritance in the +farm of Craigenputtoch had been made over to her mother, who survived +until 1842, when it reverted to Carlyle.] + +In one of the letters sent from Craigenputtoch to Weimar, bearing +the date of 25th September, 1828, we have a charming picture of our +author's seclusion and retired literary life at this period:-- + +"You inquire with such warm interest respecting our present abode and +occupations, that I feel bound to say a few words about both, while +there is still room left. Dumfries is a pleasant town, containing +about fifteen thousand inhabitants, and may be considered the centre +of the trade and judicial system of a district which possesses some +importance in the sphere of Scottish industry. Our residence is not +in the town itself, but fifteen miles to the north-west, among the +granite hills and the black morasses which stretch westward through +Galloway, almost to the Irish Sea. In this wilderness of heath and +rock, our estate stands forth a green oasis, a tract of ploughed, +partly enclosed, and planted ground, where corn ripens, and trees +afford a shade, although surrounded by sea-mews and rough-woolled +sheep. Here, with no small effort, have we built and furnished a neat, +substantial dwelling; here, in the absence of professorial or other +office, we live to cultivate literature according to our strength, +and in our own peculiar way. We wish a joyful growth to the rose and +flowers of our garden; we hope for health and peaceful thoughts to +further our aims. The roses, indeed, are still in part to be planted, +but they blossom already in anticipation. Two ponies, which carry +us everywhere, and the mountain air, are the best medicines for weak +nerves. This daily exercise--to which I am much devoted--is my only +recreation: for this nook of ours is the loneliest in Britain--six +miles removed from any one likely to visit me. Here Rousseau would +have been as happy as on his island of St. Pierre. My town friends, +indeed, ascribe my sojourn here to a similar disposition, and forbode +me no good result. But I came hither solely with the design to +simplify my way of life, and to secure the independence through which +I could be enabled to remain true to myself. This bit of earth is our +own; here we can live, write, and think, as best pleases ourselves, +even though Zoilus himself were to be crowned the monarch of +literature. Nor is the solitude of such great importance; for a +stage-coach takes us speedily to Edinburgh, which we look upon as our +British Weimar. And have I not, too, at this moment piled up upon +the table of my little library a whole cart-load of French, German, +American, and English journals and periodicals--whatever may be their +worth? Of antiquarian studies, too, there is no lack. From some of +our heights I can descry, about a day's journey to the west, the hill +where Agricola and his Romans left a camp behind them. At the foot of +it I was born, and there both father and mother still live to love me. +And so one must let time work." + +The above letter was printed by Goethe himself, in his Preface to +a German transition of Carlyle's "Life of Schiller," published at +Frankfort in 1830. Other pleasant records of the intercourse between +them exist in the shape of sundry graceful copies of verses addressed +by Goethe to Mrs. Carlyle, which will be found in the collection of +his poems. + +Carlyle had now fairly started as an original writer. From the lonely +farm of Craigenputtoch went forth the brilliant series of Essays +contributed to the Edinburgh, Westminster, and Foreign Reviews, and to +Fraser's Magazine, which were not long in gaining for him a literary +reputation in both hemispheres. To this lonely farm came one day in +August, 1833, armed with a letter of introduction, a visitor from the +other side of the Atlantic: a young American, then unknown to fame, by +name Ralph Waldo Emerson. The meeting of these two remarkable men was +thus described by the younger of them, many years afterwards:-- + +"I came from Glasgow to Dumfries, and being intent on delivering a +letter which I had brought from Rome, inquired for Craigenputtoch. +It was a farm in Nithsdale, in the parish of Dunscore, sixteen miles +distant. No public coach passed near it, so I took a private carriage +from the inn. I found the house amid desolate heathery hills, where +the lonely scholar nourished his mighty heart. Carlyle was a man from +his youth, an author who did not need to hide from his readers, and as +absolute a man of the world, unknown and exiled on that hill-farm, as +if holding on his own terms what is best in London. He was tall +and gaunt, with a cliff-like brow, self-possessed, and holding his +extraordinary powers of conversation in easy command; clinging to his +northern accent with evident relish; full of lively anecdote, and with +a streaming humour, which floated everything he looked upon. His talk +playfully exalting the familiar objects, put the companion at once +into an acquaintance with his Lars and Lemurs, and it was very +pleasant to learn what was predestined to be a pretty mythology. Few +were the objects and lonely the man, 'not a person to speak to +within sixteen miles except the minister of Dunscore; so that books +inevitably made his topics. + +"He had names of his own for all the matters familiar to his +discourse. 'Blackwood's' was the 'sand magazine;' 'Fraser's' nearer +approach to possibility of life was the 'mud magazine;' a piece of +road near by that marked some failed enterprise was 'the grave of the +last sixpence.' When too much praise of any genius annoyed him, he +professed hugely to admire the talent shewn by his pig. He had spent +much time and contrivance in confining the poor beast to one enclosure +in his pen, but pig, by great strokes of judgment, had found out +how to let a board down, and had foiled him. For all that, he still +thought man the most plastic little fellow in the planet, and he liked +Nero's death, 'Qualis artifex pereo!' better than most history. He +worships a man that will manifest any truth to him. At one time he had +inquired and read a good deal about America. Landor's principle was +mere rebellion, and that he feared was the American principle. The +best thing he knew of that country was, that in it a man can have meat +for his labour. He had read in Stewart's book, that when he inquired +in a New York hotel for the Boots, he had been shown across the +street, and had found Mungo in his own house dining on roast turkey. + +"We talked of books. Plato he does not read, and he disparaged +Socrates; and, when pressed, persisted in making Mirabeau a hero. +Gibbon he called the splendid bridge from the old world to the new. +His own reading had been multifarious. Tristram Shandy was one of his +first books after Robinson Crusoe, and Robertson's America an early +favourite. Rousseau's Confessions had discovered to him that he was +not a dunce; and it was now ten years since he had learned German, by +the advice of a man who told him he would find in that language what +he wanted. + +"He took despairing or satirical views of literature at this +moment; recounted the incredible sums paid in one year by the great +booksellers for puffing. Hence it comes that no newspaper is trusted +now, no books are bought, and the booksellers are on the eve of +bankruptcy. + +"He still returned to English pauperism, the crowded country, the +selfish abdication by public men of all that public persons should +perform. 'Government should direct poor men what to do. Poor Irish +folk come wandering over these moors. My dame makes it a rule to give +to every son of Adam bread to eat, and supplies his wants to the next +house. But here are thousands of acres which might give them all meat, +and nobody to bid these poor Irish go to the moor and till it. They +burned the stacks, and so found a way to force the rich people to +attend to them.' + +"We went out to walk over long hills, and looked at Criffel, then +without his cap, and down into Wordsworth's country. There we sat +down, and talked of the immortality of the soul. It was not +Carlyle's fault that we talked on that topic, for he had the natural +disinclination of every nimble spirit to bruise itself against walls, +and did not like to place himself where no step can be taken. But he +was honest and true, and cognizant of the subtile links that bind ages +together, and saw how every event affects all the future. 'Christ died +on the tree: that built Dunscore kirk yonder: that brought you and me +together. Time has only a relative existence.' + +"He was already turning his eyes towards London with a scholar's +appreciation. London is the heart of the world, he said, wonderful +only from the mass of human beings. He liked the huge machine. Each +keeps its own round. The baker's boy brings muffins to the window at a +fixed hour every day, and that is all the Londoner knows, or wishes +to know, on the subject. But it turned out good men. He named certain +individuals, especially one man of letters, his friend, the best mind +he knew, whom London had well served."[A] + +[Footnote A: "English Traits," by R.W. Emerson. First Visit to +England.] + +"Carlyle," says Emerson, "was already turning his eyes towards +London," and a few months after the interview just described he did +finally fix his residence there, in a quiet street in Chelsea, leading +down to the river-side. Here, in an old-fashioned house, built in the +reign of Queen Anne, he and his wife settled down in the early summer +of 1834; here they continued to live together until she died; and here +Carlyle afterwards lived on alone till the end of his life. + +With another man, of whom he now became the neighbour--Leigh Hunt--he +had already formed a slight acquaintance, which soon ripened into +a warm friendship and affection on both sides, in spite of their +singular difference of temperament and character. + +"It was on the 8th of February, 1832," says Mr. Thornton Hunt, "that +the writer of the essays named 'Characteristics' received, apparently +from Mr. Leigh Hunt, a volume entitled 'Christianism,' for which he +begged to express his thanks. By the 20th of February, Carlyle, then +lodging in London, was inviting Leigh Hunt to tea, as the means of +their first meeting; and by the 20th of November, Carlyle wrote from +Dumfries, urging Leigh Hunt to 'come hither and see us when you want +to rusticate a month. Is that for ever impossible?' The philosopher +afterwards came to live in the next street to his correspondent, in +Chelsea, and proved to be one of Leigh Hunt's kindest, most faithful, +and most considerate friends."[A] + +[Footnote A: From "The Correspondence of Leigh Hunt," edited by his +eldest son. London: Smith, Elder and Co. 1862. Vol. 1., p. 321.] + +Mr. Horne tells a story very characteristic of both men. Soon after +the publication of "Heroes and Hero Worship," they were at a small +party, when a conversation was started between these two concerning +the heroism of man. "Leigh Hunt had said something about the islands +of the blest, or El Dorado, or the Millennium, and was flowing on his +bright and hopeful way, when Carlyle dropped some heavy tree-trunk +across Hunt's pleasant stream, and banked it up with philosophical +doubts and objections at every interval of the speaker's joyous +progress. But the unmitigated Hunt never ceased his overflowing +anticipations, nor the saturnine Carlyle his infinite demurs to those +finite flourishings. The listeners laughed and applauded by turns; and +had now fairly pitted them against each other, as the philosopher of +hopefulness and of the unhopeful. The contest continued with all that +ready wit and philosophy, that mixture of pleasantry and profundity, +that extensive knowledge of books and character, with their ready +application in argument or illustration, and that perfect ease and +good nature which distinguish both of these men. The opponents were so +well matched that it was quite clear the contest would never come to +an end. But the night was far advanced, and the party broke up. They +all sallied forth, and leaving the close room, the candles and the +arguments behind them, suddenly found themselves in presence of a most +brilliant starlight night. They all looked up. 'Now,' thought Hunt, +'Carlyle's done for! he can have no answer to that!' 'There,' shouted +Hunt, 'look up there, look at that glorious harmony, that sings with +infinite voices an eternal song of Hope in the soul of man.' Carlyle +looked up. They all remained silent to hear what he would say. They +began to think he was silenced at last--he was a mortal man. But out +of that silence came a few low-toned words, in a broad Scotch accent. +And who on earth could have anticipated what the voice said? 'Eh! it's +a sad sight!' Hunt sat down on a stone step. They all laughed--then +looked very thoughtful. Had the finite measured itself with infinity, +instead of surrendering itself up to the influence? Again they +laughed--then bade each other good night, and betook themselves +homeward with slow and serious pace."[A] + +[Footnote A: "A New Spirit of the Age," by R.H. Home. London, 1844. +Vol. . p. 278.] + +In 1840 Leigh Hunt left Chelsea, and went to live at Kensington, but +Carlyle never altogether lost sight of him, and on several occasions +was able to do him very serviceable acts of kindness; as, for +instance, in writing certain Memoranda concerning him with the view of +procuring from Government a small provision for Leigh Hunt's declining +years, which we may as well give in this place:-- + + MEMORANDA + + CONCERNING MR. LEIGH HUNT. + +"1. That Mr. Hunt is a man of the most indisputedly superior worth; +a _Man of Genius_ in a very strict sense of that word, and in all +the senses which it bears or implies; of brilliant varied gifts, +of graceful fertility, of clearness, lovingness, truthfulness; of +childlike open character; also of most pure and even exemplary private +deportment; a man who can be other than _loved_ only by those who have +not seen him, or seen him from a distance through a false medium. + +"2. That, well seen into, he _has_ done much for the world;--as every +man possessed of such qualities, and freely speaking them forth in +the abundance of his heart for thirty years long, must needs do: _how_ +much, they that could judge best would perhaps estimate highest. + +"3. That, for one thing, his services in the cause of reform, as +Founder and long as Editor of the 'Examiner' newspaper; as Poet, +Essayist, Public Teacher in all ways open to him, are great and +evident: few now living in this kingdom, perhaps, could boast of +greater. + +"4. That his sufferings in that same cause have also been great; legal +prosecution and penalty (not dishonourable to him; nay, honourable, +were the whole truth known, as it will one day be): unlegal obloquy +and calumny through the Tory Press;--perhaps a greater quantity of +baseless, persevering, implacable calumny, than any other living +writer has undergone. Which long course of hostility (nearly the +cruellest conceivable, had it not been carried on in half, or almost +total misconception) may be regarded as the beginning of his other +worst distresses, and a main cause of them, down to this day. + +"5. That he is heavily laden with domestic burdens, more heavily than +most men, and his economical resources are gone from him. For the last +twelve years he has toiled continually, with passionate diligence, +with the cheerfullest spirit; refusing no task; yet hardly able with +all this to provide for the day that was passing over him; and now, +after some two years of incessant effort in a new enterprise ('The +London Journal') that seemed of good promise, it also has suddenly +broken down, and he remains in ill health, age creeping on him, +without employment, means, or outlook, in a situation of the +painfullest sort. Neither do his distresses, nor did they at any time, +arise from wastefulness, or the like, on his own part (he is a man of +humble wishes, and can live with dignity on little); but from +crosses of what is called Fortune, from injustice of other men, from +inexperience of his own, and a guileless trustfulness of nature, the +thing and things that have made him unsuccessful make him in reality +_more_ loveable, and plead for him in the minds of the candid. + +"6. That such a man is rare in a Nation, and of high value there; not +to be _procured_ for a whole Nation's revenue, or recovered when taken +from us, and some £200 a year is the price which this one, whom we +now have, is valued at: with that sum he were lifted above his +perplexities, perhaps saved from nameless wretchedness! It is believed +that, in hardly any other way could £200 abolish as much suffering, +create as much benefit, to one man, and through him to many and all. + +"Were these things set fitly before an English Minister, in whom great +part of England recognises (with surprise at such a novelty) a man of +insight, fidelity and decision, is it not probable or possible that +he, though from a quite opposite point of view, might see them in +somewhat of a similar light; and, so seeing, determine to do in +consequence? _Ut fiat_! + + "T.C." + +"Some years later," says a writer in "Macmillan's Magazine,"[A] "in +the 'mellow evening' of a life that had been so stormy, Mr. Leigh +Hunt himself told the story of his struggles, his victories, and +his defeats, with so singularly graceful a frankness, that the most +supercilious of critics could not but acknowledge that here was +an autobiographer whom it was possible to like. Here is Carlyle's +estimate of Leigh Hunt's Autobiography:-- + +[Footnote A: July, 1862.] + + "Chelsea, June 17, 1850. + +"DEAR HUNT, + +"I have just finished your Autobiography, which has been most +pleasantly occupying all my leisure these three days; and you must +permit me to write you a word upon it, out of the fulness of the +heart, while the impulse is still fresh to thank you. This good +book, in every sense one of the best I have read this long while, has +awakened many old thoughts which never were extinct, or even properly +asleep, but which (like so much else) have had to fall silent amid the +tempests of an evil time--Heaven mend it! A word from me once more, I +know, will not be unwelcome, while the world is talking of you. + +"Well, I call this an excellent good book, by far the best of the +autobiographic kind I remember to have read in the English language; +and indeed, except it be Boswell's of Johnson, I do not know where we +have such a picture drawn of a human life, as in these three volumes. + +"A pious, ingenious, altogether human and worthy book; imaging, with +graceful honesty and free felicity, many interesting objects and +persons on your life-path, and imaging throughout, what is best of +all, a gifted, gentle, patient, and valiant human soul, as it buffets +its way through the billows of the time, and will not drown though +often in danger; cannot _be_ drowned, but conquers and leaves a track +of radiance behind it: that, I think, conies out more clearly to me +than in any other of your books;--and that, I can venture to assure +you, is the best of all results to realise in a book or written +record. In fact, this book has been like an exercise of devotion to +me; I have not assisted at any sermon, liturgy or litany, this long +while, that has had so religious an effect on me. Thanks in the name +of all men. And believe, along with me, that this book will be welcome +to other generations as well as to ours. And long may you live to +write more books for us; and may the evening sun be softer on you (and +on me) than the noon sometimes was! + +"Adieu, dear Hunt (you must let me use this familiarity, for I am an +old fellow too now, as well as you). I have often thought of coming up +to see you once more; and perhaps I shall, one of these days +(though horribly sick and lonely, and beset with spectral lions, go +whitherward I may): but whether I do or not believe for ever in my +regard. And so, God bless you, + + "Prays heartily, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +On the other hand Leigh Hunt had an enthusiastic reverence for +Carlyle. There are several incidental allusions to the latter, of more +or less consequence, in Hunt's Autobiography, but the following is the +most interesting:-- + +"_Carlyle's Paramount Humanity_.--I believe that what Mr. Carlyle +loves better than his fault-finding, with all its eloquence, is the +face of any human creature that looks suffering, and loving, and +sincere; and I believe further, that if the fellow-creature were +suffering only, and neither loving nor sincere, but had come to a pass +of agony in this life which put him at the mercies of some good man +for some last help and consolation towards his grave, even at the risk +of loss to repute, and a sure amount of pain and vexation, that +man, if the groan reached him in its forlornness, would be Thomas +Carlyle."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Autobiography of Leigh Hunt, with Reminiscences of +friends and Contemporaries." (Lond. 1850.)] + +It was in "Leigh Hunt's Journal,"--a short-lived Weekly Miscellany +(1850--1851)--that Carlyle's sketch, entitled "Two Hundred and Fifty +Years Ago,"[A] first appeared. + +[Footnote A: "Two Hundred and Fifty Years Ago. From a waste paper bag +of T. Carlyle." Reprinted in Carlyle's Miscellanies, Ed. 1857.] + +It was during his residence at Craigenputtoch that "Sartor Resartus" +("The Tailor Done Over," the name of an old Scotch ballad) was +written, which, after being rejected by several publishers, finally +made its appearance in "Eraser's Magazine," 1833--34. The book, it +must be confessed, might well have puzzled the critical gentlemen--the +"book-tasters"--who decide for publishers what work to print among +those submitted in manuscript. It is a sort of philosophical romance, +in which the author undertakes to give, in the form of a review of a +German work on dress, and in a notice of the life of the writer, his +own opinions upon matters and things in general. The hero, Professor +Teufelsdroeckh ("Devil's Dirt"), seems to be intended for a portrait +of human nature as affected by the moral influence to which a +cultivated mind would be exposed by the transcendental philosophy of +Fichte. Mr. Carlyle works out his theory--the clothes philosophy--and +finds the world false and hollow, our institutions mere worn-out rags +or disguises, and that our only safety lies in flying from falsehood +to truth, and becoming in harmony with the "divine idea." There is +much fanciful, grotesque description in "Sartor," with deep thought +and beautiful imagery. "In this book," wrote John Sterling, "we always +feel that there is a mystic influence around us, bringing out into +sharp homely clearness what is noblest in the remote and infinite, +exalting into wonder what is commonest in the dust and toil of every +day." + +"Sartor" found but few admirers; those readers, however, were firm and +enthusiastic in their applause. In 1838 the "Sartor Resartus" papers, +already republished in the United States, were issued in a collected +form here; and in 1839-1840 his various scattered articles +in periodicals, after having similarly received the honour of +republication in America, were published here, first in four and +afterwards in five volumes, under the title of "Miscellanies." + +It was in the spring of 1837 that Carlyle's first great historical +work appeared, "The French Revolution:--Vol. I., The Bastile; Vol. II, +The Constitution; Vol. III., The Guillotine." The publication of this +book produced a profound impression on the public mind. A history +abounding in vivid and graphic descriptions, it was at the same time +a gorgeous "prose epic." It is perhaps the most readable of all +Carlyle's works, and indeed is one of the most remarkable books of the +age. There is no other account of the French Revolution that can be +compared with it for intensity of feeling and profoundness of thought. + +A great deal of information respecting Carlyle's manner of living and +personal history during these earlier years in London may be gleaned +incidentally from his "Life of John Sterling," a book, which, from the +nature of it, is necessarily partly autobiographical. + +Thomas Moore and others met him sometimes in London society at this +time. Moore thus briefly chronicles a breakfast at Lord Houghton's, at +which Carlyle was present:-- + +"22nd May, 1838.--Breakfasted at Milnes', and met rather a remarkable +party, consisting of Savage, Landor, and Carlyle (neither of whom +I had ever seen before), Robinson, Rogers, and Rice. A good deal of +conversation between Robinson and Carlyle about German authors, of +whom I knew nothing, nor (from what they paraded of them) felt that I +had lost much by my ignorance."[A] + +[Footnote A: Diary of Thomas Moore. (Lond. 1856.) Vol. vii., p. 224] + +In 1835, after the publication of "Sartor Resartus," Carlyle received +an invitation from some American admirers of his writings, to visit +their country, and he contemplated doing so, but his labours in +examining and collecting materials for his great work on "The French +Revolution," then hastening towards completion, prevented him. + +We may say that, for many reasons, it is to be regretted that this +design was never carried into execution. Had Carlyle witnessed with +his own eyes the admirable working of democratic institutions in the +United States, he might have done more justice to our Transatlantic +brethren, who were always his first and foremost admirers, and he +might also have acquired more faith in the future destinies of his own +countrymen. + +In December, 1837, Carlyle wrote a very remarkable letter to a +correspondent in India, which has never been printed in his works, +and which we are enabled to give here entire. It is addressed to Major +David Lester Richardson, in acknowledgment of his "Literary Leaves, +or Prose and Verse," published at Calcutta in 1836. These "Literary +Leaves" contain among other things an article on the Italian Opera +(taking much the same view of it as Carlyle does), and a sketch of +Edward Irving. These papers no doubt pleased Carlyle, and perhaps led +him to entertain a rather exaggeratedly high opinion of the rest of +the book. + + THOMAS CARLYLE TO DAVID LESTER RICHARDSON. + + "5, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London, + "_19th December_, 1837. + +"My DEAR SIR, + +"Your courteous gift, with the letter accompanying it, reached me only +about a week ago, though dated 20th of June, almost at the opposite +point of the year. Whether there has been undue delay or not is +unknown to me, but at any rate on my side there ought to be no delay. + +"I have read your volume--what little of it was known to me before, +and the much that was not known--I can say, with true pleasure. It +is written, as few volumes in these days are, with fidelity, with +successful care, with insight and conviction as to matter, with +clearness and graceful precision as to manner: in a word, it is the +impress of a mind stored with elegant accomplishments, gifted with +an eye to see, and a heart to understand; a welcome, altogether +recommendable book. More than once I have said to myself and others, +How many parlour firesides are there this winter in England, at which +this volume, could one give credible announcement of its quality, +would be right pleasant company? There are very many, _could_ one give +the announcement: but no such announcement _can_ be given; therefore +the parlour firesides must even put up with ---- or what other stuff +chance shovels in their way, and read, though with malediction all the +time. It is a great pity, but no man can help it. We are now arrived +seemingly pretty near the point when all criticism and proclamation +in matters literary has degenerated into an inane jargon, incredible, +unintelligible, inarticulate as the cawing of choughs and rooks; and +many things in that as in other provinces, are in a state of painful +and rapid transition. A good book has no way of recommending itself +except slowly and as it were accidentally from hand to hand. The man +that wrote it must abide his time. He needs, as indeed all men do, the +_faith_ that this world is built not on falsehood and jargon but on +truth and reason; that no good thing done by any creature of God was, +is, or ever can be _lost_, but will verily do the service appointed +for it, and be found among the general sum-total and all of things +after long times, nay after all time, and through eternity itself. Let +him 'cast his bread upon the waters,' therefore, cheerful of heart; +'he will find it after many days.' + +"I know not why I write all this to you; it comes very spontaneously +from me. Let it be your satisfaction, the highest a man can have in +this world, that the talent entrusted to you did not lie useless, +but was turned to account, and proved itself to be a talent; and the +'publishing world' can receive it altogether according to their own +pleasure, raise it high on the housetops, or trample it low into the +street-kennels; that is not the question at all, the _thing_ remains +precisely what it was after never such raising and never such +depressing and trampling, there is no change whatever in _it_. I bid +you go on, and prosper. + +"One thing grieves me: the tone of sadness, I might say of settled +melancholy that runs through all your utterances of yourself. It is +not right, it is wrong; and yet how shall I reprove you? If you knew +me, you would triumphantly[A] for any spiritual endowment bestowed +on a man, that it is accompanied, or one might say _preceded_ as the +first origin of it, always by a delicacy of organisation which in +a world like ours is sure to have itself manifoldly afflicted, +tormented, darkened down into sorrow and disease. You feel yourself an +exile, in the East; but in the West too it is exile; I know not where +under the sun it is not exile. Here in the Fog Babylon, amid mud +and smoke, in the infinite din of 'vociferous platitude,' and quack +outbellowing quack, with truth and pity on all hands ground under the +wheels, can one call it a home, or a world? It is a waste chaos, where +we have to swim painfully for our life. The utmost a man can do is +to swim there like a man, and hold his peace. For this seems to me +a great truth, in any exile or chaos whatsoever, that sorrow was not +given us for sorrow's sake, but always and infallibly as a lesson to +us from which we are to learn somewhat: and which, the somewhat +once _learned_, ceases to be sorrow. I do believe this; and study +in general to 'consume my own smoke,' not indeed without very ugly +out-puffs at times! Allan Cunningham is the best, he tells me that +always as one grows older, one grows happier: a thing also which I +really can believe. But as for you, my dear sir, you have other work +to do in the East than grieve. Are there not beautiful things there, +glorious things; wanting only an eye to note them, a hand to record +them? If I had the command over you, I would say, read _Paul et +Virginie_, then read the _Chaumière Indienne_; gird yourself together +for a right effort, and go and do likewise or better! I mean what I +say. The East has its own phases, there are things there which the +West yet knows not of; and one heaven covers both. He that has an eye +let him look! + +[Footnote A: There seems to be some omission or slip of the pen here.] + +"I hope you forgive me this style I have got into. It seems to me on +reading your book as if we had been long acquainted in some measure; +as if one might speak to you right from the heart. I hope we shall +meet some day or other. I send you my constant respect and good +wishes; and am and remain, + + "Yours very truly always, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle first appeared as a lecturer in 1837. His first course was on +'German Literature,' at Willis's Rooms; a series of six lectures, of +which the first was thus noticed in the _Spectator_ of Saturday, May +6, 1837.[A] + +[Footnote A: Facsimiled in "The Autographic Mirror," July, 1865.] + +"_Mr. Thomas Carlyle's Lectures_. + +"Mr. Carlyle delivered the first of a course of lectures on German +Literature, at Willis's Rooms, on Tuesday, to a very crowded and yet +a select audience of both sexes. Mr. Carlyle may be deficient in the +mere mechanism of oratory; but this minor defect is far more than +counterbalanced by his perfect mastery of his subject, the originality +of his manner, the perspicuity of his language, his simple but genuine +eloquence, and his vigorous grasp of a large and difficult question. +No person of taste or judgment could hear him without feeling that the +lecturer is a man of genius, deeply imbued with his great argument." + +"This course of lectures," says a writer already quoted, "was well +attended by the fashionables of the West End; and though they saw +in his manner something exceedingly awkward, they could not fail to +discern in his matter the impress of a mind of great originality and +superior gifts."[A] + +[Footnote A: JAMES GRANT: "Portraits of Public Characters." (Lond. +1841.) Vol. ii., p. 152.] + +The following year he delivered a second course on the 'History of +Literature, or the Successive Periods of European Culture,' at +the Literary Institution in Edwards-street, Portman-square. 'The +Revolutions of Modern Europe' was the title given to the third course, +delivered twelve months later. The fourth and last series, of six +lectures, is the best remembered, 'Heroes and Hero-worship.' This +course alone was published, and it became more immediately popular +than any of the works which had preceded it. Concerning these +lectures, Leigh Hunt remarked that it seemed "as if some Puritan +had come to life again, liberalized by German philosophy and his own +intense reflections and experience." Another critic, a Scotch writer, +could see nothing but wild impracticability in them, and exclaimed, +"Can any living man point to a single practical passage in any of +these lectures? If not, what is the real value of Mr. Carlyle's +teachings? What is Mr. Carlyle himself but a phantasm!" + +The vein of Puritanism running through his writings, composed upon +the model of the German school, impressed many critics with the belief +that their author, although full of fire and energy, was perplexed and +embarrassed with his own speculations. Concerning this Puritan element +in his reflections, Mr. James Hannay remarks, "That earnestness, that +grim humour--that queer, half-sarcastic, half-sympathetic fun--is +quite Scotch. It appears in Knox and Buchanan, and it appears in +Burns. I was not surprised when a school-fellow of Carlyle's told me +that his favourite poem was, when a boy, 'Death and Doctor Hornbook.' +And if I were asked to explain this originality, I should say that he +was a covenanter coming in the wake of the eighteenth century and the +transcendental philosophy. He has gone into the hills against 'shams,' +as they did against Prelacy, Erastianism, and so forth. But he lives +in a quieter age, and in a literary position. So he can give play +to the humour which existed in them as well, and he overflows with +a range of reading and speculation to which they were necessarily +strangers." + +'Chartism,' published in 1839, and which, to use the words of a critic +of the time, was the publication in which "he first broke ground on +the Condition of England question," appeared a short time before the +lectures on 'Heroes and Hero-worship' were delivered. If we +remember rightly, Mr. Carlyle gave forth "those grand utterances" +extemporaneously and without an abstract, notes, or a reminder of any +kind--utterances not beautiful to the flunkey-mind, or valet-soul, +occupied mainly with the fold of the hero's necktie, and the cut +of his coat. Flunkey-dom, by one of its mouthpieces, thus speaks of +them:-- + +"Perhaps his course for the present year, which was on Hero-worship, +was better attended than any previous one. Some of those who were +present estimated the average attendance at three hundred. They +chiefly consisted of persons of rank and wealth, as the number of +carriages which each day waited the conclusion of the lecture to +receive Mr. Carlyle's auditors, and to carry them to their homes, +conclusively testified. The locality of Mr. Carlyle's lectures has, I +believe, varied every year. The Hanover Rooms, Willis's Rooms, and +a place in the north of London, the name of which I forget, have +severally been chosen as the place whence to give utterance to his +profound and original trains of thought. + +"A few words will be expected here as to Mr. Carlyle's manner as a +lecturer. In so far as his mere manner is concerned, I can scarcely +bestow on him a word of commendation. There is something in his manner +which, if I may use a rather quaint term, must seem very uncouth to +London audiences of the most respectable class, _accustomed as they +are to the polished deportment[A] which is usually exhibited in +Willis's or the Hanover Rooms_. When he enters the room, and proceeds +to the sort of rostrum whence he delivers his lectures, he is, +according to the usual practice in such cases, generally received +with applause; but he very rarely takes any more notice of the mark +of approbation thus bestowed upon him, than if he were altogether +unconscious of it. And the same seeming want of respect for his +audience, or, at any rate, the same disregard for what I believe +he considers the troublesome forms of politeness, is visible at the +commencement of his lecture. Having ascended his desk, he gives a +hearty rub to his hands, and plunges at once into his subject. He +reads very closely, which, indeed, must be expected, considering +the nature of the topics which he undertakes to discuss. He is not +prodigal of gesture with his arms or body; but there is something in +his eye and countenance which indicates great earnestness of purpose, +and the most intense interest in his subject. _You can almost fancy, +in some of his more enthusiastic and energetic moments, that you +see his inmost soul in his face_. At times, indeed very often, he so +unnaturally distorts his features, as to give to his countenance a +very unpleasant expression. On such occasions, you would imagine that +he was suddenly seized with some violent paroxysms of pain. _He is +one of the most ungraceful speakers I have ever heard address a public +assemblage of persons_. In addition to the awkwardness of his general +manner, he 'makes mouths,' which would of themselves be sufficient to +mar the agreeableness of his delivery. And his manner of speaking, and +the ungracefulness of his gesticulation, are greatly aggravated by +his strong Scotch accent. Even to the generality of Scotchmen his +pronunciation is harsh in no ordinary degree. Need I say, then, what +it must be to an English ear? + +[Footnote A: Shade of Mr. Turveydrop senior, hear this man!] + +"I was present some months ago, during the delivery of a speech by Mr. +Carlyle at a meeting held in the Freemasons' Tavern, for the purpose +of forming a metropolitan library; and though that speech did not +occupy in its delivery more than five minutes, he made use of some of +the most extraordinary phraseology I ever heard employed by a +human being. He made use of the expression 'this London,' which he +pronounced 'this Loondun,' four or five times--a phrase which grated +grievously on the ears even of those of Mr. Carlyle's own countrymen +who were present, and which must have sounded doubly harsh in the ears +of an Englishman, considering the singularly broad Scotch accent with +which he spoke. + +"A good deal of uncertainty exists as to Mr. Carlyle's religious +opinions. I have heard him represented as a firm and entire believer +in revelation, and I have heard it affirmed with equal confidence that +he is a decided Deist. My own impression is," &c.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Portraits of Public Characters," by the author of +"Random Recollections of the Lords and Commons." Vol. ii. pp. +152-158.] + +In 1841 Carlyle superintended the publication of the English +edition of his friend Emerson's Essays,[B] to which he prefixed a +characteristic Preface of some length. + +[Footnote B: Essays: by R.W. Emerson, of Concord, Massachusetts. With +Preface by Thomas Carlyle. London: James Fraser, 1841.] + +"The name of Ralph Waldo Emerson," he writes, "is not entirely new +in England: distinguished travellers bring us tidings of such a man; +fractions of his writings have found their way into the hands of +the curious here; fitful hints that there is, in New England, some +spiritual notability called Emerson, glide through Reviews and +Magazines. Whether these hints were true or not true, readers are now +to judge for themselves a little better. + +"Emerson's writings and speakings amount to something: and yet +hitherto, as seems to me, this Emerson is perhaps far less notable for +what he has spoken or done, than for the many things he has not spoken +and has forborne to do. With uncommon interest I have learned that +this, and in such a never-resting, locomotive country too, is one of +those rare men who have withal the invaluable talent of sitting still! +That an educated man, of good gifts and opportunities, after looking +at the public arena, and even trying, not with ill success, what its +tasks and its prizes might amount to, should retire for long years +into rustic obscurity; and, amid the all-pervading jingle of dollars +and loud chaffering of ambitions and promotions, should quietly, +with cheerful deliberateness, sit down to spend _his_ life not in +Mammon-worship, or the hunt for reputation, influence, place, or any +outward advantage whatsoever: this, when we get a notice of it, is a +thing really worth noting." + +In 1843, "Past and Present" appeared--a work without the wild power +which "Sartor Resartus" possessed over the feelings of the reader, +but containing passages which look the same way, and breathe the +same spirit. The book contrasts, in a historico-philosophical spirit, +English society in the Middle Ages, with English society in our own +day. In both this and the preceding work the great measures advised +for the amelioration of the people are education and emigration. + +Another very admirable letter, addressed by Mr. Carlyle in 1843 to a +young man who had written to him desiring his advice as to a proper +choice of reading, and, it would appear also, as to his conduct in +general, we shall here bring forth from its hiding-place in an old +Scottish newspaper of a quarter of a century ago:-- + +"DEAR SIR, + +"Some time ago your letter was delivered me; I take literally the +first free half-hour I have had since to write you a word of answer. + +"It would give me true satisfaction could any advice of +mine contribute to forward you in your honourable course of +self-improvement, but a long experience has taught me that advice can +profit but little; that there is a good reason why advice is so seldom +followed; this reason namely, that it is so seldom, and can almost +never be, rightly given. No man knows the state of another; it is +always to some more or less imaginary man that the wisest and most +honest adviser is speaking. + +"As to the books which you--whom I know so little of--should read, +there is hardly anything definite that can be said. For one thing, you +may be strenuously advised to keep reading. Any good book, any book +that is wiser than yourself, will teach you something--a great many +things, indirectly and directly, if your mind be open to learn. +This old counsel of Johnson's is also good, and universally +applicable:--'Read the book you do honestly feel a wish and curiosity +to read.' The very wish and curiosity indicates that you, then and +there, are the person likely to get good of it. 'Our wishes are +presentiments of our capabilities;' that is a noble saying, of deep +encouragement to all true men; applicable to our wishes and efforts in +regard to reading as to other things. Among all the objects that look +wonderful or beautiful to you, follow with fresh hope the one which +looks wonderfullest, beautifullest. You will gradually find, by +various trials (which trials see that you make honest, manful ones, +not silly, short, fitful ones), what _is_ for you the wonderfullest, +beautifullest--what is _your_ true element and province, and be able +to profit by that. True desire, the monition of nature, is much to be +attended to. But here, also, you are to discriminate carefully between +_true_ desire and false. The medical men tell us we should eat what +we _truly_ have an appetite for; but what we only _falsely_ have an +appetite for we should resolutely avoid. It is very true; and flimsy, +desultory readers, who fly from foolish book to foolish book, and get +good of none, and mischief of all--are not these as foolish, unhealthy +eaters, who mistake their superficial false desire after spiceries and +confectioneries for their real appetite, of which even they are +not destitute, though it lies far deeper, far quieter, after solid +nutritive food? With these illustrations, I will recommend Johnson's +advice to you. + +"Another thing, and only one other, I will say. All books are properly +the record of the history of past men--what thoughts past men had in +them--what actions past men did: the summary of all books whatsoever +lies there. It is on this ground that the class of books specifically +named History can be safely recommended as the basis of all study of +books--the preliminary to all right and full understanding of anything +we can expect to find in books. Past history, and especially the past +history of one's own native country, everybody may be advised to begin +with that. Let him study that faithfully; innumerable inquiries will +branch out from it; he has a broad-beaten highway, from which all +the country is more or less visible; there travelling, let him choose +where he will dwell. + +"Neither let mistakes and wrong directions--of which every man, in +his studies and elsewhere, falls into many--discourage you. There is +precious instruction to be got by finding that we are wrong. Let a +man try faithfully, manfully, to be right, he will grow daily more +and more right. It is, at bottom, the condition which all men have +to cultivate themselves. Our very walking is an incessant falling--a +falling and a catching of ourselves before we come actually to the +pavement!--it is emblematic of all things a man does. + +"In conclusion, I will remind you that it is not by books alone, or +by books chiefly, that a man becomes in all points a man. Study to do +faithfully whatsoever thing in your actual situation, there and now, +you find either expressly or tacitly laid to your charge; that is +your post; stand in it like a true soldier. Silently devour the many +chagrins of it, as all human situations have many; and see you aim not +to quit it without doing all that _it_, at least, required of you. +A man perfects himself by work much more than by reading. They are a +growing kind of men that can wisely combine the two things--wisely, +valiantly, can do what is laid to their hand in their present sphere, +and prepare themselves withal for doing other wider things, if such +lie before them. + +"With many good wishes and encouragements, I remain, yours sincerely, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE. + + "Chelsea, 13th March, 1843." + +The publication of "Past and Present" elicited a paper "On the Genius +and Tendency of the Writings of Thomas Carlyle," from Mazzini, which +appeared in the "British and Foreign Review," of October, 1843.[A] It +is a candid and thoughtful piece of criticism, in which the writer, +while striving to do justice to Carlyle's genius, protests strongly +and uncompromisingly against the tendency of his teaching. + +[Footnote A: Reprinted in the "Life and Writings of Joseph Mazzini." +(London, 1867). Vol. iv. pp. 56-144.] + +Some months afterwards, when the House of Commons was occupied with +the illegal opening of Mazzini's letters, Carlyle spontaneously +stepped forward and paid the following tribute to his character:-- + +"TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"In your observations in yesterday's _Times_ on the late disgraceful +affair of Mr. Mazzini's letters and the Secretary of State, you +mention that Mr. Mazzini is entirely unknown to you, entirely +indifferent to you; and add, very justly, that if he were the most +contemptible of mankind, it would not affect your argument on the +subject.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Mr. Mazzini's character and habits and society are +nothing to the point, unless connected with some certain or probable +evidence of evil intentions or treasonable plots. We know nothing, +and care nothing about him. He may be the most worthless and the most +vicious creature in the world; but this is no reason of itself why +his letters should be detained and opened."--leading article, June 17, +1844.] + +"It may tend to throw farther light on this matter if I now certify +you, which I in some sort feel called upon to do, that Mr. Mazzini is +not unknown to various competent persons in this country; and that he +is very far indeed from being contemptible--none farther, or very few +of living men. I have had the honour to know Mr. Mazzini for a series +of years; and, whatever I may think of his practical insight and skill +in worldly affairs, I can with great freedom testify to all men that +he, if I have ever seen one such, is a man of genius and virtue, a man +of sterling veracity, humanity, and nobleness of mind; one of those +rare men, numerable unfortunately but as units in this world, who are +worthy to be called martyr-souls; who, in silence, piously in their +daily life, understand and practise what is meant by that. + +"Of Italian democracies and young Italy's sorrows, of extraneous +Austrian Emperors in Milan, or poor old chimerical Popes in Bologna, +I know nothing, and desire to know nothing; but this other thing I do +know, and can here declare publicly to be a fact, which fact all of +us that have occasion to comment on Mr. Mazzini and his affairs may do +well to take along with us, as a thing leading towards new clearness, +and not towards new additional darkness, regarding him and them. + +"Whether the extraneous Austrian Emperor and miserable old chimera +of a Pope shall maintain themselves in Italy, or be obliged to decamp +from Italy, is not a question in the least vital to Englishmen. But +it is a question vital to us that sealed letters in an English +post-office be, as we all fancied they were, respected as things +sacred; that opening of men's letters, a practice near of kin to +picking men's pockets, and to other still viler and far fataler forms +of scoundrelism be not resorted to in England, except in cases of the +very last extremity. When some new gunpowder plot may be in the +wind, some double-dyed high treason, or imminent national wreck not +avoidable otherwise, then let us open letters--not till then. + +"To all Austrian Kaisers and such like, in their time of trouble, +let us answer, as our fathers from of old have answered:--Not by such +means is help here for you. Such means, allied to picking of pockets +and viler forms of scoundrelism, are not permitted in this country for +your behoof. The right hon. Secretary does himself detest such, and +even is afraid to employ them. He dare not: it would be dangerous +for him! All British men that might chance to come in view of such +a transaction, would incline to spurn it, and trample on it, and +indignantly ask him what he meant by it? + +"I am, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE.[A] + + "Chelsea, June 18." + +[Footnote A: From _The Times_, Wednesday, June 19, 1844.] + +The autumn of this year was saddened for Carlyle by the loss of +the dear friend whose biography he afterwards wrote. On the 18th of +September, 1844--after a short career of melancholy promise, only half +fulfilled--John Sterling died, in his thirty-ninth year. + +The next work that appeared from Carlyle's pen--a special service +to history, and to the memory of one of England's greatest men--was +"Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, with Elucidations and a +Connecting Narrative," two volumes, published in 1845. If there were +any doubt remaining after the publication of the "French Revolution" +what position our author might occupy amongst the historians of the +age, it was fully removed on the appearance of "Cromwell's Letters." +The work obtained a great and an immediate popularity; and though +bulky and expensive, a very large impression was quickly sold. +These speeches and letters of Cromwell, the spelling and punctuation +corrected, and a few words added here and there for clearness' sake, +and to accommodate them to the language and style in use now, were +first made intelligible and effective by Mr. Carlyle. "The authentic +utterances of the man Oliver himself," he says, "I have gathered them +from far and near; fished them up from the foul Lethean quagmires +where they lay buried. I have washed, or endeavoured to wash them +clean from foreign stupidities--such a job of buckwashing as I do not +long to repeat--and the world shall now see them in their own shape." +The work was at once republished in America, and two editions were +called for here within the year. + +While engaged on this work, Carlyle went down to Rugby by express +invitation, on Friday, 13th May, 1842, and on the following day +explored the field of Naseby, in company with Dr. Arnold. The meeting +of two such remarkable men--only six weeks before the death of +the latter--has in it something solemn and touching, and unusually +interesting. Carlyle left the school-house, expressing the hope that +it might "long continue to be what was to him one of the rarest sights +in the world--a temple of industrious peace." + +Arnold, who, with the deep sympathy arising from kindred nobility of +soul, had long cherished a high reverence for Carlyle, was very proud +of having received such a guest under his roof, and during those few +last weeks of life was wont to be in high spirits, talking with his +several guests, and describing with much interest, his recent visit to +Naseby with Carlyle, "its position on some of the highest table-land +in England--the streams falling on the one side into the Atlantic, on +the other into the German Ocean--far away, too, from any town--Market +Harborough, the nearest, into which the cavaliers were chased late in +the long summer evening on the fourteenth of June." + +Perhaps the most graphic description of Carlyle's manner and +conversation ever published, is contained in the following passage +from a letter addressed to Emerson by an accomplished American, +Margaret Fuller, who visited England in the autumn of 1846, and whose +strange, beautiful history and tragical death on her homeward voyage, +are known to most readers. + +The letter is dated Paris, November 16, 1846. + +"Of the people I saw in London, you will wish me to speak first of the +Carlyles. Mr. C. came to see me at once, and appointed an evening to +be passed at their house. That first time, I was delighted with him. +He was in a very sweet humour,--full of wit and pathos, without being +overbearing or oppressive. I was quite carried away with the rich flow +of his discourse, and the hearty, noble earnestness of his personal +being brought back the charm which once was upon his writing, before I +wearied of it. I admired his Scotch, his way of singing his great full +sentences, so that each one was like the stanza of a narrative ballad. +He let me talk, now and then, enough to free my lungs and change my +position, so that I did not get tired. That evening, he talked of the +present state of things in England, giving light, witty sketches +of the men of the day, fanatics and others, and some sweet, homely +stories he told of things he had known of the Scotch peasantry. + +"Of you he spoke with hearty kindness; and he told, with beautiful +feeling, a story of some poor farmer, or artisan in the country, who +on Sunday lays aside the cark and care of that dirty English world, +and sits reading the Essays, and looking upon the sea. + +"I left him that night, intending to go out very often to their +house. I assure you there never was anything so witty as Carlyle's +description of ---- ----. It was enough to kill one with laughing. +I, on my side, contributed a story to his fund of anecdote on this +subject, and it was fully appreciated. Carlyle is worth a thousand of +you for that;--he is not ashamed to laugh when he is amused, but goes +on in a cordial, human fashion. + +"The second time Mr. C. had a dinner-party, at which was a witty, +French, flippant sort of man, author of a History of Philosophy,[A] +and now writing a Life of Goethe, a task for which he must be as unfit +as irreligion and sparkling shallowness can make him. But he told +stories admirably, and was allowed sometimes to interrupt Carlyle a +little, of which one was glad, for that night he was in his more acrid +mood, and though much more brilliant than on the former evening, grew +wearisome to me, who disclaimed and rejected almost everything he +said. + +[Footnote A: George Henry Lewes.] + +"For a couple of hours he was talking about poetry, and the whole +harangue was one eloquent proclamation of the defects in his own mind. +Tennyson wrote in verse because the schoolmasters had taught him that +it was great to do so, and had thus, unfortunately, been turned from +the true path for a man. Burns had, in like manner, been turned from +his vocation. Shakespeare had not had the good sense to see that +it would have been better to write straight on in prose;--and such +nonsense, which, though amusing enough at first, he ran to death after +a while. + +"The most amusing part is always when he comes back to some refrain, +as in the French Revolution of the _sea-green_. In this instance, it +was Petrarch and _Laura_, the last word pronounced with his ineffable +sarcasm of drawl. Although he said this over fifty times, I could not +help laughing when _Laura_ would come. Carlyle running his chin out +when he spoke it, and his eyes glancing till they looked like the eyes +and beak of a bird of prey. + +Poor Laura! Luckily for her that her poet had already got her safely +canonized beyond the reach of this Teufelsdröckh vulture. + +"The worst of hearing Carlyle is, that you cannot interrupt him. I +understand the habit and power of haranguing have increased very much +upon him, so that you are a perfect prisoner when he has once got hold +of you. To interrupt him is a physical impossibility. If you get a +chance to remonstrate for a moment, he raises his voice and bears +you down. True, he does you no injustice, and, with his admirable +penetration, sees the disclaimer in your mind, so that you are not +morally delinquent; but it is not pleasant to be unable to utter it. +The latter part of the evening, however, he paid us for this, by a +series of sketches, in his finest style of railing and raillery, of +modern French literature, not one of them, perhaps, perfectly just, +but all drawn with the finest, boldest strokes, and, from his point of +view, masterly. All were depreciating, except that of Béranger. Of him +he spoke with perfect justice, because with hearty sympathy. + +"I had, afterward, some talk with Mrs. C., whom hitherto I had only +_seen_, for who can speak while her husband is there? I like her very +much;--she is full of grace, sweetness, and talent. Her eyes are sad +and charming. + + * * * * * + +"After this, they went to stay at Lord Ashburton's, and I only saw +them once more, when they came to pass an evening with us. Unluckily, +Mazzini was with us, whose society, when he was there alone, I enjoyed +more than any. He is a beauteous and pure music: also, he is a dear +friend of Mrs. C., but his being there gave the conversation a turn to +'progress' and ideal subjects, and C. was fluent in invectives on +all our 'rose-water imbecilities.' We all felt distant from him, and +Mazzini, after some vain efforts to remonstrate, became very sad. Mrs. +C. said to me,-- + +"'These are but opinions to Carlyle, but to Mazzini, who has given his +all, and helped bring his friends to the scaffold, in pursuit of such +subjects, it is a matter of life and death.' + +"All Carlyle's talk, that evening, was a defence of mere +force,--success the test of right;--if people would not behave well, +put collars round their necks;--find a hero, and let them be his +slaves, &c. It was very Titanic, and anti-celestial. I wish the last +evening had been more melodious. However, I bid Carlyle farewell with +feelings of the warmest friendship and admiration. We cannot feel +otherwise to a great and noble nature, whether it harmonise with our +own or not. I never appreciated the work he has done for his age +till I saw England. I could not. You must stand in the shadow of that +mountain of shams, to know how hard it is to cast light across it. + +"Honour to Carlyle! _Hoch_! Although, in the wine with which we drink +this health, I, for one, must mingle the despised 'rose-water.' + +"And now, having to your eye shown the defects of my own mind, in +the sketch of another, I will pass on more lowly,--more willing to be +imperfect, since Fate permits such noble creatures, after all, to +be only this or that. It is much if one is not only a crow or +magpie;--Carlyle is only a lion. Some time we may, all in full, be +intelligent and humanely fair." + + * * * * * + +"_December_, 1846.--Accustomed to the infinite wit and exuberant +richness of his writings, his talk is still an amazement and +a splendour scarcely to be faced with steady eyes. He does not +converse;--only harangues. It is the usual misfortune of such marked +men,--happily not one invariable or inevitable,--that they cannot +allow other minds room to breathe, and show themselves in their +atmosphere, and thus miss the refreshment and instruction which the +greatest never cease to need from the experience of the humblest. + +"Carlyle allows no one a chance, but bears down all opposition, not +only by his wit and onset of words, resistless in their sharpness as +so many bayonets, but by actual physical superiority,--raising his +voice, and rushing on his opponent with a torrent of sound. This is +not in the least from unwillingness to allow freedom to others. On the +contrary, no man would more enjoy a manly resistance to his thought. +But it is the impulse of a mind accustomed to follow out its own +impulse, as the hawk its prey, and which knows not how to stop in +the chase. Carlyle, indeed, is arrogant and overbearing; but in his +arrogance there is no littleness,--no self-love. It is the heroic +arrogance of some old Scandinavian conqueror;--it is his nature, and +the untameable impulse that has given him power to crush the dragons. +You do not love him, perhaps, nor revere; and perhaps, also, he would +only laugh at you if you did; but you like him heartily, and like to +see him the powerful smith, the Siegfried, melting all the old iron +in his furnace till it glows to a sunset red, and burns you, if you +senselessly go too near. + +"He seems, to me, quite isolated,--lonely as the desert,--yet never +was a man more fitted to prize a man, could he find one to match +his mood. He finds them, but only in the past. He sings, rather than +talks. He pours upon you a kind of satirical, heroical, critical poem, +with regular cadences, and generally catching up, near the beginning, +some singular epithet, which serves as a _refrain_ when his song is +full, or with which, as with a knitting needle, he catches up the +stitches, if he has chanced, now and then, to let fall a row. + +"For the higher kinds of poetry he has no sense, and his talk on that +subject is delightfully and gorgeously absurd. He sometimes stops a +minute to laugh at it himself, then begins anew with fresh vigour; for +all the spirits he is driving before him seem to him as Fata Morganas, +ugly masks, in fact, if he can but make them turn about; but he laughs +that they seem to others such dainty Ariels. His talk, like his books, +is full of pictures; his critical strokes masterly. Allow for his +point of view, and his survey is admirable. He is a large subject. I +cannot speak more or wiselier of him now, nor needs it;--his works are +true, to blame and praise him,--the Siegfried of England,--great and +powerful, if not quite invulnerable, and of a might rather to destroy +evil, than legislate for good."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli." (Boston, 1852.) Vol. +iii., pp. 96-104.] + +In 1848 Mr. Carlyle contributed a series of articles to the _Examiner_ +and _Spectator_, principally on Irish affairs, which, as he has never +yet seen fit to reprint them in his Miscellanies, are apparently quite +unknown to the general public. With the exception of the last, they +may be considered as a sort of alarum note, sounded to herald +the approach of the Latter-Day Pamphlets, which appeared shortly +afterwards. + +The following is a list of these newspaper articles:-- + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + March 4. "Louis Philippe." + April 29. "Repeal of the Union." + May 13. "Legislation for Ireland." + +In _The Spectator_, 1848. + + May 13. "Ireland and the British Chief Governor." + " "Irish Regiments (of the New Era)." + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + Dec. 2. "Death of Charles Buller." + +The last-named paper, a tribute to the memory of his old pupil, we +shall give entire. Another man of genius,[A] now also gone to his +rest, sang sorrowfully on the same occasion: + +[Footnote A: W.M. Thackeray.] + + "Who knows the inscrutable design? + Blest be He who took and gave! + Why should your mother, Charles, not mine, + Be weeping at her darling's grave? + + We bow to Heaven that will'd it so, + That darkly rules the fate of all, + That sends the respite or the blow, + That's free to give, or to recall." + +Carlyle's paper reads like a solemn and touching funeral oration to +the uncovered mourners as they stand round the grave before it is +closed:-- + +"A very beautiful soul has suddenly been summoned from among us; one +of the clearest intellects, and most aërial activities in England, +has unexpectedly been called away. Charles Buller died on Wednesday +morning last, without previous sickness, reckoned of importance, till +a day or two before. An event of unmixed sadness, which has created a +just sorrow, private and public. The light of many a social circle +is dimmer henceforth, and will miss long a presence which was always +gladdening and beneficent; in the coming storms of political trouble, +which heap themselves more and more in ominous clouds on our horizon, +one radiant element is to be wanting now. + +"Mr. Buller was in his forty-third year, and had sat in Parliament +some twenty of those. A man long kept under by the peculiarities of +his endowment and position, but rising rapidly into importance of late +years; beginning to reap the fruits of long patience, and to see an +ever wider field open round him. He was what in party language is +called a 'Reformer,' from his earliest youth; and never swerved from +that faith, nor could swerve. His luminous sincere intellect laid bare +to him in all its abject incoherency the thing that was untrue, which +thenceforth became for him a thing that was not tenable, that it was +perilous and scandalous to attempt maintaining. Twenty years in +the dreary, weltering lake of parliamentary confusion, with its +disappointments and bewilderments, had not quenched this tendency, in +which, as we say, he persevered as by a law of nature itself, for the +essence of his mind was clearness, healthy purity, incompatibility +with fraud in any of its forms. What he accomplished, therefore, +whether great or little, was all to be _added_ to the sum of good; +none of it to be deducted. There shone mildly in his whole conduct +a beautiful veracity, as if it were unconscious of itself; a perfect +spontaneous absence of all cant, hypocrisy, and hollow pretence, +not in word and act only, but in thought and instinct. To a singular +extent it can be said of him that he was a spontaneous clear man. Very +gentle, too, though full of fire; simple, brave, graceful. What he +did, and what he said, came from him as light from a luminous body, +and had thus always in it a high and rare merit, which any of the more +discerning could appreciate fully. + +"To many, for a long while, Mr. Buller passed merely for a man of wit, +and certainly his beautiful natural gaiety of character, which by no +means meant _levity_, was commonly thought to mean it, and did for +many years, hinder the recognition of his intrinsic higher qualities. +Slowly it began to be discovered that, under all this many-coloured +radiancy and coruscation, there burnt a most steady light; a sound, +penetrating intellect, full of adroit resources, and loyal by nature +itself to all that was methodic, manful, true;--in brief, a mildly +resolute, chivalrous, and gallant character, capable of doing much +serious service. + +"A man of wit he indisputably was, whatever more amongst the wittiest +of men. His speech, and manner of being, played everywhere like soft +brilliancy of lambent fire round the common objects of the hour, and +was, beyond all others that English society could show, entitled to +the name of excellent, for it was spontaneous, like all else in him, +genuine, humane,--the glittering play of the soul of a real man. To +hear him, the most serious of men might think within himself, 'How +beautiful is human gaiety too!' Alone of wits, Buller never made wit; +he could be silent, or grave enough, where better was going; often +rather liked to be silent if permissible, and always was so where +needful. His wit, moreover, was ever the ally of wisdom, not of folly, +or unkindness, or injustice; no soul was ever hurt by it; never, we +believe, never, did his wit offend justly any man, and often have we +seen his ready resource relieve one ready to be offended, and light up +a pausing circle all into harmony again. In truth, it was beautiful to +see such clear, almost childlike simplicity of heart coexisting with +the finished dexterities, and long experiences, of a man of the world. +Honour to human worth, in whatever form we find it! This man was true +to his friends, true to his convictions,--and true without effort, +as the magnet is to the north. He was ever found on the right +side; helpful to it, not obstructive of it, in all he attempted or +performed. + +"Weak health; a faculty indeed brilliant, clear, prompt, not deficient +in depth either, or in any kind of active valour, but wanting the +stern energy that could long endure to _continue_ in the deep, in the +chaotic, new, and painfully incondite--this marked out for him his +limits; which, perhaps with regrets enough, his natural veracity and +practicality would lead him quietly to admit and stand by. He was not +the man to grapple, in its dark and deadly dens, with the Lernæan coil +of social Hydras; perhaps not under any circumstances: but he did, +unassisted, what he could; faithfully himself did something--nay, +something truly considerable;--and in his _patience_ with the much +that by him and his strength could not be done let us grant there was +something of beautiful too! + +"Properly, indeed, his career as a public man was but beginning. +In the office he last held, much was silently expected of him; he +himself, too, recognised well what a fearful and immense question this +of Pauperism is; with what ominous rapidity the demand for solution +of it is pressing on; and how little the world generally is yet +aware what methods and principles, new, strange, and altogether +contradictory to the shallow maxims and idle philosophies current at +present, would be needed for dealing with it! This task he perhaps +contemplated with apprehension; but he is not now to be tried with +this, or with any task more. He has fallen, at this point of the +march, an honourable soldier; and has left us here to fight along +without him. Be his memory dear and honourable to us, as that of +one so worthy ought. What in him was true and valiant endures for +evermore--beyond all memory or record. His light, airy brilliancy has +suddenly become solemn, fixed in the earnest stillness of Eternity. +_There_ shall we also, and our little works, all shortly be." + +In 1850 appeared the "Latter-Day Pamphlets," essays suggested by the +convulsions of 1848, in which, more than in any previous publication, +the author spoke out in the character of a social and political censor +of his own age. "He seemed to be the worshipper of mere brute force, +the advocate of all harsh, coercive measures. Model prisons and +schools for the reform of criminals, poor-laws, churches as at present +constituted, the aristocracy, parliament, and other institutions, were +assailed and ridiculed in unmeasured terms, and generally, the +English public was set down as composed of sham heroes, and a valet +or 'flunkey' world." From their very nature as stern denunciations +of what the author considered contemporary fallacies, wrongs, and +hypocrisies, these pamphlets produced a storm of critical indignation +against him. + +The life of John Sterling was published in the following year; and +Carlyle then began that long spell of work--the "History of Frederick +the Great"--which extended over thirteen years, the last, and perhaps +the greatest, monument of his genius. + +In 1856, when we may suppose his mind to be full of the details of +battles, and overflowing with military tactics, he received from Sir +W. Napier his "History of the Administration of Scinde," and wrote the +following letter to the author:-- + + "THOMAS CARLYLE TO SIR WILLIAM NAPIER. + + "Chelsea, May 12, 1856. + +"DEAR SIR, + +"I have read with attention, and with many feelings and reflections, +your record of Sir C. Napier's Administration of Scinde. You must +permit me to thank you, in the name of Britain at large, for writing +such a book; and in my own poor name to acknowledge the great +compliment and kindness implied in sending me a copy for myself. + +"It is a book which every living Englishman would be the better +for reading--for studying diligently till he saw into it, till he +recognised and believed the high and tragic phenomenon set forth +there! A book which may be called 'profitable' in the old Scripture +sense; profitable for reproof, for correction and admonition, for +great sorrow, yet for 'building up in righteousness' too--in heroic, +manful endeavour to do well, and not ill, in one's time and place. +One feels it a kind of possession to know that one has had such a +fellow-citizen and contemporary in these evil days. + +"The fine and noble qualities of the man are very recognisable to me; +his subtle, piercing intellect turned all to the practical, giving +him just insight into men and into things; his inexhaustible adroit +contrivances; his fiery valour; sharp promptitude to seize the good +moment that will not return. A lynx-eyed, fiery man, with the spirit +of an old knight in him; more of a hero than any modern I have seen +for a long time. + +"A singular veracity one finds in him; not in his words alone--which, +however, I like much for their fine rough _naïveté_--but in his +actions, judgments, aims; in all that he thinks, and does, and +says--which, indeed, I have observed is the root of all greatness or +real worth in human creatures, and properly the first (and also the +rarest) attribute of what we call _genius_ among men. + +"The path of such a man through the foul jungle of this world--the +struggle of Heaven's inspiration against the terrestrial fooleries, +cupidities, and cowardices--cannot be other than tragical: but the man +does tear out a bit of way for himself too; strives towards the good +goal, inflexibly persistent till his long rest come: the man does +leave his mark behind him, ineffaceable, beneficent to all good men, +maleficent to none: and we must not complain. The British nation of +this time, in India or elsewhere--God knows no nation ever had more +need of such men, in every region of its affairs! But also perhaps no +nation ever had a much worse chance to get hold of them, to recognise +and loyally second them, even when they are there. + +"Anarchic stupidity is wide as the night; victorious wisdom is but as +a lamp in it shining here and there. Contrast a Napier even in Scinde +with, for example, a Lally at Pondicherry or on the Place de Grève; +one has to admit that it is the common lot, that it might have been +far worse! + +"There is great talent in this book apart from its subject. The +narrative moves on with strong, weighty step, like a marching phalanx, +with the gleam of clear steel in it--sheers down the opponent objects +and tramples them out of sight in a very potent manner. The writer, +it is evident, had in him a lively, glowing image, complete in all its +parts, of the transaction to be told; and that is his grand secret +of giving the reader so lively a conception of it. I was surprised to +find how much I had carried away with me, even of the Hill campaign +and of Trukkee itself; though without a map the attempt to understand +such a thing seemed to me desperate at first. + +"With many thanks, and gratified to have made this reflex +acquaintance, which, if it should ever chance to become a direct one, +might gratify me still more, + + "I remain always yours sincerely, + + "T. CARLYLE."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Life of General Sir William Napier, K.C.B." Edited by +H.A. Bruce, M.P. London: Murray, 1864. Vol. ii. pp. 312-314.] + +In June, 1861, a few days after the great fire in which Inspector +Braidwood perished in the discharge of his duty, Carlyle broke a long +silence with the following letter:-- + + "TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"There is a great deal of public sympathy, and of deeper sort than +usual, awake at present on the subject of Inspector Braidwood. It is +a beautiful emotion, and apparently a perfectly just one, and well +bestowed. Judging by whatever light one gets, Braidwood seems to have +been a man of singular worth in his department, and otherwise; such a +servant as the public seldom has. Thoroughly skilled in his function, +nobly valiant in it, and faithful to it--faithful to the death. +In rude, modest form, actually a kind of hero, who has perished in +serving us! + +"Probably his sorrowing family is not left in wealthy circumstances. +Most certainly it is pity when a generous emotion, in many men, or in +any man, has to die out futile, and leave no _action_ behind it. The +question, therefore, suggests itself--Should not there be a 'Braidwood +Testimonial,' the proper parties undertaking it, in a modest, serious +manner, the public silently testifying (to such extent, at least) what +worth its emotion has? + +"I venture to throw out this hint, and, if it be acted on, will, with +great satisfaction, give my mite among other people; but must, for +good reasons, say further, that this [is] all I can do in the matter +(of which, indeed, I know nothing but what everybody knows, and a +great deal less than every reader of the newspapers knows); and that, +in particular, I cannot answer any letters on the subject, should such +happen to be sent me. + +"In haste, I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "T. CARLYLE.[A] + + "5, Cheyne-row, Chelsea, June 30." + +[Footnote A: (Printed in _The Times_, Tuesday, July 2, 1861.)] + +The "History of Frederick the Great" was completed early in 1865. +Later in the same year the students of Edinburgh University elected +Carlyle as Lord Rector. We cannot do better than describe the +proceedings and the subsequent address in the words of the late +Alexander Smith:-- + +"Mr. Gladstone demitted office, and then it behoved the students of +the University to cast about for a worthy successor. Two candidates +were proposed, Mr. Carlyle and Mr. Disraeli; and on the election day +Mr. Carlyle was returned by a large and enthusiastic majority. This +was all very well, but a doubt lingered in the minds of many whether +Mr. Carlyle would accept the office, or if accepting it, whether he +would deliver an address--said address being the sole apple which the +Rectorial tree is capable of bearing. The hare was indeed caught, but +it was doubtful somewhat whether the hare would allow itself to be +_cooked_ after the approved academical fashion. It was tolerably well +known that Mr. Carlyle had emerged from his long spell of work on +"Frederick," in a condition of health the reverse of robust; that +he had once or twice before declined similar honours from Scottish +Universities--from Glasgow some twelve or fourteen years ago, and from +Aberdeen some seven or eight; and that he was constitutionally opposed +to all varieties of popular displays, more especially those of the +oratorical sort. + +"But all dispute was ended when it was officially announced that Mr. +Carlyle had accepted the office of Lord Rector, that he would conform +to all its requirements, and that the Rectorial address would be +delivered late in spring. And so when the days began to lengthen in +these northern latitudes, and crocuses to show their yellow and purple +heads, people began to talk about the visit of the great writer, and +to speculate on what manner and fashion of speech he would deliver. + +"Edinburgh has no University Hall, and accordingly when speech-day +approached, the largest public room in the city was chartered by the +University authorities. This public room--the Music Hall in George +Street--will contain, under severe pressure, from eighteen hundred to +nineteen hundred persons, and tickets to that extent were secured by +the students and members of the General Council. Curious stories are +told of the eagerness on every side manifested to hear Mr. Carlyle. +Country clergymen from beyond Aberdeen came into Edinburgh for the +sole purpose of hearing and seeing. Gentlemen came down from London +by train the night before, and returned to London by train the night +after. + +"In a very few minutes after the doors were opened the large hall was +filled in every part, and when up the central passage the Principal, +the Lord Rector, the Members of the Senate, and other gentlemen +advanced towards the platform, the cheering was vociferous and hearty. +The Principal occupied the chair of course, the Lord Rector on his +right, the Lord Provost on his left. Every eye was fixed on the +Rector. To all appearance, as he sat, time and labour had dealt +tenderly with him. His face had not yet lost the country bronze which +he brought up with him from Dumfriesshire as a student fifty-six years +ago. His long residence in London had not touched his Annandale look, +nor had it--as we soon learned--touched his Annandale accent. His +countenance was striking, homely, sincere, truthful--the countenance +of a man on whom 'the burden of the unintelligible world' had weighed +more heavily than on most. His hair was yet almost dark; his moustache +and short beard were iron grey. His eyes were wide, melancholy, +sorrowful; and seemed as if they had been at times a-weary of the +sun. Altogether in his aspect there was something aboriginal, as of +a piece, of unhewn granite, which had never been polished to any +approved pattern, whose natural and original vitality had never +been tampered with. In a word, there seemed no passivity about Mr. +Carlyle--he was the diamond, and the world was his pane of glass; he +was a graving tool rather than a thing graven upon--a man to set his +mark on the world--a man on whom the world could not set _its_ mark. +And just as, glancing towards Fife a few minutes before, one could not +help thinking of his early connection with Edward Irving, so seeing +him sit beside the venerable Principal of the University, one could +not help thinking of his earliest connection with literature. + +"Time brings men into the most unexpected relationships. When the +Principal was plain Mr. Brewster, editor of the Edinburgh Cyclopædia, +little dreaming that he should ever be Knight of Hanover and head +of the Northern Metropolitan University, Mr. Carlyle--just as little +dreaming that he should be the foremost man of letters of his day and +Lord Rector of the same University--was his contributor, writing for +said Cyclopædia biographies of Montesquieu and other notables. And so +it came about that after years of separation and of honourable labour, +the old editor and contributor were brought together again--in new +aspects. + +"The proceedings began by the conferring of the degree of LL.D. on Mr. +Erskine of Linlathen--an old friend of Mr. Carlyle's--on Professors +Huxley, Tyndall, and Ramsay, and on Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer. That +done, amid a tempest of cheering and hats enthusiastically waved, Mr. +Carlyle, slipping off his Rectorial robe--which must have been a very +shirt of Nessus to him--advanced to the table and began to speak in +low, wavering, melancholy tones, which were in accordance with +the melancholy eyes, and in the Annandale accent, with which his +playfellows must have been familiar long ago. So self-contained +was he, so impregnable to outward influences, that all his years +of Edinburgh and London life could not impair even in the slightest +degree, _that_. + +"The opening sentences were lost in the applause. What need of quoting +a speech which by this time has been read by everybody? Appraise it as +you please, it was a thing _per se_. Just as, if you wish a purple dye +you must fish up the Murex; if you wish ivory you must go to the east; +so if you desire an address such as Edinburgh listened to the other +day, you must go to Chelsea for it. It may not be quite to your taste, +but, in any case, there is no other intellectual warehouse in which +that kind of article is kept in stock. + +"The gratitude I owe to him is--or should be--equal to that of most. +He has been to me only a voice, sometimes sad, sometimes wrathful, +sometimes scornful; and when I saw him for the first time with the +eye of flesh stand up amongst us the other day, and heard him speak +kindly, brotherly, affectionate words--his first appearance of that +kind, I suppose, since he discoursed of Heroes and Hero Worship to the +London people--I am not ashamed to confess that I felt moved towards +him, as I do not think in any possible combination of circumstances I +could have felt moved towards any other living man."[A] + +[Footnote A: _The Argosy_, May, 1866.] + +The Edinburgh correspondent to a London paper thus describes what took +place:-- + +"A vast interest among the intelligent public has been excited by the +prospect of Mr. Thomas Carlyle's appearance to be installed as Lord +Rector of the University of Edinburgh. With the exception of the +delivery of his lectures on Heroes and Hero-worship, he has avoided +oratory; and to many of his admirers the present occasion seemed +likely to afford their only chance of ever seeing him in the flesh, +and hearing his living voice. The result has been, that the University +authorities have been beset by applications in number altogether +unprecedented--to nearly all of which they could only give the +reluctant answer, that admission for strangers was impossible. The +students who elect Mr. Carlyle received tickets, if they applied +within the specified time, and the members of the University +council, or graduates, obtained the residue according to priority of +application. Ladies' tickets to the number of one hundred and fifty +were issued, each professor obtaining four, and the remaining thirty +being placed at the disposal of Sir David Brewster, the Principal. And +the one hundred and fifty lucky ladies were conspicuous in the front +of the gallery to-day, having been admitted before the doors for +students and other males were open. + +"The hour appointed for letting them in was kept precisely--it was +half-past one P.M., but an hour before it, despite occasional +showers of rain, a crowd had begun to gather at the front door of +the music-hall, and at the opening of the door it had gathered to +proportions sufficient to half fill the building, its capacity under +severe crushing being about two thousand. + +"When the door was opened, they rushed in as crowds of young men +only can and dare rush, and up the double stairs they streamed like +a torrent; which torrent, however, policemen and check-gates soon +moderated. I chanced to fall into a lucky current of the crowd, and +got in amongst the first two or three hundred, and got forward to the +fourth seat from the platform, as good a place for seeing and hearing +as any. + +"The proceedings of the day were fixed to commence at two P.M., and +the half-hour of waiting was filled up by the students in throwing +occasional volleys of peas, whistling _en masse_ various lively tunes, +and in clambering, like small escalading parties, on to and over the +platform to take advantage of the seats in the organ gallery behind. +For Edinburgh students, however, let me say that these proceedings +were singularly decorous. They did indulge in a little fun when +nothing else was doing, but they did not come for that alone. Any +student who wanted fun could have sold his ticket at a handsome +profit, for which better fun could be had elsewhere. I heard among the +crowd that some students had got so high a price as a guinea each for +their tickets, and I heard of others who had been offered no less +but had refused it. And I must say further, that they listened to Mr. +Carlyle's address with as much attention and reverence as they could +have bestowed on a prophet--only I daresay most prophets would have +elicited less applause and laughter. + +"Shortly before two, the city magistrates and a few other personages +mounted the platform, and, with as much quietness as the fancy of the +students directed, took the seats which had been marked out for them +by large red pasteboard tickets. At two precisely the students in +the organ gallery started to the tops of the seats and began to cheer +vociferously, and almost instantly all the audience followed their +example. The procession was on its way through the hall, and in half +a minute Lord Provost Chambers, in his official robes, mounted the +platform stair; then Principal Sir David Brewster and Lord Rector +Carlyle, both in their gold-laced robes of office; then the Rev. Dr. +Lee, and the other professors, in their gowns; also the LL.D.'s to be, +in black gowns. Lord Neaves and Dr. Guthrie were there in an LL.D.'s +black gown and blue ribbons; Mr. Harvey, the President of the Royal +Academy, and Sir D. Baxter, Bart.--men conspicuous in their plain +clothes. + +"Dr. Lee offered up a prayer of a minute and a half, at the 'Amen' of +which I could see Mr. Carlyle bow very low. Then the business of the +occasion commenced. Mr. Gibson--a tall, thin, pale-faced, beardless, +acute, composed-looking young gentleman, in an M.A.'s gown--introduced +Mr. Carlyle, 'the most distinguished son of the University,' to the +Principal, Sir David Brewster, as the Lord Rector elected by the +students. Sir David saluted him as such, thinking, perhaps, of the +time when, an unknown young man, Thomas Carlyle wrote articles for +Brewster's 'Cyclopædia,' and got Brewster's name to introduce to +public notice his translation of Legendre's 'Geometry.' Next Professor +Muirhead, for the time being the Dean of the Faculty of Laws in the +University, introduced various gentlemen to the Principal in order, +as persons whom the senate had thought worthy of the degree of LL.D., +giving a dignified, but not always very happy, account of the merits +of each. There was Mr. Erskine, of Linlathen, Mr. Carlyle's host for +the time being, and often previously, an old friend of Irving and +Chalmers, himself the writer of various elegant and sincere religious +books, and one of the best and most amiable of men. If intelligent +goodness ever entitled any one to the degree of LL.D., he certainly +deserves it; and when I say this, I do not insinuate that on grounds +of pure intellect he is not well entitled to the honour. He is now, I +should think, nearer eighty than seventy years of age--a mild-looking, +full-eyed old man, with a face somewhat of the type of Lord Derby's. +There was Professor Huxley, young in years, dark, heavy-browed, alert +and resolute, but not moulded after any high ideal; and there was +Professor Tyndall, also young, lithe of limb, and nonchalant in +manner. When his name was called he sat as if he had no concern +in what was going on, and then rose with an easy smile, partly of +modesty, but in great measure of indifference. + +"Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer and first discoverer of the fate of Sir +John Franklin, who is an M.D. of Edinburgh, was now made LL.D. He is +of tall, wiry, energetic figure, slightly baldish, with greyish, curly +hair, keen, handsome face, high crown and sloping forehead, and his +bearing is that of a soldier--of a man who has both given and obeyed +commands, and been drilled to stand steady and upright. Carlyle +himself was offered the degree of LL.D., but he declined the honour, +laughing it off, in fact, in a letter, with such excuses as that he +had a brother a Dr. Carlyle (an M.D., also a man of genius, I insert +parenthetically, and known in literature as a translator of 'Dante'), +and that if two Dr. Carlyles should appear at Paradise, mistakes might +arise. + +"After all the LL.D's had heard their merits enumerated, and had had +a black hood or wallet of some kind, with a blue ribbon conspicuous in +it, flung over their heads, Principal Brewster announced that the Lord +Rector would now deliver his address. Thereupon Mr. Carlyle rose at +once, shook himself out of his gold-laced rectorial gown, left it on +his chair, and stepped quietly to the table, and drawing his tall, +bony frame into a position of straight perpendicularity not possible +to one man in five hundred at seventy years of age, he began to speak +quietly and distinctly, but nervously. There was a slight flush on +his face, but he bore himself with composure and dignity, and in the +course of half an hour he was obviously beginning to feel at his ease, +so far at least as to have adequate command over the current of his +thought. + +"He spoke on quite freely and easily, hardly ever repeated a word, +never looked at a note, and only once returned to finish up a topic +from which he had deviated. He apologised for not having come with +a written discourse. It was usual, and 'it would have been more +comfortable for me just at present,' but he had tried it, and could +not satisfy himself, and 'as the spoken word comes from the heart,' he +had resolved to try that method. What he said in words will be learned +otherwise than from me. I could not well describe it; but I do not +think I ever heard any address that I should be so unwilling to blot +from my memory. Not that there was much in it that cannot be found in +his writings, or inferred from them; but the manner of the man was a +key to the writings, and for naturalness and quiet power, I have never +seen anything to compare with it. He did not deal in rhetoric. He +talked--it was continuous, strong, quiet talk--like a patriarch about +to leave the world to the young lads who had chosen him and were just +entering the world. His voice is a soft, downy voice--not a tone in +it is of the shrill, fierce kind that one would expect it to be in +reading the Latter-day Pamphlets. + +"There was not a trace of effort or of affectation, or even of +extravagance. Shrewd common sense there was in abundance. There was +the involved disrupted style also, but it looked so natural that +reflection was needed to recognise in it that very style which purists +find to be un-English and unintelligible. Over the angles of this +disrupted style rolled out a few cascades of humour--quite as if +by accident. He let them go, talking on in his soft, downy accents, +without a smile; occasionally for an instant looking very serious, +with his dark eyes beating like pulses, but generally looking merely +composed and kindly, and so, to speak, father-like. He concluded by +reciting his own translation of a poem of Goethe-- + + "'The future hides in it gladness and sorrow.' + +And this he did in a style of melancholy grandeur not to be described, +but still less to be forgotten. It was then alone that the personality +of the philosopher and poet were revealed continuously in his manner +of utterance. The features of his face are familiar to all from his +portraits. But I do not think any portrait, unless, perhaps, Woolner's +medallion, gives full expression to the resolution that is visible +in his face. Besides, they all make him look sadder and older than he +appears. Although he be threescore and ten, his hair is still abundant +and tolerably black, and there is considerable colour in his cheek. +Not a man of his age on that platform to-day looked so young, and he +had done more work than any ten on it." + +The correspondent of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ gives some interesting +particulars:-- + +"Mr. Carlyle had not spoken in public before yesterday, since those +grand utterances on Heroes and Hero-worship in the institute in +Edwards Street, Marylebone, which one can scarcely believe, whilst +reading them, to have been, in the best sense, extemporaneously +delivered. In that case Mr. Carlyle began the series, as we have +heard, by bringing a manuscript which he evidently found much in his +way, and presently abandoned. On the second evening he brought some +notes or headings; but these also tripped him until he had left them. +The remaining lectures were given like his conversation, which no +one can hear without feeling that, with all its glow and inspiration, +every sentence would be, if taken down, found faultless. It was so +in his remarkable extemporaneous address yesterday. He had no notes +whatever. 'But,' says our correspondent, in transmitting the report, +'I have never heard a speech of whose more remarkable qualities so few +can be conveyed on paper. You will read of "applause" and "laughter," +but you will little realize the eloquent blood flaming up the +speaker's cheek, the kindling of his eye, or the inexpressible +voice and look when the drolleries were coming out. When he spoke +of clap-trap books exciting astonishment 'in the minds of foolish +persons,' the evident halting at the word '_fools_,' and the smoothing +of his hair, as if he must be decorous, which preceded the change +to 'foolish persons,' were exceedingly comical. As for the flaming +bursts, they took shape in grand tones, whose impression was made +deeper, not by raising, but by lowering the voice. Your correspondent +here declares that he should hold it worth his coming all the way +from London in the rain in the Sunday night train were it only to have +heard Carlyle say, "There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of all +California, or the getting of all the suffrages that are on the planet +just now!"' In the first few minutes of the address there was some +hesitation, and much of the shrinking that one might expect in a +secluded scholar; but these very soon cleared away, and during the +larger part, and to the close of the oration, it was evident that he +was receiving a sympathetic influence from his listeners, which he +did not fail to return tenfold. The applause became less frequent; +the silence became that of a woven spell; and the recitation of +the beautiful lines from Goethe, at the end, was so masterly--so +marvellous--that one felt in it that Carlyle's real anathemas against +rhetoric were but the expression of his knowledge that there is a +rhetoric beyond all other arts." + +In the _Times_ the following leader appeared upon Mr. Carlyle's +address:-- + +"There is something in the return of a man to the haunts of his youth, +after he has acquired fame and a recognised position in the world, +which is of itself sufficient to arrest attention. We are interested +in the retrospect and the contrast, the juxtaposition of the old and +the new, the hopes of early years, the memory of the struggles and +contests of manhood, the repose of victory. A man may differ as much +as he pleases from the doctrines of Mr. Carlyle, he may reject his +historical teachings, and may distrust his politics, but he must be +of a very unkindly disposition not to be touched by his reception +at Edinburgh. It is fifty-four years, he told the students of the +University, since he, a boy of fourteen, came as a student, 'full of +wonder and expectation,' to the old capital of his native country, and +now he returns, having accomplished the days of man spoken of by the +Psalmist, that he may be honoured by students of this generation, +and may give them a few words of advice on the life which lies before +them. + +"The discourse of the new Lord Rector squared very well with the +occasion. There was no novelty in it. New truths are not the gifts +which the old offer the young; the lesson we learn last is but the +fulness of the meaning of what was only partially apprehended at +first. Mr. Carlyle brought out things familiar enough to everyone who +has read his works; there were the old platitudes and the old truths, +and, it must be owned, mingled here and there with them the old +errors. Time has, however, its recompenses, and if the freshness of +youth seemed to be wanting in the address of the Rector, so also was +its crudity. There was a singular mellowness in Mr. Carlyle's speech, +which was reflected in the homely language in which it was couched. +The chief lessons he had to enforce were to avoid cram, and to be +painstaking, diligent, and patient in the acquisition of knowledge. +Students are not to try to make themselves acquainted with the +outsides of as many things as possible, and 'to go flourishing about' +upon the strength of their acquisitions, but to count a thing as known +only when it is stamped on their mind. The doctrine is only a new +reading of the old maxim, _non multa sed multum_, but it is as much +needed now as ever it was. Still more appropriate to the present day +was Mr. Carlyle's protest against the notion that a University is +the place where a man is to be fitted for the special work of a +profession. A University, as he puts it, teaches a man how to read, +or, as we may say more generally, how to learn. It is not the function +of such a place to offer particular and technical knowledge, but to +prepare a man for mastering any science by teaching him the method of +all. A child learns the use of his body, not the art of a carpenter or +smith, and the University student learns the use of his mind, not the +professional lore of a lawyer or a physician. It is pleasant to meet +with a strong reassertion of doctrines which the utilitarianism of a +commercial and manufacturing age is too apt to make us all forget. +Mr. Carlyle is essentially conservative in his notions on academic +functions. Accuracy, discrimination, judgment, are with him the be-all +and end-all of educational training. If a man has learnt to know a +thing in itself, and in its relation to surrounding phenomena, he +has got from a University what it is its proper duty to teach. +Accordingly, we find him bestowing a good word on poor old Arthur +Collins, who showed that he possessed these valuable qualities in the +humble work of compiling a Peerage. + +"The new Lord Rector is, however, as conservative in his choice of the +implements of study as he is in the determination of its objects. The +languages and the history of the great nations of antiquity he puts +foremost, like any other pedagogue. The Greeks and the Romans are, +he tells the Edinburgh students, 'a pair of nations shining in the +records left by themselves as a kind of pillar to light up life in the +darkness of the past ages;' and he adds that it would be well worth +their while to get an understanding of what these people were, and +what they did. It is here, however, that an old error of Mr. +Carlyle's crops up among his well-remembered truths. He quotes from +Machiavelli--evidently agreeing himself with the sentiment, though he +refrained from asking the assent of his audience to it--the statement +that the history of Rome showed that a democracy could not permanently +exist without the occasional intervention of a Dictator. It is +possible that if Machiavelli had had the experience of the centuries +which have elapsed since his day, he would have seen fit to alter his +conclusion, and it is to be regretted that the admiration which Mr. +Carlyle feels for the great men of history will not allow him to +believe in the possibility of a political society where each might +find his proper sphere and duty without disturbing the order and +natural succession of the commonwealth. His judgment on this point +is like that of a man who had only known the steam-engine before +the invention of governor balls, and was ready to declare that its +mechanism would be shattered if a boy were not always at hand to +regulate the pressure of the steam. + + * * * * * + +"We may turn, however, from this difference to another of Mr. +Carlyle's doctrines, which mark at once his independence of thought +and his respect for experience, where he declares the necessity for +recognising the hereditary principle in government, if there is to be +'any fixity in things.' In the same way we find him almost lamenting +the fact that Oxford, once apparently so fast-anchored as to be +immovable, has begun to twist and toss on the eddy of new ideas. + +"It is impossible to glance at Mr. Carlyle's Easter Monday discourse +without recalling the oration which his predecessor pronounced on +resigning office last autumn. * * * Mr. Carlyle is as simple and +practical as his predecessor was dazzling and rhetorical. An ounce of +mother wit, quotes the new Lord Rector, is worth a pound of clergy, +and while he admires Demosthenes, he prefers the eloquence of Phocion. +A little later he repeats his old doctrine on the virtue of silence, +laments the fact that 'the finest nations in the world--the English +and the American--are going all away into wind and tongue,' and +protests that a man is not to be esteemed wise because he has poured +out speech copiously. Mr. Carlyle has so often inculcated these +sentiments in his books that there can be no suspicion of an _arrière +pensée_ in their utterance now, but the contrast between him and his +predecessor is at the least instructive. Each does, however, in some +measure, supply what is deficient in the other. No one would claim +for the Chancellor of the Exchequer the intensity of power of his +successor, but in his abundant energy, his wide sympathy with popular +movement, and his real, if vague and indiscriminating, faith in the +activity and progress of modern life, he conveys lessons of trust +in the present, and hopefulness in the future, which would be +ill-exchanged for the patient and somewhat sad stoicism of Mr. +Carlyle." + +Carlyle was still in Scotland on April 21, and there the terrible and +solemn news had to be conveyed to him of the sudden death of her who +had been his true and faithful life-companion for forty years. + +Mrs. Carlyle died on Saturday, April 21, under very peculiar +circumstances. She was taking her usual drive in Hyde Park about four +o'clock, when her little favourite dog--which was running by the side +of the brougham--was run over by a carriage. She was greatly alarmed, +though the dog was not seriously hurt. She lifted the dog into the +carriage, and the man drove on. Not receiving any call or direction +from his mistress, as was usual, he stopped the carriage and +discovered her, as he thought, in a fit, or ill, and drove to +St. George's Hospital, which was near at hand. When there it was +discovered that she must have been dead some little time. Mrs. +Carlyle's health had been for several months feeble, but not in a +state to excite anxiety or alarm. + +On the following Wednesday her remains were conveyed from London to +Haddington for interment there, and the funeral took place on Thursday +afternoon. Mr. Carlyle was accompanied from London (whither he had +returned immediately on the receipt of that solemn message) by his +brother, Dr. Carlyle, Mr. John Forster, and the Hon. Mr. Twistleton. +The funeral cortège was followed on foot by a large number of +gentlemen who had known Mrs. Carlyle and her father, Dr. Welsh, +who was held in high estimation in the town, where he had practised +medicine till his death, in 1819. The grave, which is the same as +that occupied by Dr. Welsh's remains, lies in the centre of the ruined +choir of the old cathedral at Haddington. In accordance with the +Scottish practice, there was no service read, and Mr. Carlyle threw +a handful of earth on the coffin after it had been lowered into the +grave. + + * * * * * + +Carlyle wrote the following inscription to be placed on his wife's +tombstone:-- + + "Here likewise now rests Jane Welsh Carlyle, spouse of Thomas + Carlyle, Chelsea, London. She was born at Haddington 14th + July, 1801; only child of the above John Welsh and of Grace + Welsh, Caplegell, Dumfriesshire, his wife. In her bright + existence she had more sorrows than are common, but also a + soft invincibility, a clearness of discernment, and a noble + loyalty of heart which are rare. For forty years she was the + true and loving helpmate of her husband, and by act and word + unweariedly forwarded him as none else could in all of worthy + that he did or attempted. She died at London, 21st April, + 1866, suddenly snatched away from him, and the light of his + life as if gone out." + +Later in the same year, weighed down as he was by his great sorrow, +Carlyle nevertheless thought it a public duty to come forward +in defence of Governor Eyre, when the quelling of the Jamaica +insurrection excited so much controversy, and seemed to divide England +into two parties. He acted as Vice-President of the Defence Fund. The +following is a letter written to Mr. Hamilton Hume, giving his views +on the subject in full: + + "Ripple Court, Ringwould, Dover, + + "_August 23_, 1866. + +"SIR, + +"The clamour raised against Governor Eyre appears to me to be +disgraceful to the good sense of England; and if it rested on any +depth of conviction, and were not rather (as I always flatter myself +it is) a thing of rumour and hearsay, of repetition and reverberation, +mostly from the teeth outward, I should consider it of evil omen to +the country and to its highest interests in these times. For my own +share, all the light that has yet reached me on Mr. Eyre and his +history in the world goes steadily to establish the conclusion that he +is a just, humane, and valiant man, faithful to his trusts everywhere, +and with no ordinary faculty of executing them; that his late services +in Jamaica were of great, perhaps of incalculable value, as certainly +they were of perilous and appalling difficulty--something like the +case of 'fire,' suddenly reported, 'in the ship's powder room,' in +mid-ocean where the moments mean the ages, and life and death hang +on your use or misuse of the moments; and, in short, that penalty and +clamour are not the thing this Governor merits from any of us, but +honour and thanks, and wise imitation (I will farther say), should +similar emergencies arise, on the great scale or on the small, in +whatever we are governing! + +"The English nation never loved anarchy, nor was wont to spend its +sympathy on miserable mad seditions, especially of this inhuman and +half-brutish type; but always loved order, and the prompt suppression +of seditions, and reserved its tears for something worthier than +promoters of such delirious and fatal enterprises who had got their +wages for their sad industry. Has the English nation changed, then, +altogether? I flatter myself it is not, not yet quite; but only that +certain loose, superficial portions of it have become a great deal +louder, and not any wiser, than they formerly used to be. + +"At any rate, though much averse, at any time, and at this time in +particular, to figure on committees, or run into public noises without +call, I do at once, and feel that as a British citizen I should, and +must, make you welcome to my name for your committee, and to whatever +good it can do you. With the hope only that many other British men, of +far more significance in such a matter, will at once or gradually do +the like; and that, in fine, by wise effort and persistence, a blind +and disgraceful act of public injustice may be prevented; and an +egregrious folly as well--not to say, for none can say or compute, +what a vital detriment throughout the British Empire, in such an +example set to all the colonies and governors the British Empire has! + +"Farther service, I fear, I am not in a state to promise, but the +whole weight of my conviction and good wishes is with you; and if +other service possible to me do present itself, I shall not want for +willingness in case of need. Enclosed is my mite of contribution to + your fund."I have the honour to be yours truly, + + "T. CARLYLE." + + "To HAMILTON HUME, Esq., + "Hon. Sec. 'Eyre Defence Fund.'" + +In August, 1867, Carlyle broke silence again with an utterance in the +style of the _Latter-Day Pamphlets_, entitled "Shooting Niagara: and +After?" published anonymously (though everyone, of course, knew it to +be his) in _Macmillan's Magazine_. Shortly afterwards it was reprinted +as a separate pamphlet, with additions, and with the author's name on +the title-page. + +In February, 1868, Carlyle wrote some Recollections of Sir William +Hamilton, as a contribution to Professor Veitch's Memoir of that +accomplished metaphysician. + +In November, 1870, he addressed a long and very remarkable letter +to the _Times_, on the French-German war, which is reprinted in the +latest edition of his collected Miscellanies. + +Two years later (November, 1872) he added a very beautiful Supplement +to the People's Edition of his "Life of Schiller," founded on Saupe's +"Schiller and his Father's Household," and other more recent books on +Schiller that had appeared in Germany. + +His last literary productions were a series of papers on "The Early +Kings of Norway," and an Essay on "The Portraits of John Knox," which +appeared, in instalments, in _Fraser's Magazine_, in the first four +months of 1875. On the 4th December of that year, Carlyle attained +his eightieth year, and this anniversary was signalised by some of the +more distinguished of his friends and admirers by striking a medal, +the head being executed by Mr. Boehm, whose noble statue of Carlyle, +exhibited in the Royal Academy in the previous year, had won so much +merited praise from Mr. Ruskin and others. The medal was accompanied +by an address, signed by the subscribers. Carlyle seems to have been +much gratified with this honour, which took him quite by surprise, and +he expressed his acknowledgments as follows:-- + +"This of the medal and formal address of friends was an altogether +unexpected event, to be received as a conspicuous and peculiar honour, +without example hitherto anywhere in my life.... To you ... I address +my thankful acknowledgments, which surely are deep and sincere, and +will beg you to convey the same to all the kind friends so beautifully +concerned in it. Let no one of you be other than assured that the +beautiful transaction, in result, management, and intention, was +altogether gratifying, welcome, and honourable to me, and that I +cordially thank one and all of you for what you have been pleased +to do. Your fine and noble gift shall remain among my precious +possessions, and be the symbol to me of something still more _golden_ +than itself, on the part of my many dear and too generous friends, so +long as I continue in this world. + + "Yours and theirs, from the heart, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle's last public utterances were a letter on the Eastern +Question, addressed to Mr. George Howard, and printed in the _Times_ +of November 28, 1876, and a letter to the Editor of the _Times_, on +"The Crisis," printed in that journal on May 5, 1877. + +He was now beginning to feel the effects of his great age. Yearly and +monthly he grew more feeble. His wonted walking exercise had to be +curtailed, and at last abandoned. He was affectionately and piously +tended during these last years by his niece, Mary Aitken, now Mrs. +Alexander Carlyle. In the autumn of 1879 he lost his brother, Dr. John +Aitken Carlyle, the translator of Dante's "Inferno." + +The end came at last, after a long and gradual decay of strength. The +great writer and noble-hearted man passed away peacefully at about +half-past eight o'clock on the morning of Saturday, February 5, 1881, +in the eighty-sixth year of his age. + +His remains were conveyed to Scotland, and were laid in the +burial-ground at Ecclefechan, where the ashes of his father and +mother, and of others of his kindred, repose. He had executed what is +known in Scotch law as a "deed of mortification," by virtue of +which he bequeathed to Edinburgh University the estate of +Craigenputtoch--which had come to him through his wife--for the +foundation of ten Bursaries in the Faculty of Arts, to be called the +"John Welsh Bursaries." In his Will he bequeathed the books which +he had used in writing on Cromwell and Friedrich to Harvard College, +Massachusetts. + +In less than a month after his death, with a haste on many accounts +to be deplored, and which has excited much animadversion, his literary +executor, Mr. James Anthony Froude, the historian, issued two volumes +of posthumous "Reminiscences," written by Carlyle, partly in 1832, +and partly in 1866-67. The first section consists of a memorial paper, +written immediately after his father's death; the second contains +Reminiscences of his early friend, Edward Irving, commenced at Cheyne +Row in the autumn of 1866, and finished at Mentone on the 2nd January, +1867. The Reminiscences of Lord Jeffrey were begun on the following +day, and finished on January 19. The paper on Southey and Wordsworth, +relegated to the Appendix, was also written at Mentone between the +28th January and the 8th March, 1867. The Memorials of his wife, which +fill the greater part of the second volume, were written at Cheyne +Row, during the month after her death. + +Of the earlier portraits of Carlyle three are specially interesting, +1. The full-length sketch by "Croquis" (Daniel Maclise) which formed +one of the _Fraser_ Gallery portraits, and was published in the +magazine in June, 1833. (The original sketch of this is now deposited +in the Forster Collection at South Kensington.) 2. Count D'Orsay's +sketch, published by Mitchell in 1839, is highly characteristic of +the artist. It was taken when no man of position was counted a dutiful +subject who did not wear a black satin stock and a Petersham coat. +The great author's own favourite among the early portraits was 3. +the sketch by Samuel Laurence, engraved in Horne's "New Spirit of the +Age," published in 1844. Since the art of photography came into vogue, +a series of photographs of various degrees of merit and success have +been executed by Messrs. Elliott and Fry, and by Watkins. The late +Mrs. Cameron also produced a photograph of him in her peculiar style, +but it was not so successful as her fine portrait of Tennyson. An +oil-painting by Mr. Watts, exhibited some fifteen years ago, and now +also forming part of the Forster Collection at South Kensington, is +remarkable for its weird wildness; but it gave great displeasure to +the old philosopher himself! More lately we have a remarkable portrait +by Mr. Whistler, who seized the _tout ensemble_ of his illustrious +sitter's character and costume in a very effective manner. The _terra +cotta_ statue by Mr. Boehm, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1875, +has received such merited meed of enthusiastic praise from Mr. +Ruskin that it needs no added praise of ours. It has been excellently +photographed from two points of view by Mr. Hedderly, of Riley Street, +Chelsea. + +One of the best and happiest of the many likenesses of Mr. Carlyle +that appeared during the last decade of his life was a sketch by Mrs. +Allingham--a picture as well as a portrait--representing the venerable +philosopher in a long and picturesque dressing-gown, seated on a chair +and poring over a folio, in the garden at the back of the quaint old +house at Chelsea, which will henceforth, as long as it stands, be +associated with his memory. Beside him on the grass lies a long clay +pipe (a churchwarden) which he has been smoking in the sweet +morning air. So that altogether, as far as pictorial, graphic, and +photographic art can go, the features, form, and bodily semblance of +Carlyle will be as well known to future generations as they are to our +own. + + * * * * * + +The impression of his brilliant and eloquent talk, though it will +perhaps remain, for at least half a century to come, more or less +vivid to some of those of the new generation who were privileged to +hear it, will, of course, gradually fade away. But it seems +hardly probable that the rich legacy of his long roll of +writings--historical, biographical, critical--can be regarded as other +than a permanent one, in which each succeeding generation will find +fresh delight and instruction. The series of vivid pictures he has +left behind in his "French Revolution," in his "Cromwell," in his +"Frederick," can hardly become obsolete or cease to be attractive; nor +is such power of word-painting likely soon to be equalled or ever +to be surpassed. The salt of humour that savours nearly all he wrote +(that lambent humour that lightens and plays over the grimmest and +sternest of his pages) will also serve to keep his writings fresh and +readable. Many of his _dicta_ and opinions will doubtless be more and +more called in question, especially in those of his works which are +more directly of a didactic than a narrative character, and in regard +to subjects which he was by habit, by mental constitution, and by that +prejudice from which the greatest can never wholly free themselves, +incapable of judging broadly or soundly,--such, for instance, as the +scope and functions of painting and the fine arts generally, the value +of modern poetry, or the working of Constitutional and Parliamentary +institutions. + + RICHARD HERNE SHEPHERD. + + _Chelsea, June, 1881_. + + + + +ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS. + +[Illustration] + + + + + ADDRESS + DELIVERED TO THE + STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY, + APRIL 2, 1866. + + +GENTLEMEN, + +I have accepted the office you have elected me to, and have now the +duty to return thanks for the great honour done me. Your enthusiasm +towards me, I admit, is very beautiful in itself, however undesirable +it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling honourable +to all men, and one well known to myself when I was in a position +analogous to your own. I can only hope that it may endure to the +end--that noble desire to honour those whom you think worthy of +honour, and come to be more and more select and discriminate in the +choice of the object of it; for I can well understand that you +will modify your opinions of me and many things else as you go +on. (Laughter and cheers.) There are now fifty-six years gone +last November since I first entered your city, a boy of not quite +fourteen--fifty-six years ago--to attend classes here and gain +knowledge of all kinds, I know not what, with feelings of wonder and +awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this +is what we have come to. (Cheers.) There is something touching +and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third +generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up and +saying, "Well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the +vineyard: you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and +have had many judges." As the old proverb says, "He that builds by the +wayside has many masters." We must expect a variety of judges; but the +voice of young Scotland, through you, is really of some value to +me, and I return you many thanks for it, though I cannot describe my +emotions to you, and perhaps they will be much more conceivable if +expressed in silence. (Cheers.) + +When this office was proposed to me, some of you know that I was not +very ambitious to accept it, at first. I was taught to believe that +there were more or less certain important duties which would lie in +my power. This, I confess, was my chief motive in going into it--at +least, in reconciling the objections felt to such things; for if I can +do anything to honour you and my dear old _Alma Mater_, why should I +not do so? (Loud cheers.) Well, but on practically looking into the +matter when the office actually came into my hands, I find it grows +more and more uncertain and abstruse to me whether there is much real +duty that I can do at all. I live four hundred miles away from you, +in an entirely different state of things; and my weak health--now for +many years accumulating upon me--and a total unacquaintance with +such subjects as concern your affairs here,--all this fills me +with apprehension that there is really nothing worth the least +consideration that I can do on that score. You may, however, depend +upon it that if any such duty does arise in any form, I will use my +most faithful endeavour to do whatever is right and proper, according +to the best of my judgment. (Cheers.) + +In the meanwhile, the duty I have at present--which might be very +pleasant, but which is quite the reverse, as you may fancy--is to +address some words to you on some subjects more or less cognate to the +pursuits you are engaged in. In fact, I had meant to throw out some +loose observations--loose in point of order, I mean--in such a way as +they may occur to me--the truths I have in me about the business you +are engaged in, the race you have started on, what kind of race it is +you young gentlemen have begun, and what sort of arena you are likely +to find in this world. I ought, I believe, according to custom, to +have written all that down on paper, and had it read out. That would +have been much handier for me at the present moment (a laugh), but +when I attempted to write, I found that I was not accustomed to write +speeches, and that I did not get on very well. So I flung that away, +and resolved to trust to the inspiration of the moment--just to what +came uppermost. You will therefore have to accept what is readiest, +what comes direct from the heart, and you must just take that in +compensation for any good order of arrangement there might have been +in it. + +I will endeavour to say nothing that is not true, as far as I can +manage, and that is pretty much all that I can engage for. (A laugh.) +Advices, I believe, to young men--and to all men--are very seldom much +valued. There is a great deal of advising, and very little faithful +performing. And talk that does not end in any kind of action, is +better suppressed altogether. I would not, therefore, go much into +advising; but there is one advice I must give you. It is, in fact, the +summary of all advices, and you have heard it a thousand times, I dare +say; but I must, nevertheless, let you hear it the thousand and first +time, for it is most intensely true, whether you will believe it at +present or not--namely, that above all things the interest of your own +life depends upon being diligent now, while it is called to-day, +in this place where you have come to get education. Diligent! That +includes all virtues in it that a student can have; I mean to include +in it all qualities that lead into the acquirement of real instruction +and improvement in such a place. If you will believe me, you who +are young, yours is the golden season of life. As you have heard it +called, so it verily is, the seed-time of life, in which, if you do +not sow, or if you sow tares instead of wheat, you cannot expect to +reap well afterwards, and you will arrive at indeed little; while in +the course of years, when you come to look back, and if you have +not done what you have heard from your advisers--and among many +counsellers there is wisdom--you will bitterly repent when it is too +late. The habits of study acquired at Universities are of the highest +importance in after-life. At the season when you are in young years +the whole mind is, as it were, fluid, and is capable of forming itself +into any shape that the owner of the mind pleases to order it to form +itself into. The mind is in a fluid state, but it hardens up gradually +to the consistency of rock or iron, and you cannot alter the habits of +an old man, but as he has begun he will proceed and go on to the last. +By diligence, I mean among other things--and very chiefly--honesty in +all your inquiries into what you are about. Pursue your studies in the +way your conscience calls honest. More and more endeavour to do that. +Keep, I mean to say, an accurate separation of what you have really +come to know in your own minds, and what is still unknown. Leave all +that on the hypothetical side of the barrier, as things afterwards to +be acquired, if acquired at all; and be careful not to stamp a thing +as known when you do not yet know it. Count a thing known only when it +is stamped on your mind, so that you may survey it on all sides with +intelligence. + +There is such a thing as a man endeavouring to persuade himself, and +endeavouring to persuade others, that he knows about things when +he does not know more than the outside skin of them; and he goes +flourishing about with them. ("Hear, hear," and a laugh.) There is +also a process called cramming in some Universities (a laugh)--that +is, getting up such points of things as the examiner is likely to put +questions about. Avoid all that as entirely unworthy of an honourable +habit. Be modest, and humble, and diligent in your attention to what +your teachers tell you, who are profoundly interested in trying to +bring you forward in the right way, so far as they have been able +to understand it. Try all things they set before you, in order, if +possible, to understand them, and to value them in proportion to your +fitness for them. Gradually see what kind of work you can do; for it +is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work +he is to do in this universe. In fact, morality as regards study is, +as in all other things, the primary consideration, and overrides +all others. A dishonest man cannot do anything real; and it would be +greatly better if he were tied up from doing any such thing. He does +nothing but darken counsel by the words he utters. That is a very old +doctrine, but a very true one; and you will find it confirmed by +all the thinking men that have ever lived in this long series of +generations of which we are the latest. + +I daresay you know, very many of you, that it is now seven hundred +years since Universities were first set up in this world of ours. +Abelard and other people had risen up with doctrines in them the +people wished to hear of, and students flocked towards them from all +parts of the world. There was no getting the thing recorded in books +as you may now. You had to hear him speaking to you vocally, or else +you could not learn at all what it was that he wanted to say. And so +they gathered together the various people who had anything to teach, +and formed themselves gradually, under the patronage of kings +and other potentates who were anxious about the culture of their +populations, nobly anxious for their benefit, and became a University. + +I daresay, perhaps, you have heard it said that all that is greatly +altered by the invention of printing, which took place about midway +between us and the origin of Universities. A man has not now to go +away to where a professor is actually speaking, because in most cases +he can get his doctrine out of him through a book, and can read it, +and read it again and again, and study it. I don't know that I know of +any way in which the whole facts of a subject may be more completely +taken in, if our studies are moulded in conformity with it. +Nevertheless, Universities have, and will continue to have, an +indispensable value in society--a very high value. I consider the very +highest interests of man vitally intrusted to them. + +In regard to theology, as you are aware, it has been the study of the +deepest heads that have come into the world--what is the nature of +this stupendous universe, and what its relations to all things, as +known to man, and as only known to the awful Author of it. In +fact, the members of the Church keep theology in a lively condition +(laughter), for the benefit of the whole population, which is the +great object of our Universities. I consider it is the same now +intrinsically, though very much forgotten, from many causes, and +not so successful as might be wished at all. (A laugh.) It remains, +however, a very curious truth, what has been said by observant people, +that the main use of the Universities in the present age is that, +after you have done with all your classes, the next thing is a +collection of books, a great library of good books, which you proceed +to study and to read. What the Universities have mainly done--what I +have found the University did for me, was that it taught me to read +in various languages and various sciences, so that I could go into the +books that treated of these things, and try anything I wanted to make +myself master of gradually, as I found it suit me. Whatever you may +think of all that, the clearest and most imperative duty lies on +every one of you to be assiduous in your reading; and learn to be good +readers, which is, perhaps, a more difficult thing than you imagine. +Learn to be discriminative in your reading--to read all kinds of +things that you have an interest in, and that you find to be really +fit for what you are engaged in. Of course, at the present time, in a +great deal of the reading incumbent on you you must be guided by the +books recommended to you by your professors for assistance towards the +prelections. And then, when you get out of the University, and go into +studies of your own, you will find it very important that you have +selected a field, a province in which you can study and work. + +The most unhappy of all men is the man that cannot tell what he is +going to do, that has got no work cut out for him in the world, and +does not go into it. For work is the grand cure of all the maladies +and miseries that ever beset mankind--honest work, which you intend +getting done. If you are in a strait, a very good indication as to +choice--perhaps the best you could get--is a book you have a great +curiosity about. You are then in the readiest and best of all possible +conditions to improve by that book. It is analogous to what doctors +tell us about the physical health and appetites of the patient. You +must learn to distinguish between false appetite and real. There is +such a thing as a false appetite, which will lead a man into vagaries +with regard to diet, will tempt him to eat spicy things which he +should not eat at all, and would not but that it is toothsome, and for +the moment in baseness of mind. A man ought to inquire and find +out what he really and truly has an appetite for--what suits his +constitution; and that, doctors tell him, is the very thing he ought +to have in general. And so with books. As applicable to almost all +of you, I will say that it is highly expedient to go into history--to +inquire into what has passed before you in the families of men. The +history of the Romans and Greeks will first of all concern you; and +you will find that all the knowledge you have got will be extremely +applicable to elucidate that. There you have the most remarkable race +of men in the world set before you, to say nothing of the languages, +which your professors can better explain, and which, I believe, are +admitted to be the most perfect orders of speech we have yet found +to exist among men. And you will find, if you read well, a pair of +extremely remarkable nations shining in the records left by themselves +as a kind of pillar to light up life in the darkness of the past +ages; and it will be well worth your while if you can get into the +understanding of what these people were and what they did. You will +find a great deal of hearsay, as I have found, that does not touch on +the matter; but perhaps some of you will get to see a Roman face to +face; you will know in some measure how they contrived to exist, and +to perform these feats in the world; I believe, also, you will find +a thing not much noted, that there was a very great deal of deep +religion in its form in both nations. That is noted by the wisest of +historians, and particularly by Ferguson, who is particularly well +worth reading on Roman history; and I believe he was an alumnus in our +own University. His book is a very creditable book. He points out the +profoundly religious nature of the Roman people, notwithstanding the +wildness and ferociousness of their nature. They believed that Jupiter +Optimus--Jupiter Maximus--was lord of the universe, and that he +had appointed the Romans to become the chief of men, provided they +followed his commands--to brave all difficulty, and to stand up with +an invincible front--to be ready to do and die; and also to have the +same sacred regard to veracity, to promise, to integrity, and all the +virtues that surround that noblest quality of men--courage--to +which the Romans gave the name of virtue, manhood, as the one thing +ennobling for a man. + +In the literary ages of Rome, that had very much decayed away; but +still it had retained its place among the lower classes of the Roman +people. Of the deeply religious nature of the Greeks, along with their +beautiful and sunny effulgences of art, you have a striking proof, if +you look for it. + +In the tragedies of Sophocles, there is a most distinct recognition of +the eternal justice of Heaven, and the unfailing punishment of crime +against the laws of God. + +I believe you will find in all histories that that has been at the +head and foundation of them all, and that no nation that did +not contemplate this wonderful universe with an awe-stricken and +reverential feeling that there was a great unknown, omnipotent, and +all-wise, and all-virtuous Being, superintending all men in it, and +all interests in it--no nation ever came to very much, nor did any man +either, who forgot that. If a man did forget that, he forgot the most +important part of his mission in this world. + +In our own history of England, which you will take a great deal of +natural pains to make yourselves acquainted with, you will find it +beyond all others worthy of your study; because I believe that the +British nation--and I include in them the Scottish nation--produced +a finer set of men than any you will find it possible to get anywhere +else in the world. (Applause.) I don't know in any history of +Greece or Rome where you will get so fine a man as Oliver Cromwell. +(Applause.) And we have had men worthy of memory in our little corner +of the island here as well as others, and our history has been strong +at least in being connected with the world itself--for if you examine +well you will find that John Knox was the author, as it were, of +Oliver Cromwell; that the Puritan revolution would never have taken +place in England at all if it had not been for that Scotchman. +(Applause.) This is an arithmetical fact, and is not prompted by +national vanity on my part at all. (Laughter and applause.) And it +is very possible, if you look at the struggle that was going on in +England, as I have had to do in my time, you will see that people were +overawed with the immense impediments lying in the way. + +A small minority of God-fearing men in the country were flying away +with any ship they could get to New England, rather than take the lion +by the beard. They durstn't confront the powers with their most just +complaint to be delivered from idolatry. They wanted to make the +nation altogether conformable to the Hebrew Bible, which they +understood to be according to the will of God; and there could be no +aim more legitimate. However, they could not have got their desire +fulfilled at all if Knox had not succeeded by the firmness and +nobleness of his mind. For he is also of the select of the earth to +me--John Knox. (Applause.) What he has suffered from the ungrateful +generations that have followed him should really make us humble +ourselves to the dust, to think that the most excellent man our +country has produced, to whom we owe everything that distinguishes +us among modern nations, should have been sneered at and abused by +people. Knox was heard by Scotland--the people heard him with the +marrow of their bones--they took up his doctrine, and they defied +principalities and powers to move them from it. "We must have it," +they said. + +It was at that time the Puritan struggle arose in England, and you +know well that the Scottish Earls and nobility, with their tenantry, +marched away to Dunse-hill, and sat down there; and just in the course +of that struggle, when it was either to be suppressed or brought +into greater vitality, they encamped on the top of Dunse-hill thirty +thousand armed men, drilled for that occasion, each regiment around +its landlord, its earl, or whatever he might be called, and eager +for Christ's Crown and Covenant. That was the signal for all England +rising up into unappeasable determination to have the Gospel there +also, and you know it went on and came to be a contest whether +the Parliament or the King should rule--whether it should be old +formalities and use and wont, or something that had been of new +conceived in the souls of men--namely, a divine determination to walk +according to the laws of God here as the sum of all prosperity--which +of these should have the mastery; and after a long, long agony of +struggle, it was decided--the way we know. I should say also of that +Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell's--notwithstanding the abuse it has +encountered, and the denial of everybody that it was able to get on in +the world, and so on--it appears to me to have been the most salutary +thing in the modern history of England on the whole. If Oliver +Cromwell had continued it out, I don't know what it would have come +to. It would have got corrupted perhaps in other hands, and could +not have gone on, but it was pure and true to the last fibre in his +mind--there was truth in it when he ruled over it. + +Machiavelli has remarked, in speaking about the Romans, that +democracy cannot exist anywhere in the world; as a Government it is an +impossibility that it should be continued, and he goes on proving that +in his own way. I do not ask you all to follow him in his conviction +(hear); but it is to him a clear truth that it is a solecism and +impossibility that the universal mass of men should govern themselves. +He says of the Romans that they continued a long time, but it was +purely in virtue of this item in their constitution--namely, that they +had all the conviction in their minds that it was solemnly necessary +at times to appoint a Dictator--a man who had the power of life and +death over everything--who degraded men out of their places, ordered +them to execution, and did whatever seemed to him good in the name +of God above him. He was commanded to take care that the Republic +suffered no detriment, and Machiavelli calculates that that was the +thing that purified the social system from time to time, and enabled +it to hang on as it did--an extremely likely thing if it was composed +of nothing but bad and tumultuous men triumphing in general over the +better, and all going the bad road, in fact. Well, Oliver Cromwell's +Protectorate, or Dictatorate if you will, lasted for about ten years, +and you will find that nothing that was contrary to the laws of Heaven +was allowed to live by Oliver. (A laugh, and applause.) For example, +it was found by his Parliament, called "Barebones"--the most zealous +of all Parliaments probably--the Court of Chancery in England was in +a state that was really capable of no apology--no man could get up and +say that that was a right court. There were, I think, fifteen thousand +or fifteen hundred--(laughter)--I don't really remember which, but +we shall call it by the last (renewed laughter)--there were fifteen +hundred cases lying in it undecided; and one of them, I remember, for +a large amount of money, was eighty-three years old, and it was going +on still. Wigs were waving over it, and lawyers were taking their +fees, and there was no end of it, upon which the Barebones people, +after deliberation about it, thought it was expedient, and commanded +by the Author of Man and the Fountain of Justice, and for the true +and right, to abolish the court. Really, I don't know who could have +dissented from that opinion. At the same time, it was thought by those +who were wiser, and had more experience of the world, that it was a +very dangerous thing, and would never suit at all. The lawyers began +to make an immense noise about it. (Laughter.) All the public, the +great mass of solid and well-disposed people who had got no deep +insight into such matters, were very adverse to it, and the president +of it, old Sir Francis Rous, who translated the Psalms--those that +we sing every Sunday in the church yet--a very good man and a wise +man--the Provost of Eton--he got the minority, or I don't know whether +or no he did not persuade the majority--he, at any rate, got a great +number of the Parliament to go to Oliver the Dictator, and lay +down their functions altogether, and declare officially with their +signature on Monday morning that the Parliament was dissolved. + +The thing was passed on Saturday night, and on Monday morning Rous +came and said, "We cannot carry on the affair any longer, and we +remit it into the hands of your Highness." Oliver in that way became +Protector a second time. + +I give you this as an instance that Oliver felt that the Parliament +that had been dismissed had been perfectly right with regard to +Chancery, and that there was no doubt of the propriety of abolishing +Chancery, or reforming it in some kind of way. He considered it, and +this is what he did. He assembled sixty of the wisest lawyers to be +found in England. Happily, there were men great in the law--men who +valued the laws as much as anybody does now, I suppose. (A laugh.) +Oliver said to them, "Go and examine this thing, and in the name of +God inform me what is necessary to be done with regard to it. You will +see how we may clean out the foul things in it that render it poison +to everybody." Well, they sat down then, and in the course of six +weeks--there was no public speaking then, no reporting of speeches, +and no trouble of any kind; there was just the business in hand--they +got sixty propositions fixed in their minds of the things that +required to be done. And upon these sixty propositions Chancery was +reconstituted and remodelled, and so it has lasted to our time. It had +become a nuisance, and could not have continued much longer. + +That is an instance of the manner in which things were done when a +Dictatorship prevailed in the country, and that was what the Dictator +did. Upon the whole, I do not think that, in general, out of common +history books, you will ever get into the real history of this +country, or anything particular which it would beseem you to know. You +may read very ingenious and very clever books by men whom it would be +the height of insolence in me to do any other thing than express +my respect for. But their position is essentially sceptical. Man +is unhappily in that condition that he will make only a temporary +explanation of anything, and you will not be able, if you are like the +man, to understand how this island came to be what it is. You will not +find it recorded in books. You will find recorded in books a jumble +of tumults, disastrous ineptitudes, and all that kind of thing. But to +get what you want you will have to look into side sources, and inquire +in all directions. + +I remember getting Collins' _Peerage_ to read--a very poor peerage as +a work of genius, but an excellent book for diligence and fidelity--I +was writing on Oliver Cromwell at the time. (Applause.) I could get no +biographical dictionary, and I thought the peerage book would help +me, at least tell me whether people were old or young; and about all +persons concerned in the actions about which I wrote. I got a great +deal of help out of poor Collins. He was a diligent and dark London +bookseller of about a hundred years ago, who compiled out of all kinds +of treasury chests, archives, books that were authentic, and out +of all kinds of things out of which he could get the information he +wanted. He was a very meritorious man. I not only found the solution +of anything I wanted there, but I began gradually to perceive this +immense fact, which I really advise every one of you who read history +to look out for and read for--if he has not found it--it was that +the kings of England all the way from the Norman Conquest down to +the times of Charles I. had appointed, so far as they knew, those who +deserved to be appointed, peers. They were all Royal men, with minds +full of justice and valour and humanity, and all kinds of qualities +that are good for men to have who ought to rule over others. Then +their genealogy was remarkable--and there is a great deal more in +genealogies than is generally believed at present. + +I never heard tell of any clever man that came out of entirely stupid +people. If you look around the families of your acquaintance, you will +see such cases in all directions. I know that it has been the case in +mine. I can trace the father, and the son, and the grandson, and the +family stamp is quite distinctly legible upon each of them, so that +it goes for a great deal--the hereditary principle in Government as in +other things; and it must be recognised so soon as there is any fixity +in things. + +You will remark that if at any time the genealogy of a peerage +fails--if the man that actually holds the peerage is a fool in these +earnest striking times, the man gets into mischief and gets into +treason--he gets himself extinguished altogether, in fact. (Laughter.) + +From these documents of old Collins it seems that a peer conducts +himself in a solemn, good, pious, manly kind of way when he takes +leave of life, and when he has hospitable habits, and is valiant in +his procedure throughout; and that in general a King, with a noble +approximation to what was right, had nominated this man, saying "Come +you to me, sir; come out of the common level of the people, where +you are liable to be trampled upon; come here and take a district of +country and make it into your own image more or less; be a king under +me, and understand that that is your function." I say this is the most +divine thing that a human being can do to other human beings, and no +kind of being whatever has so much of the character of God Almighty's +Divine Government as that thing we see that went all over England, and +that is the grand soul of England's history. + +It is historically true that down to the time of Charles I., it was +not understood that any man was made a peer without having a merit in +him to constitute him a proper subject for a peerage. In Charles +I.'s time it grew to be known or said that if a man was by birth a +gentleman, and was worth £10,000 a-year, and bestowed his gifts up and +down among courtiers, he could be made a peer. Under Charles II. it +went on with still more rapidity, and has been going on with ever +increasing velocity until we see the perfect break-neck pace at which +they are now going. (A laugh.) And now a peerage is a paltry kind of +thing to what it was in these old times, I could go into a great many +more details about things of that sort, but I must turn to another +branch of the subject. + +One remark more about your reading. I do not know whether it has been +sufficiently brought home to you that there are two kinds of books. +When a man is reading on any kind of subject, in most departments of +books--in all books, if you take it in a wide sense--you will find +that there is a division of good books and bad books--there is a good +kind of a book and a bad kind of a book. I am not to assume that you +are all ill acquainted with this; but I may remind you that it is a +very important consideration at present. It casts aside altogether the +idea that people have that if they are reading any book--that if +an ignorant man is reading any book, he is doing rather better than +nothing at all. I entirely call that in question. I even venture to +deny it. (Laughter and cheers.) It would be much safer and better +would he have no concern with books at all than with some of them. You +know these are my views. There are a number, an increasing number, of +books that are decidedly to him not useful. (Hear.) But he will learn +also that a certain number of books were written by a supreme, noble +kind of people--not a very great number--but a great number adhere +more or less to that side of things. In short, as I have written +it down somewhere else, I conceive that books are like men's +souls--divided into sheep and goats. (Laughter and applause.) Some +of them are calculated to be of very great advantage in teaching--in +forwarding the teaching of all generations. Others are going down, +down, doing more and more, wilder and wilder mischief. + +And for the rest, in regard to all your studies here, and whatever +you may learn, you are to remember that the object is not particular +knowledge--that you are going to get higher in technical perfections, +and all that sort of thing. There is a higher aim lies at the rear of +all that, especially among those who are intended for literary, for +speaking pursuits--the sacred profession. You are ever to bear in +mind that there lies behind that the acquisition of what may be called +wisdom--namely, sound appreciation and just decision as to all the +objects that come round about you, and the habit of behaving with +justice and wisdom. In short, great is wisdom--great is the value +of wisdom. It cannot be exaggerated. The highest achievement of +man--"Blessed is he that getteth understanding." And that, I believe, +occasionally may be missed very easily; but never more easily than +now, I think. If that is a failure, all is a failure. However, I will +not touch further upon that matter. + +In this University I learn from many sides that there is a great and +considerable stir about endowments. Oh, I should have said in regard +to book reading, if it be so very important, how very useful would +an excellent library be in every University. I hope that will not be +neglected by those gentlemen who have charge of you--and, indeed, I am +happy to hear that your library is very much improved since the time I +knew it; and I hope it will go on improving more and more. You require +money to do that, and you require also judgment in the selectors of +the books--pious insight into what is really for the advantage of +human souls, and the exclusion of all kinds of clap-trap books which +merely excite the astonishment of foolish people. (Laughter.) Wise +books--as much as possible good books. + +As I was saying, there appears to be a great demand for endowments--an +assiduous and praiseworthy industry for getting new funds collected +for encouraging the ingenious youth of Universities, especially +in this the chief University of the country. (Hear, hear.) Well, I +entirely participate in everybody's approval of the movement. It +is very desirable. It should be responded to, and one expects most +assuredly will. At least, if it is not, it will be shameful to the +country of Scotland, which never was so rich in money as at the +present moment, and never stood so much in need of getting noble +Universities to counteract many influences that are springing up +alongside of money. It should not be backward in coming forward in +the way of endowments (a laugh)--at least, in rivalry to our rude +old barbarous ancestors, as we have been pleased to call them. Such +munificence as theirs is beyond all praise, to whom I am sorry to say +we are not yet by any manner of means equal or approaching equality. +(Laughter.) There is an overabundance of money, and sometimes I cannot +help thinking that, probably, never has there been at any other time +in Scotland the hundredth part of the money that now is, or even the +thousandth part, for wherever I go there is that gold-nuggeting (a +laugh)--that prosperity. + +Many men are counting their balances by millions. Money was never so +abundant, and nothing that is good to be done with it. ("Hear, hear," +and a laugh.) No man knows--or very few men know--what benefit to get +out of his money. In fact, it too often is secretly a curse to him. +Much better for him never to have had any. But I do not expect that +generally to be believed. (Laughter.) Nevertheless, I should think it +a beautiful relief to any man that has an honest purpose struggling +in him to bequeath a handsome house of refuge, so to speak, for some +meritorious man who may hereafter be born into the world, to enable +him a little to get on his way. To do, in fact, as those old Norman +kings whom I have described to you--to raise a man out of the dirt and +mud where he is getting trampled, unworthily on his part, into some +kind of position where he may acquire the power to do some good in his +generation. I hope that as much as possible will be done in that way; +that efforts will not be relaxed till the thing is in a satisfactory +state. At the same time, in regard to the classical department of +things, it is to be desired that it were properly supported--that +we could allow people to go and devote more leisure possibly to the +cultivation of particular departments. + +We might have more of this from Scotch Universities than we have. I +am bound, however, to say that it does not appear as if of late times +endowment was the real soul of the matter. The English, for example, +are the richest people for endowments on the face of the earth in +their Universities; and it is a remarkable fact that since the time +of Bentley you cannot name anybody that has gained a great name in +scholarship among them, or constituted a point of revolution in the +pursuits of men in that way. The man that did that is a man worthy +of being remembered among men, although he may be a poor man, and not +endowed with worldly wealth. One man that actually did constitute +a revolution was the son of a poor weaver in Saxony, who edited his +"Tibullus" in Dresden in the room of a poor comrade, and who, while he +was editing his "Tibullus," had to gather his pease-cod shells on the +streets and boil them for his dinner. That was his endowment. But he +was recognised soon to have done a great thing. His name was Heyne. + +I can remember it was quite a revolution in my mind when I got hold +of that man's book on Virgil. I found that for the first time I had +understood him--that he had introduced me for the first time into +an insight of Roman life, and pointed out the circumstances in which +these were written, and here was interpretation; and it has gone on in +all manner of development, and has spread out into other countries. + +Upon the whole, there is one reason why endowments are not given now +as they were in old days, when they founded abbeys, colleges, and all +kinds of things of that description, with such success as we know. All +that has changed now. Why that has decayed away may in part be that +people have become doubtful that colleges are now the real sources +of that which I call wisdom, whether they are anything more--anything +much more--than a cultivating of man in the specific arts. In fact, +there has been a suspicion of that kind in the world for a long time. +(A laugh.) That is an old saying, an old proverb, "An ounce of mother +wit is worth a pound of clergy." (Laughter.) There is a suspicion that +a man is perhaps not nearly so wise as he looks, or because he has +poured out speech so copiously. (Laughter.) + +When the seven free Arts on which the old Universities were based came +to be modified a little, in order to be convenient for or to promote +the wants of modern society--though, perhaps, some of them are +obsolete enough even yet for some of us--there arose a feeling that +mere vocality, mere culture of speech, if that is what comes out of a +man, though he may be a great speaker, an eloquent orator, yet there +is no real substance there--if that is what was required and aimed at +by the man himself, and by the community that set him upon becoming +a learned man. Maid-servants, I hear people complaining, are getting +instructed in the "ologies," and so on, and are apparently totally +ignorant of brewing, boiling, and baking (laughter); above all things, +not taught what is necessary to be known, from the highest to the +lowest--strict obedience, humility, and correct moral conduct. Oh, it +is a dismal chapter, all that, if one went into it! + +What has been done by rushing after fine speech? I have written down +some very fierce things about that, perhaps considerably more emphatic +than I would wish them to be now; but they are deeply my conviction. +(Hear, hear.) There is very great necessity indeed of getting a little +more silent than we are. It seems to me the finest nations of the +world--the English and the American--are going all away into wind +and tongue. (Applause and laughter.) But it will appear sufficiently +tragical by-and-bye, long after I am away out of it. Silence is the +eternal duty of a man. He wont get to any real understanding of +what is complex, and, what is more than any other, pertinent to his +interests, without maintaining silence. "Watch the tongue," is a very +old precept, and a most true one. I do not want to discourage any +of you from your Demosthenes, and your studies of the niceties of +language, and all that. Believe me, I value that as much as any of +you. I consider it a very graceful thing, and a proper thing, for +every human creature to know what the implement which he uses in +communicating his thoughts is, and how to make the very utmost of it. +I want you to study Demosthenes, and know all his excellencies. At the +same time, I must say that speech does not seem to me, on the whole, +to have turned to any good account. + +Why tell me that a man is a fine speaker if it is not the truth that +he is speaking? Phocion, who did not speak at all, was a great deal +nearer hitting the mark than Demosthenes. (Laughter.) He used to tell +the Athenians--"You can't fight Philip. You have not the slightest +chance with him. He is a man who holds his tongue; he has great +disciplined armies; he can brag anybody you like in your cities here; +and he is going on steadily with an unvarying aim towards his object: +and he will infallibly beat any kind of men such as you, going +on raging from shore to shore with all that rampant nonsense." +Demosthenes said to him one day--"The Athenians will get mad some day +and kill you." "Yes," Phocion says, "when they are mad; and you as +soon as they get sane again." (Laughter.) + +It is also told about him going to Messina on some deputation that +the Athenians wanted on some kind of matter of an intricate and +contentious nature, that Phocion went with some story in his mouth to +speak about. He was a man of few words--no unveracity; and after he +had gone on telling the story a certain time there was one burst of +interruption. One man interrupted with something he tried to answer, +and then another; and, finally, the people began bragging and bawling, +and no end of debate, till it ended in the want of power in the people +to say any more. Phocion drew back altogether, struck dumb, and would +not speak another word to any man; and he left it to them to decide in +any way they liked. + +It appears to me there is a kind of eloquence in that which is equal +to anything Demosthenes ever said--"Take your own way, and let me out +altogether." (Applause.) + +All these considerations, and manifold more connected with +them--innumerable considerations, resulting from observation of the +world at this moment--have led many people to doubt of the salutary +effect of vocal education altogether. I do not mean to say it should +be entirely excluded; but I look to something that will take hold +of the matter much more closely, and not allow it slip out of our +fingers, and remain worse than it was. For if a good speaker--an +eloquent speaker--is not speaking the truth, is there a more horrid +kind of object in creation? (Loud cheers.) Of such speech I hear all +manner and kind of people say it is excellent; but I care very little +about how he said it, provided I understand it, and it be true. +Excellent speaker! but what if he is telling me things that are +untrue, that are not the fact about it--if he has formed a wrong +judgment about it--if he has no judgment in his mind to form a right +conclusion in regard to the matter? An excellent speaker of that kind +is, as it were, saying--"Ho, every one that wants to be persuaded +of the thing that is not true, come hither." (Great laughter and +applause.) I would recommend you to be very chary of that kind of +excellent speech. (Renewed laughter.) + +Well, all that being the too well-known product of our method of vocal +education--the mouth merely operating on the tongue of the pupil, and +teaching him to wag it in a particular way (laughter)--it had made a +great many thinking men entertain a very great distrust of this not +very salutary way of procedure, and they have longed for some kind of +practical way of working out the business. There would be room for +a great deal of description about it if I went into it; but I must +content myself with saying that the most remarkable piece of reading +that you may be recommended to take and try if you can study is a book +by Goethe--one of his last books, which he wrote when he was an old +man, about seventy years of age--I think one of the most beautiful +he ever wrote, full of mild wisdom, and which is found to be very +touching by those who have eyes to discern and hearts to feel it. It +is one of the pieces in "Wilhelm Meister's Travels." I read it through +many years ago; and, of course, I had to read into it very hard when +I was translating it (applause), and it has always dwelt in my mind +as about the most remarkable bit of writing that I have known to be +executed in these late centuries. I have often said, there are ten +pages of that which, if ambition had been my only rule, I would rather +have written than have written all the books that have appeared since +I came into the world. (Cheers.) Deep, deep is the meaning of what +is said there. They turn on the Christian religion and the religious +phenomena of Christian life--altogether sketched out in the most airy, +graceful, delicately-wise kind of way, so as to keep himself out +of the common controversies of the street and of the forum, yet to +indicate what was the result of things he had been long meditating +upon. Among others, he introduces, in an aërial, flighty kind of way, +here and there a touch which grows into a beautiful picture--a scheme +of entirely mute education, at least with no more speech than is +absolutely necessary for what they have to do. + +Three of the wisest men that can be got are met to consider what is +the function which transcends all others in importance to build up +the young generation, which shall be free from all that perilous stuff +that has been weighing us down and clogging every step, and which is +the only thing we can hope to go on with if we would leave the world +a little better, and not the worse of our having been in it for those +who are to follow. The man who is the eldest of the three says to +Goethe, "You give by nature to the well-formed children you bring into +the world a great many precious gifts, and very frequently these are +best of all developed by nature herself, with a very slight assistance +where assistance is seen to be wise and profitable, and forbearance +very often on the part of the overlooker of the process of education; +but there is one thing that no child brings into the world with it, +and without which all other things are of no use." Wilhelm, who is +there beside him, says, "What is that?" "All who enter the world want +it," says the eldest; "perhaps you yourself." Wilhelm says, +"Well, tell me what it is." "It is," says the eldest, +"reverence--_Ehrfurcht_--Reverence! Honour done to those who are +grander and better than you, without fear; distinct from fear." +_Ehrfurcht_--"the soul of all religion that ever has been among +men, or ever will be." And he goes into practicality. He practically +distinguishes the kinds of religion that are in the world, and he +makes out three reverences. The boys are all trained to go through +certain gesticulations, to lay their hands on their breast and look +up to heaven, and they give their three reverences. The first and +simplest is that of reverence for what is above us. It is the soul +of all the Pagan religions; there is nothing better in man than that. +Then there is reverence for what is around us or about us--reverence +for our equals, and to which he attributes an immense power in the +culture of man. The third is reverence for what is beneath us--to +learn to recognise in pain, sorrow, and contradiction, even in those +things, odious as they are to flesh and blood--to learn that there +lies in these a priceless blessing. And he defines that as being +the soul of the Christian religion--the highest of all religions; a +height, as Goethe says--and that is very true, even to the letter, as +I consider--a height to which the human species was fated and enabled +to attain, and from which, having once attained it, it can never +retrograde. It cannot descend down below that permanently, Goethe's +idea is. + +Often one thinks it was good to have a faith of that kind--that +always, even in the most degraded, sunken, and unbelieving times, he +calculates there will be found some few souls who will recognise what +that meant; and that the world, having once received it, there is no +fear of its retrograding. He goes on then to tell us the way in which +they seek to teach boys, in the sciences particularly, whatever the +boy is fit for. Wilhelm left his own boy there, expecting they would +make him a Master of Arts, or something of that kind; and when he came +back for him he saw a thundering cloud of dust coming over the plain, +of which he could make nothing. It turned out to be a tempest of wild +horses, managed by young lads who had a turn for hunting with their +grooms. His own son was among them, and he found that the breaking of +colts was the thing he was most suited for. (Laughter.) This is +what Goethe calls Art, which I should not make clear to you by any +definition unless it is clear already. (A laugh.) I would not attempt +to define it as music, painting, and poetry, and so on; it is in quite +a higher sense than the common one, and in which, I am afraid, most of +our painters, poets, and music men would not pass muster. (A laugh.) +He considers that the highest pitch to which human culture can go; and +he watches with great industry how it is to be brought about with men +who have a turn for it. + +Very wise and beautiful it is. It gives one an idea that something +greatly better is possible for man in the world. I confess it seems to +me it is a shadow of what will come, unless the world is to come to +a conclusion that is perfectly frightful; some kind of scheme of +education like that, presided over by the wisest and most sacred men +that can be got in the world, and watching from a distance--a training +in practicality at every turn; no speech in it except that speech that +is to be followed by action, for that ought to be the rule as nearly +as possible among them. For rarely should men speak at all unless it +is to say that thing that is to be done; and let him go and do his +part in it, and to say no more about it. I should say there is nothing +in the world you can conceive so difficult, _prima facie_, as that +of getting a set of men gathered together--rough, rude, and ignorant +people--gather them together, promise them a shilling a day, rank +them up, give them very severe and sharp drill, and by bullying and +drill--for the word "drill" seems as if it meant the treatment that +would force them to learn--they learn what it is necessary to learn; +and there is the man, a piece of an animated machine, a wonder of +wonders to look at. He will go and obey one man, and walk into the +cannon's mouth for him, and do anything whatever that is commanded of +him by his general officer. And I believe all manner of things in +this way could be done if there were anything like the same attention +bestowed. Very many things could be regimented and organized into the +mute system of education that Goethe evidently adumbrates there. But I +believe, when people look into it, it will be found that they will not +be very long in trying to make some efforts in that direction; for the +saving of human labour, and the avoidance of human misery, would be +uncountable if it were set about and begun even in part. + +Alas! it is painful to think how very far away it is--any fulfilment +of such things; for I need not hide from you, young gentlemen--and +that is one of the last things I am going to tell you--that you have +got into a very troublous epoch of the world; and I don't think +you will find it improve the footing you have, though you have many +advantages which we had not. You have careers open to you, by public +examinations and so on, which is a thing much to be approved, and +which we hope to see perfected more and more. All that was entirely +unknown in my time, and you have many things to recognise as +advantages. But you will find the ways of the world more anarchical +than ever, I think. As far as I have noticed, revolution has come upon +us. We have got into the age of revolutions. All kinds of things are +coming to be subjected to fire, as it were; hotter and hotter the wind +rises around everything. + +Curious to say, now in Oxford and other places that used to seem to +live at anchor in the stream of time, regardless of all changes, they +are getting into the highest humour of mutation, and all sorts of new +ideas are getting afloat. It is evident that whatever is not made of +asbestos will have to be burnt in this world. It will not stand the +heat it is getting exposed to. And in saying that, it is but saying +in other words that we are in an epoch of anarchy--anarchy _plus_ the +constable. (Laughter.) There is nobody that picks one's pocket without +some policeman being ready to take him up. (Renewed laughter.) But in +every other thing he is the son, not of Kosmos, but of Chaos. He is +a disobedient, and reckless, and altogether a waste kind of +object--commonplace man in these epochs; and the wiser kind of +man--the select, of whom I hope you will be part--has more and more a +set time to it to look forward, and will require to move with double +wisdom; and will find, in short, that the crooked things that he has +to pull straight in his own life, or round about, wherever he may be, +are manifold, and will task all his strength wherever he may go. + +But why should I complain of that either?--for that is a thing a +man is born to in all epochs. He is born to expend every particle of +strength that God Almighty has given him, in doing the work he finds +he is fit for--to stand it out to the last breath of life, and do his +best. We are called upon to do that; and the reward we all get--which +we are perfectly sure of if we have merited it--is that we have got +the work done, or, at least, that we have tried to do the work; for +that is a great blessing in itself; and I should say there is not very +much more reward than that going in this world. If the man gets meat +and clothes, what matters it whether he have £10,000, or £10,000,000, +or £70 a-year. He can get meat and clothes for that; and he will find +very little difference intrinsically, if he is a wise man. + +I warmly second the advice of the wisest of men--"Don't be ambitious; +don't be at all too desirous to success; be loyal and modest." Cut +down the proud towering thoughts that you get into you, or see they be +pure as well as high. There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of +all California would be, or the getting of all the suffrages that are +on the planet just now. (Loud and prolonged cheers.) + +Finally, gentlemen, I have one advice to give you, which is +practically of very great importance, though a very humble one. + +I have no doubt you will have among you people ardently bent to +consider life cheap, for the purpose of getting forward in what they +are aiming at of high; and you are to consider throughout, much more +than is done at present, that health is a thing to be attended to +continually--that you are to regard that as the very highest of all +temporal things for you. (Applause.) There is no kind of achievement +you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. What are +nuggets and millions? The French financier said, "Alas! why is there +no sleep to be sold?" Sleep was not in the market at any quotation. +(Laughter and applause.) + +It is a curious thing that I remarked long ago, and have often +turned in my head, that the old word for "holy" in the German +language--_heilig_--also means "healthy." And so _Heil-bronn_ means +"holy-well," or "healthy-well." We have in the Scotch "hale;" and, +I suppose our English word "whole"--with a "w"--all of one piece, +without any hole in it--is the same word. I find that you could +not get any better definition of what "holy" really is than +"healthy--completely healthy." _Mens sana in corpore sano_. +(Applause.) + +A man with his intellect a clear, plain, geometric mirror, brilliantly +sensitive of all objects and impressions around it, and imagining all +things in their correct proportions--not twisted up into convex or +concave, and distorting everything, so that he cannot see the truth of +the matter without endless groping and manipulation--healthy, clear, +and free, and all round about him. We never can attain that at all. +In fact, the operations we have got into are destructive of it. You +cannot, if you are going to do any decisive intellectual operation--if +you are going to write a book--at least, I never could--without +getting decidedly made ill by it, and really you must if it is your +business--and you must follow out what you are at--and it sometimes +is at the expense of health. Only remember at all times to get back +as fast as possible out of it into health, and regard the real +equilibrium as the centre of things. You should always look at the +_heilig_, which means holy, and holy means healthy. + +Well, that old etymology--what a lesson it is against certain gloomy, +austere, ascetic people, that have gone about as if this world were +all a dismal-prison house! It has, indeed, got all the ugly things in +it that I have been alluding to; but there is an eternal sky over it, +and the blessed sunshine, verdure of spring, and rich autumn, and all +that in it, too. Piety does not mean that a man should make a sour +face about things, and refuse to enjoy in moderation what his Maker +has given. Neither do you find it to have been so with old Knox. If +you look into him you will find a beautiful Scotch humour in him, as +well as the grimmest and sternest truth when necessary, and a great +deal of laughter. We find really some of the sunniest glimpses of +things come out of Knox that I have seen in any man; for instance, in +his "History of the Reformation," which is a book I hope every one of +you will read--a glorious book. + +On the whole, I would bid you stand up to your work, whatever it may +be, and not be afraid of it--not in sorrows or contradiction to yield, +but pushing on towards the goal. And don't suppose that people are +hostile to you in the world. You will rarely find anybody designedly +doing you ill. You may feel often as if the whole world is obstructing +you, more or less; but you will find that to be because the world +is travelling in a different way from you, and rushing on in its own +path. Each man has only an extremely good-will to himself--which he +has a right to have--and is moving on towards his object. Keep out of +literature as a general rule, I should say also. (Laughter.) If you +find many people who are hard and indifferent to you in a world that +you consider to be unhospitable and cruel--as often, indeed, happens +to a tender-hearted, stirring young creature--you will also find there +are noble hearts who will look kindly on you, and their help will be +precious to you beyond price. You will get good and evil as you go on, +and have the success that has been appointed to you. + +I will wind up with a small bit of verse that is from Goethe also, +and has often gone through my mind. To me it has the tone of a modern +psalm in it in some measure. It is sweet and clear. The clearest +of sceptical men had not anything like so clear a mind as that man +had--freer from cant and misdirected notion of any kind than any man +in these ages has been This is what the poet says:-- + + The Future hides in it + Gladness and sorrow: + We press still thorow; + Nought that abides in it + Daunting us--Onward! + + And solemn before us, + Veiled, the dark Portal, + Goal of all mortal. + Stars silent rest o'er us-- + Graves under us, silent. + + While earnest thou gazest + Comes boding of terror, + Come phantasm and error; + Perplexes the bravest + With doubt and misgiving. + + But heard are the voices, + Heard are the Sages, + The Worlds and the Ages: + "Choose well: your choice is + Brief, and yet endless." + + Here eyes do regard you + In Eternity's stillness; + Here is all fulness, + Ye brave, to reward you. + Work, and despair not.[A] + +[Footnote A: Originally published in Carlyle's "Past and Present," +(Lond. 1843,) p. 318, and introduced there by the following words:-- + +"My candid readers, we will march out of this Third Book with a +rhythmic word of Goethe's on our tongue; a word which perhaps has +already sung itself, in dark hours and in bright, through many a +heart. To me, finding it devout yet wholly credible and veritable, +full of piety yet free of cant; to me joyfully finding much in it, and +joyfully missing so much in it, this little snatch of music, by the +greatest German man, sounds like a stanza in the grand _Road Song_ +and _Marching Song_ of our great Teutonic kindred,--wending, wending, +valiant and victorious, through the undiscovered Deeps of Time!"] + +One last word. _Wir heissen euch hoffen_--we bid you be of hope. Adieu +for this time. + + + + +THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY. + + +The following is a letter addressed by Mr. Carlyle to Dr. Hutchison +Stirling, late one of the candidates for the Chair of Moral Philosophy +in the University of Edinburgh:-- + + "Chelsea, 16th June, 1868. + + "DEAR STIRLING,-- + +"You well know how reluctant I have been to interfere at all in the +election now close on us, and that in stating, as bound, what my own +clear knowledge of your qualities was, I have strictly held by that, +and abstained from more. But the news I now have from Edinburgh is of +such a complexion, so dubious, and so surprising to me; and I now find +I shall privately have so much regret in a certain event--which +seems to be reckoned possible, and to depend on one gentleman of the +seven--that, to secure my own conscience in the matter, a few plainer +words seem needful. To whatever I have said of you already, therefore, +I now volunteer to add, that I think you not only the one man in +Britain capable of bringing Metaphysical Philosophy, in the ultimate, +German or European, and highest actual form of it, distinctly home to +the understanding of British men who wish to understand it, but that +I notice in you farther, on the moral side, a sound strength of +intellectual discernment, a noble valour and reverence of mind, which +seems to me to mark you out as the man capable of doing us the highest +service in Ethical science too: that of restoring, or decisively +beginning to restore, the doctrine of morals to what I must ever +reckon its one true and everlasting basis (namely, the divine or +supra-sensual one), and thus of victoriously reconciling and rendering +identical the latest dictates of modern science with the earliest +dawnings of wisdom among the race of men. + +"This is truly my opinion, and how important to me, not for the sake +of Edinburgh University alone, but of the whole world for ages to +come, I need not say to you! I have not the honour of any personal +acquaintance with Mr. Adam Black, late member for Edinburgh, but for +fifty years back have known him, in the distance, and by current and +credible report, as a man of solid sense, independence, probity, and +public spirit; and if, in your better knowledge of the circumstances, +you judge it suitable to read this note to him--to him, or indeed to +any other person--you are perfectly at liberty to do so. + + "Yours sincerely always, + + "T. CARLYLE." +[Illustration] + + + + +FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS. + + +Mr. Carlyle, ex-Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, being +asked before the expiration of his term of office, to deliver a +valedictory address to the students, he sent the following letter to +Mr. Robertson, Vice-President of the Committee for his election:-- + + "Chelsea, December 6, 1868. + +"DEAR SIR,-- + +"I much regret that a valedictory speech from me, in present +circumstances, is a thing I must not think of. Be pleased to advise +the young gentlemen who were so friendly towards me that I have +already sent them, in silence, but with emotions deep enough, perhaps +too deep, my loving farewell, and that ingratitude or want of regard +is by no means among the causes that keep me absent. With a fine +youthful enthusiasm, beautiful to look upon, they bestowed on me that +bit of honour, loyally all they had; and it has now, for reasons one +and another, become touchingly memorable to me--touchingly, and even +grandly and tragically--never to be forgotten for the remainder of +my life. Bid them, in my name, if they still love me, fight the good +fight, and quit themselves like men in the warfare to which they are +as if conscript and consecrated, and which lies ahead. Tell them to +consult the eternal oracles (not yet inaudible, nor ever to become so, +when worthily inquired of); and to disregard, nearly altogether, in +comparison, the temporary noises, menacings, and deliriums. May they +love wisdom, as wisdom, if she is to yield her treasures, must be +loved, piously, valiantly, humbly, beyond life itself, or the prizes +of life, with all one's heart and all one's soul. In that case (I will +say again), and not in any other case, it shall be well with them. + +"Adieu, my young friends, a long adieu, yours with great sincerity, + + "T. CARLYLE" + + + + +BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE. + + +At a meeting of the Senatus Academicus of Edinburgh University, a few +weeks after his decease, a deed of mortification by Thomas Carlyle +in favour of that body, for the foundation of ten Bursaries in the +Faculty of Arts, was read. The document opens as follows:-- + +"I, Thomas Carlyle, residing at Chelsea, presently Rector in the +University of Edinburgh, from the love, favour and affection which I +bear to that University, and from my interest in the advancement of +education in my native Scotland, as elsewhere, for these and for other +more peculiar reasons, which also I wish to record, do intend, and +am now in the act of making to the said University, a bequest, +as underwritten, of the estate of Craigenputtoch, which is now my +property. Craigenputtoch lies at the head of the parish of Dunscore, +in Nithsdale, Dumfriesshire. The extent is of about 1,800 acres; +rental at present, on lease of nineteen years, is £250; the annual +worth, with the improvements now in progress, is probably £300. +Craigenputtoch was for many generations the patrimony of a family +named Welsh, the eldest son usually a 'John Welsh,' in series going +back, think some, to the famous John Welsh, son-in-law of the reformer +Knox. The last male heir of the family was John Welsh, Esq., surgeon, +Haddington. His one child and heiress was my late dear, magnanimous, +much-loving, and, to me, inestimable wife, in memory of whom, and +of her constant nobleness and piety towards him and towards me, I am +now--she having been the last of her kindred--about to bequeath to +Edinburgh University with whatever piety is in me this Craigenputtoch, +which was theirs and hers, on the terms, and for the purposes, and +under the conditions underwritten. Therefore I do mortify and +dispose to and in favour of the said University of Edinburgh, for +the foundation and endowment of ten equal Bursaries, to be called +the 'John Welsh Bursaries,' in the said University, heritably and +irredeemably, all and whole the lands of Upper Craigenputtoch. The +said estate is not to be sold, but to be kept and administered as +land, the net annual revenue of it to be divided into ten equal +Bursaries, to be called, as aforesaid, the 'John Welsh Bursaries.' The +Senatus Academicus shall bestow them on the ten applicants entering +the University who, on strict and thorough examination and open +competitive trial by examiners whom the Senatus will appoint for that +end, are judged to show the best attainment of actual proficiency and +the best likelihood of more in the department or faculty called of +arts, as taught there. Examiners to be actual professors in said +faculty, the fittest whom the Senatus can select, with fit assessors +or coadjutors and witnesses, if the Senatus see good, and always the +report of the said examiners to be minuted and signed, and to govern +the appointments made, and to be recorded therewith. More specially I +appoint that five of the 'John Welsh Bursaries' shall be given for the +best proficiency in mathematics--I would rather say 'in mathesis,' if +that were a thing to be judged of from competition--but practically +above all in pure geometry, such being perennial, the symptom not +only of steady application, but of a clear, methodic intellect, +and offering in all epochs good promise for all manner of arts and +pursuits. The other five Bursaries I appoint to depend (for the +present and indefinitely onwards) on proficiency in classical +learning, that is to say, in knowledge of Latin, Greek, and English, +all of these, or any two of them. This also gives good promise of a +young mind, but as I do not feel certain that it gives perennially or +will perennially be thought in universities to give the best promise, +I am willing that the Senatus of the University, in case of a change +of its opinion on this point hereafter in the course of generations, +shall bestow these latter five Bursaries on what it does then consider +the most excellent proficiency in matters classical, or the best proof +of a classical mind, which directs its own highest effort towards +teaching and diffusing in the new generations that will come. The +Bursaries to be open to free competition of all who come to study in +Edinburgh University, and who have never been of any other University, +the competition to be held on or directly before or after their first +matriculation there. Bursaries to be always given on solemnly strict +and faithful trial to the worthiest, or if (what in justice can never +happen, though it illustrates my intention) the claims of two +were absolutely equal, and could not be settled by further trial, +preference is to fall in favour of the more unrecommended and +unfriended under penalties graver than I, or any highest mortal, can +pretend to impose, but which I can never doubt--as the law of eternal +justice, inexorably valid, whether noticed or unnoticed, pervades all +corners of space and of time--are very sure to be punctually exacted +if incurred. This is to be the perpetual rule for the Senatus in +deciding." + +After stating some other conditions, the document thus concludes: + +"And so may a little trace of help to the young heroic soul struggling +for what is highest spring from this poor arrangement and bequest. +May it run for ever, if it can, as a thread of pure water from the +Scottish rocks, trickling into its little basin by the thirsty wayside +for those to whom it veritably belongs. Amen. Such is my bequest to +Edinburgh University. In witness whereof these presents, written upon +this and the two preceding pages by James Steven Burns, clerk to John +Cook, writer to the signet, are subscribed by me at Chelsea, the +20th day of June, 1867, before these witnesses: John Forster, +barrister-at-law, man of letters, etc., residing at Palace-gate House, +Kensington, London; and James Anthony Froude, man of letters, residing +at No. 5, Onslow Gardens, Brompton, London. + + "_(Signed)_ T. CARLYLE. + + "JOHN FORSTER,} + "J.A. FROUDE, } _Witnesses_. + +[Illustration] + + + + +INDEX. + + + Abelard, 134. + Aitken, Mary, 117. + Allingham, Mrs., her sketch of Carlyle, 121. + Annan, Academy, 9. + Anspach's _History_ of Newfoundland, 13. + Arnold, Thomas, visits the field of Naseby with Carlyle, 63, 64. + + Baillie, Joanna, her Metrical Legends, 13. + Bentley, Richard, the last of English scholars, 162. + Black, Adam, 191. + Boehm, Mr., his medallion and statue of Carlyle, 116, 120, 121. + Braidwood Testimonial, 85, 86. + Brewster, Sir David, his Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, 10, 11; + writes a Preface to Carlyle's Translation of Legendre, 13; + presides at Carlyle's installation as Rector of Edinburgh + University, 90, 93, 96. + Buchanan, George, 47. + Buller, Charles, Carlyle becomes tutor to, 15; + his death, 74; + Carlyle's tribute to, 75-80. + Burns, Robert, 67. + + Cameron, Mrs., her photograph of Carlyle, 120. + Carlyle, Jane Welsh, Goethe's verses to, 20; + described by Margaret Fuller, 68, 69; + death of, 109; + funeral, 110; + inscription on her tombstone, 111. + Carlyle, Thomas, birth and parentage, 8; + early studies, 9; + school-mastering, 9-10; + first attempts in literature, 10-14; + Buller tutorship, 15; + German translations, 15-17; + his marriage, 17; + life at Craigenputtoch, 17-18; + removes to London, 25; + his affection for Leigh Hunt, 26; + letter to Major Richardson, 40; + his Lectures, 45; + advice to a young man, 54; + defence of Mazzini, 59; + visit to Rugby, 63; + his letter to Sir William Napier, 81; + the Edinburgh Rectorship and Address, 87-109; + death of his wife, 109; + on the Jamaica insurrection, 112; + latest writings, 115; + medal and address, 116; + closing years of life, 117; + his _Reminiscences_, 118; + portraits of, 119. + Carlyle, John A., his Translation of Dante, 98; + death of, 117. + Chelsea, old memories of, 25; + Carlyle fixes his residence there, 25, 26. + Collins's Peerage, 152. + Craigenputtoch, 17; + description of by Carlyle, in a letter to Goethe, 18. + Cromwell, Oliver, Letters and Speeches, 68; + his Protectorate, 145 + Cunningham, Allan, on old age, 44: + + Demosthenes, 166. + De Quincey, Thomas, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16 + D'Orsay, Count, his Portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Dumfries, 18. + + Emerson, Ralph Waldo, his visit to Carlyle at Craigenputtoch, 21; + his Essays introduced to the English public by Carlyle, 52; + Margaret Fuller's letter to him, 64. + Eyre, Edward John, Carlyle's defence of, 112. + + Ferguson's Roman History, 140. + Fichte, 37. + Forster, John, 200. + Fraser's Magazine, 20, 22, 115, 119. + Frederick the Great, History of, 81, 87. + French Revolution, History of the, 38. + Froude, James Anthony, 118, 200. + Fuller, Margaret, her Letter to Emerson describing Carlyle's + conversation, 65-73. + + German Romance, 16. + Gibbon, 23. + Goethe, his _Faust_, 13; + his _Wilhelm Meister_ translated by Carlyle, 15; + Carlyle's letters to him, 18; + writes an Introduction to the German translation of Carlyle's Life + of Schiller, 20; + his verses to Mrs. Carlyle, _ib_.; + Wilhelm Meister's Travels, 170-171; + Verses by him, quoted, 186, 187. + Grant, James, quoted, 46, 48-52. + + Hannay, James, on Carlyle, 47. + Heyne, his Tibullus and Virgil, 162-163. + Hoffmann, Carlyle's translation from, 16. + Horne, R.H., quoted, 27, 28. + Houghton, Lord, breakfast party at his house, 38. + Hunt, Leigh, invited by Carlyle to visit him in Dumfriesshire. 26; + settles at Chelsea, _ib_.; + characteristic anecdote, 27; + leaves Chelsea, 28; + Carlyle's eulogium on, 29; + Carlyle's opinion + of his Autobiography, 33; + quoted, 35, 46. + + Ireland, Carlyle's papers on, 74. + Irving, Edward, 10, 40. + + Jeffrey, Lord, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16; + Carlyle's Reminiscences of, 119. + Johnson, Samuel, advice as to reading, 55. + + Kirkcaldy, 10. + Knox, John, an ancestor of Carlyle's wife, 17, 196; + grim humour of, 47; + the portraits of, 115; + belongs to the select of the earth, 142-143; + his History of the Reformation, 184-185. + + Lally, at Pondicherry, 84. + La Motte Fouqué, Carlyle's Translations from, 16. + Landor, Walter Savage, 23, 38. + Latter-Day Pamphlets, 80. + Laurence, Samuel, his portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Legendre's Geometry, translated by Carlyle, 13, 14. + Leslie, Sir John, 9. + Lewes, George Henry, 66. + London Magazine, The, 15, 16. + Louis Philippe, 74. + + Machiavelli on Democracy, 107, 146. + Maclise, Daniel, 119. + Mazzini, his articles on Carlyle, 58; + Carlyle's defence of his character, 59; + remonstrates vainly with Carlyle, 69. + Milnes, R. M., see _Houghton_, Lord. + Mirabeau, 23. + Moore, Thomas, meets Carlyle at a breakfast party, 38. + Musæus, Carlyle's translations from, 17. + + Napier, Sir William, his History of the Administration of Scinde 81; + Carlyle's letter to him, 81-85. + Necker, Carlyle's biography of him, quoted, 11. + Nero, death of, 22. + Newfoundland, Carlyle's account of, quoted, 12. + + Ossoli, see _Fuller_. + + _Past and Present_, 53; + quoted, 187-188. + _Paul et Virginie_, 44. + Petrarch and _Laura_, 67. + Phocion, 167. + + Quincey, see _De Quincey_. + + Richardson, David Lester, his _Literary Leaves_, 40; + Carlyle's letter to him, 40-44. + Richter, Jean Paul, 17. + Robinson, Henry Crabb, 38, 39. + Rous, Sir Francis, 148. + Rousseau, at St. Pierre, 19; + his Confessions, 23. + Ruskin, John, his praise of Boehm's statue of Carlyle, 116, 121. + Rugby School, 63, 64. + + _Sartor Resartus_, 36, 37. + Schiller, Friedrich, Carlyle's life of him, 15; + Supplement to, 115. + Shakespeare, 67. + Smith, Alexander, his account of the delivery of Carlyle's Address at + Edinburgh, 87-92. + Socrates, disparaged by Carlyle, 23. + Sophocles, the tragedies of, 141. + Sterling, John, 37, 38; + death of, 62; + Carlyle's life of him, 81. + Stirling, Dr., Carlyle's letter to, 189-191. + + Tennyson, why he wrote in verse, 67. + Teufelsdröckh, 36, 68. + Thackeray, W.M., his verses on the death of Charles Buller, 15, 74-75. + Tieck, 17. + Turveydrop senior, on Polished Deportment, 49. + + University of Edinburgh, 125. + + Watts, G.F., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + Welsh family, 17. + Whistler, J.A., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + + Youth, the golden season of life, 130. + + Zoilus, 19. + +THE END. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's On the Choice of Books, by Thomas Carlyle + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13435 *** diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..35373bf --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #13435 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13435) diff --git a/old/13435-8.txt b/old/13435-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3a546f1 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/13435-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4250 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Choice of Books, by Thomas Carlyle + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: On the Choice of Books + +Author: Thomas Carlyle + +Release Date: September 11, 2004 [EBook #13435] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, S.R.Ellison and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + + ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS + + THOMAS CARLYLE + + _WITH A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR_ + +[Illustration: _No_. 5 _Great Cheyne Row. + +The Residence of Mr. Carlyle from_ 1834 _until his Death_] + + _A NEW EDITION_ + + CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY + +[Illustration] + + + + CONTENTS. PAGE + BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION 7 + + ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY, APRIL 2, 1866 125 + + THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY 189 + + FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS 192 + + BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE 195 + + INDEX 201 + +[Illustration] + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION. + +There comes a time in the career of every man of genius who has +devoted a long life to the instruction and enlightenment of his +fellow-creatures, when he receives before his death all the honours +paid by posterity. Thus when a great essayist or historian lives to +attain a classic and world-wide fame, his own biography becomes as +interesting to the public as those he himself has written, and by +which he achieved his laurels. + +This is almost always the case when a man of such cosmopolitan +celebrity outlives the ordinary allotted period of threescore years +and ten; for a younger generation has then sprung up, who only hear +of his great fame, and are ignorant of the long and painful steps +by which it was achieved. These remarks are peculiarly applicable +in regard to the man whose career we are now to dwell on for a short +time: his genius was of slow growth and development, and his fame was +even more tardy in coming; but since the world some forty years ago +fairly recognised him as a great and original thinker and teacher, +few men have left so indelible an impress on the public mind, or +have influenced to so great a degree the most thoughtful of their +contemporaries. + +Thomas Carlyle was born on Tuesday, December 4th, 1795, at +Ecclefechan, a small village in the district of Annandale, +Dumfriesshire. His father, a stone-mason, was noted for quickness of +mental perception, and great energy and decision of character; +his mother, as affectionate, pious, and more than ordinarily +intelligent;[A] and thus accepting his own theory, that "the history +of a man's childhood is the description of his parents' environment," +Carlyle entered upon the "mystery of life" under happy and enviable +circumstances. After preliminary instruction, first at the parish +school, and afterwards at Annan, he went, in November, 1809, and when +he was fourteen years old, to the University of Edinburgh. Here +he remained till the summer of 1814, distinguishing himself by his +devotion to mathematical studies then taught there by Professor +Leslie. As a student, he was irregular in his application, but when he +did set to work, it was with his whole energy. He appears to have been +a great reader of general literature at this time, and the stories +that are told of the books that he got through are scarcely to be +credited. In the summer of 1814, on the resignation of Mr. Waugh, +Carlyle obtained, by competitive examination at Dumfries, the post of +mathematical master at Annan Academy. Although he had, at his parents' +desire, commenced his studies with a view to entering the Scottish +Church, the idea of becoming a minister was growingly distasteful to +him. A fellow-student describes his habits at this time as lonely and +contemplative; and we know from another source that his vacations +were principally spent among the hills and by the rivers of his +native county. In the summer of 1816 he was promoted to the post of +"classical and mathematical master" at the old Burgh or Grammar School +at Kirkcaldy. At the new school in that town Edward Irving, whose +acquaintance Carlyle first made at Edinburgh, about Christmas, 1815, +had been established since the year 1812; they were thus brought +closely together, and their intimacy soon ripened into a friendship +destined to become famous. At Kirkcaldy Carlyle remained over two +years, becoming more and more convinced that neither as minister nor +as schoolmaster was he to successfully fight his way up in the world. +It had become clear to him that literature was his true vocation, +and he would have started in the profession at once, had it been +convenient for him to do so. + +[Footnote A: James Carlyle was born in August, 1758, and died January +23, 1832. His second wife (whose maiden name was Margaret Aitken), was +born in September, 1771, and died on Christmas Day, 1853. There +were nine children of this marriage, "whereof four sons and three +daughters," says the inscription en the tombstone in the burial-ground +at Ecclefechan, "survived, gratefully reverent of such a father and +such a mother."] + +He had already written several articles and essays, and a few of them +had appeared in print; but they gave little promise or indication of +the power he was afterwards to exhibit. During the years 1820--1823, +he contributed a series of articles (biographical and topographical) +to Brewster's "Edinburgh Encyclopaedia,"[1] viz.:-- + +[Footnote 1: Vols. XIV. to XVI. The fourteenth volume bears at the end +the imprint, "Edinburgh, printed by Balfour and Clarke, 1820;" and the +sixteenth volume, "Printed by A. Balfour and Co., Edinburgh, 1823." +Most of these articles are distinguished by the initials "T.C."; but +they are all attributed to Carlyle in the List of the Authors of the +Principal Articles, prefixed to the work on its completion.] + + 1. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu + 2. Montaigne + 3. Montesquieu + 4. Montfaucon + 5. Dr. Moore + 6. Sir John Moore + 7. Necker + 8. Nelson + 9. Netherlands + 10. Newfoundland + 11. Norfolk + 12. Northamptonshire + 13. Northumberland + 14. Mungo Park + 15. Lord Chatham + 16. William Pitt. + +The following is from the article on _Necker_:-- + +"As an author, Necker displays much irregular force of imagination, +united with considerable perspicuity and compass of thought; though +his speculations are deformed by an undue attachment to certain +leading ideas, which, harmonizing with his habits of mind, had +acquired an excessive preponderance in the course of his long and +uncontroverted meditations. He possessed extensive knowledge, and +his works bespeak a philosophical spirit; but their great and +characteristic excellence proceeds from that glow of fresh and +youthful admiration for everything that is amiable or august in the +character of man, which, in Necker's heart, survived all the blighting +vicissitudes it had passed through, _combining, in a singular union, +the fervour of the stripling with the experience of the sage_."[A] + +[Footnote A: "In the earliest authorship of Mr. Carlyle," says Mr. +James Russell Lowell, alluding to these papers, "we find some not +obscure hints of the future man. The outward fashion of them is that +of the period; but they are distinguished by a certain security of +judgment, remarkable at any time, remarkable especially in one so +young. Carlyle, in these first essays, already shows the influence of +his master Goethe, the most widely receptive of critics. In a +compact notice of Montaigne there is not a word as to his religious +scepticism. The character is looked at purely from its human and +literary sides."] + +Here is a passage from the article on _Newfoundland_, interesting as +containing perhaps the earliest germ of the later style:-- + +"The ships intended for the fishery on the southeast coast, arrive +early in June. Each takes her station opposite any unoccupied part of +the beach where the fish may be most conveniently cured, and retains +it till the end of the season. Formerly the master who arrived first +on any station was constituted _fishing-admiral_, and had by law the +power of settling disputes among the other crews. But the jurisdiction +of those _admirals_ is now happily superseded by the regular +functionaries who reside on shore. Each captain directs his whole +attention to the collection of his own cargo, without minding the +concerns of his neighbour. Having taken down what part of the rigging +is removable, they set about their laborious calling, and must pursue +it zealously. Their mode of proceeding is thus described by Mr. +Anspach, _a clerical person, who lived in the island several years, +and has since written a meagre and very confused book, which he calls +a_ HISTORY _of it_." + +To the "New Edinburgh Review" (1821-22) Carlyle also contributed +two papers--one on Joanna Baillie's "Metrical Legends," and one on +Goethe's "Faust." + +In the year 1822 he made a translation of "Legendre's Geometry," to +which he prefixed an Essay on Proportion; and the book appeared a +year or two afterwards under the auspices of the late Sir David +Brewster.[A] The Essay on Proportion remains to this day the most +lucid and succinct exposition of the subject hitherto published. + +[Footnote A: "Elements of Geometry and Trigonometry," with Notes. +Translated from the French of A.M. Legendre. Edited by David Brewster, +LL.D. With Notes and Additions, and an Introductory Chapter on +Proportion. Edinburgh: published by Oliver and Boyd; and G. and W.B. +Whittaker, London. 1824, pp. xvi., 367. Sir David Brewster's +Preface, in which he speaks of "an Introduction on Proportion, by the +Translator," is dated _Edinburgh, August_ 1, 1822.] + +"I was already," says Carlyle in his _Reminiscences_, "getting my head +a little up, translating 'Legendre's Geometry' for Brewster. I still +remember a happy forenoon in which I did a _Fifth Book_ (or complete +'doctrine of proportion') for that work, complete really and lucid, +and yet one of the briefest ever known. It was begun and done that +forenoon, and I have (except correcting the press next week) never +seen it since; but still I feel as if it were right enough and +felicitous in its kind! I only got £50 for my entire trouble in that +'Legendre;' but it was an honest job of work, honestly done."[A] + +[Footnote A: _Reminiscences by Thomas Carlyle_, Edited by James +Anthony Froude. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1881, Vol. 1., pp. +198-199.] + +The late Professor de Morgan--an excellent authority--pronounced a +high eulogium upon this Essay on Proportion. + +In 1822 Carlyle accepted the post of tutor to Charles Buller, of whose +early death and honourable promise, two touching records remain to us, +one in verse by Thackeray, and one in prose by Carlyle. + +For the next four years Carlyle devoted his attention almost +exclusively to German literature. + +His Life of Schiller first appeared under the title of "Schiller's +Life and Writings," in the London Magazine. + + Part I.--October, 1823. + Part II.--January, 1824. + Part III.--July, 1824. + " August, 1824. + " September, 1824. + +It was enlarged, and separately published by Messrs. Taylor and +Hessey, the proprietors of the Magazine, in 1825. + +The translation of "Wilhelm Meister," in 1824,[A] was the first real +introduction of Goethe to the reading world of Great Britain. It +appeared without the name of the translator, but its merits were too +palpable to be overlooked, though some critics objected to the strong +infusion of German phraseology which had been imported into the +English version. This acquired idiom never left our author, even in +his original works, although the "Life of Schiller," written but a few +months before, is almost entirely free from the peculiarity. "Wilhelm +Meister," in its English dress, was better received by the English +reading public than by English critics. De Quincey, in one of his +dyspeptic fits, fell upon the book, its author, and the translator,[B] +and Lord Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review, although admitting Carlyle +to be a talented person, heaped condemnation upon the work. + +[Footnote A: Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship. 3 Vols., Edinburgh, +1824.] + +[Footnote B: Curiously enough in the very numbers of the "London +Magazine" containing the later instalments of Carlyle's Life of +Schiller.] + +Carlyle's next work was a series of translations, entitled "German +Romance: Specimens of the chief Authors; with Biographical and +Critical Notices." 4 vols. Edinburgh, 1827. The Preface and +Introductions are reprinted in the second volume of Carlyle's +Collected Works: the Specimens translated from Hoffmann and La Motte +Fouqué, have not been reprinted. + +"This," says Carlyle, in 1857, "was a Book of Translations, not of my +suggesting or desiring, but of my executing as honest journey-work in +defect of better. The pieces selected were the suitablest discoverable +on such terms: not quite of _less_ than no worth (I considered) any +piece of them; nor, alas, of a very high worth any, except one only. +Four of these lots, or quotas to the adventure, Musæus's, Tieck's, +Richter's, Goethe's, will be given in the final stage of this Series; +the rest we willingly leave, afloat or stranded, as waste driftwood, +to those whom they may farther concern." + +It was in 1826 that Mr. Carlyle married Miss Jane Welsh, the only +child of Dr. John Welsh, of Haddington,[A] a lineal descendant of John +Knox, and a lady fitted in every way to be the wife of such a man. For +some time after marriage he continued to reside at Edinburgh, but +in May, 1828, he took up his residence in his native county, at +Craigenputtoch--a solitary farmhouse on a small estate belonging to +his wife's mother, about fifteen miles from Dumfries, and in one of +the most secluded parts of the country. Most of his letters to Goethe +were written from this place. + +[Footnote A: Her father had been dead some seven years when Carlyle +and she were married, and the life interest of her inheritance in the +farm of Craigenputtoch had been made over to her mother, who survived +until 1842, when it reverted to Carlyle.] + +In one of the letters sent from Craigenputtoch to Weimar, bearing +the date of 25th September, 1828, we have a charming picture of our +author's seclusion and retired literary life at this period:-- + +"You inquire with such warm interest respecting our present abode and +occupations, that I feel bound to say a few words about both, while +there is still room left. Dumfries is a pleasant town, containing +about fifteen thousand inhabitants, and may be considered the centre +of the trade and judicial system of a district which possesses some +importance in the sphere of Scottish industry. Our residence is not +in the town itself, but fifteen miles to the north-west, among the +granite hills and the black morasses which stretch westward through +Galloway, almost to the Irish Sea. In this wilderness of heath and +rock, our estate stands forth a green oasis, a tract of ploughed, +partly enclosed, and planted ground, where corn ripens, and trees +afford a shade, although surrounded by sea-mews and rough-woolled +sheep. Here, with no small effort, have we built and furnished a neat, +substantial dwelling; here, in the absence of professorial or other +office, we live to cultivate literature according to our strength, +and in our own peculiar way. We wish a joyful growth to the rose and +flowers of our garden; we hope for health and peaceful thoughts to +further our aims. The roses, indeed, are still in part to be planted, +but they blossom already in anticipation. Two ponies, which carry +us everywhere, and the mountain air, are the best medicines for weak +nerves. This daily exercise--to which I am much devoted--is my only +recreation: for this nook of ours is the loneliest in Britain--six +miles removed from any one likely to visit me. Here Rousseau would +have been as happy as on his island of St. Pierre. My town friends, +indeed, ascribe my sojourn here to a similar disposition, and forbode +me no good result. But I came hither solely with the design to +simplify my way of life, and to secure the independence through which +I could be enabled to remain true to myself. This bit of earth is our +own; here we can live, write, and think, as best pleases ourselves, +even though Zoilus himself were to be crowned the monarch of +literature. Nor is the solitude of such great importance; for a +stage-coach takes us speedily to Edinburgh, which we look upon as our +British Weimar. And have I not, too, at this moment piled up upon +the table of my little library a whole cart-load of French, German, +American, and English journals and periodicals--whatever may be their +worth? Of antiquarian studies, too, there is no lack. From some of +our heights I can descry, about a day's journey to the west, the hill +where Agricola and his Romans left a camp behind them. At the foot of +it I was born, and there both father and mother still live to love me. +And so one must let time work." + +The above letter was printed by Goethe himself, in his Preface to +a German transition of Carlyle's "Life of Schiller," published at +Frankfort in 1830. Other pleasant records of the intercourse between +them exist in the shape of sundry graceful copies of verses addressed +by Goethe to Mrs. Carlyle, which will be found in the collection of +his poems. + +Carlyle had now fairly started as an original writer. From the lonely +farm of Craigenputtoch went forth the brilliant series of Essays +contributed to the Edinburgh, Westminster, and Foreign Reviews, and to +Fraser's Magazine, which were not long in gaining for him a literary +reputation in both hemispheres. To this lonely farm came one day in +August, 1833, armed with a letter of introduction, a visitor from the +other side of the Atlantic: a young American, then unknown to fame, by +name Ralph Waldo Emerson. The meeting of these two remarkable men was +thus described by the younger of them, many years afterwards:-- + +"I came from Glasgow to Dumfries, and being intent on delivering a +letter which I had brought from Rome, inquired for Craigenputtoch. +It was a farm in Nithsdale, in the parish of Dunscore, sixteen miles +distant. No public coach passed near it, so I took a private carriage +from the inn. I found the house amid desolate heathery hills, where +the lonely scholar nourished his mighty heart. Carlyle was a man from +his youth, an author who did not need to hide from his readers, and as +absolute a man of the world, unknown and exiled on that hill-farm, as +if holding on his own terms what is best in London. He was tall +and gaunt, with a cliff-like brow, self-possessed, and holding his +extraordinary powers of conversation in easy command; clinging to his +northern accent with evident relish; full of lively anecdote, and with +a streaming humour, which floated everything he looked upon. His talk +playfully exalting the familiar objects, put the companion at once +into an acquaintance with his Lars and Lemurs, and it was very +pleasant to learn what was predestined to be a pretty mythology. Few +were the objects and lonely the man, 'not a person to speak to +within sixteen miles except the minister of Dunscore; so that books +inevitably made his topics. + +"He had names of his own for all the matters familiar to his +discourse. 'Blackwood's' was the 'sand magazine;' 'Fraser's' nearer +approach to possibility of life was the 'mud magazine;' a piece of +road near by that marked some failed enterprise was 'the grave of the +last sixpence.' When too much praise of any genius annoyed him, he +professed hugely to admire the talent shewn by his pig. He had spent +much time and contrivance in confining the poor beast to one enclosure +in his pen, but pig, by great strokes of judgment, had found out +how to let a board down, and had foiled him. For all that, he still +thought man the most plastic little fellow in the planet, and he liked +Nero's death, 'Qualis artifex pereo!' better than most history. He +worships a man that will manifest any truth to him. At one time he had +inquired and read a good deal about America. Landor's principle was +mere rebellion, and that he feared was the American principle. The +best thing he knew of that country was, that in it a man can have meat +for his labour. He had read in Stewart's book, that when he inquired +in a New York hotel for the Boots, he had been shown across the +street, and had found Mungo in his own house dining on roast turkey. + +"We talked of books. Plato he does not read, and he disparaged +Socrates; and, when pressed, persisted in making Mirabeau a hero. +Gibbon he called the splendid bridge from the old world to the new. +His own reading had been multifarious. Tristram Shandy was one of his +first books after Robinson Crusoe, and Robertson's America an early +favourite. Rousseau's Confessions had discovered to him that he was +not a dunce; and it was now ten years since he had learned German, by +the advice of a man who told him he would find in that language what +he wanted. + +"He took despairing or satirical views of literature at this +moment; recounted the incredible sums paid in one year by the great +booksellers for puffing. Hence it comes that no newspaper is trusted +now, no books are bought, and the booksellers are on the eve of +bankruptcy. + +"He still returned to English pauperism, the crowded country, the +selfish abdication by public men of all that public persons should +perform. 'Government should direct poor men what to do. Poor Irish +folk come wandering over these moors. My dame makes it a rule to give +to every son of Adam bread to eat, and supplies his wants to the next +house. But here are thousands of acres which might give them all meat, +and nobody to bid these poor Irish go to the moor and till it. They +burned the stacks, and so found a way to force the rich people to +attend to them.' + +"We went out to walk over long hills, and looked at Criffel, then +without his cap, and down into Wordsworth's country. There we sat +down, and talked of the immortality of the soul. It was not +Carlyle's fault that we talked on that topic, for he had the natural +disinclination of every nimble spirit to bruise itself against walls, +and did not like to place himself where no step can be taken. But he +was honest and true, and cognizant of the subtile links that bind ages +together, and saw how every event affects all the future. 'Christ died +on the tree: that built Dunscore kirk yonder: that brought you and me +together. Time has only a relative existence.' + +"He was already turning his eyes towards London with a scholar's +appreciation. London is the heart of the world, he said, wonderful +only from the mass of human beings. He liked the huge machine. Each +keeps its own round. The baker's boy brings muffins to the window at a +fixed hour every day, and that is all the Londoner knows, or wishes +to know, on the subject. But it turned out good men. He named certain +individuals, especially one man of letters, his friend, the best mind +he knew, whom London had well served."[A] + +[Footnote A: "English Traits," by R.W. Emerson. First Visit to +England.] + +"Carlyle," says Emerson, "was already turning his eyes towards +London," and a few months after the interview just described he did +finally fix his residence there, in a quiet street in Chelsea, leading +down to the river-side. Here, in an old-fashioned house, built in the +reign of Queen Anne, he and his wife settled down in the early summer +of 1834; here they continued to live together until she died; and here +Carlyle afterwards lived on alone till the end of his life. + +With another man, of whom he now became the neighbour--Leigh Hunt--he +had already formed a slight acquaintance, which soon ripened into +a warm friendship and affection on both sides, in spite of their +singular difference of temperament and character. + +"It was on the 8th of February, 1832," says Mr. Thornton Hunt, "that +the writer of the essays named 'Characteristics' received, apparently +from Mr. Leigh Hunt, a volume entitled 'Christianism,' for which he +begged to express his thanks. By the 20th of February, Carlyle, then +lodging in London, was inviting Leigh Hunt to tea, as the means of +their first meeting; and by the 20th of November, Carlyle wrote from +Dumfries, urging Leigh Hunt to 'come hither and see us when you want +to rusticate a month. Is that for ever impossible?' The philosopher +afterwards came to live in the next street to his correspondent, in +Chelsea, and proved to be one of Leigh Hunt's kindest, most faithful, +and most considerate friends."[A] + +[Footnote A: From "The Correspondence of Leigh Hunt," edited by his +eldest son. London: Smith, Elder and Co. 1862. Vol. 1., p. 321.] + +Mr. Horne tells a story very characteristic of both men. Soon after +the publication of "Heroes and Hero Worship," they were at a small +party, when a conversation was started between these two concerning +the heroism of man. "Leigh Hunt had said something about the islands +of the blest, or El Dorado, or the Millennium, and was flowing on his +bright and hopeful way, when Carlyle dropped some heavy tree-trunk +across Hunt's pleasant stream, and banked it up with philosophical +doubts and objections at every interval of the speaker's joyous +progress. But the unmitigated Hunt never ceased his overflowing +anticipations, nor the saturnine Carlyle his infinite demurs to those +finite flourishings. The listeners laughed and applauded by turns; and +had now fairly pitted them against each other, as the philosopher of +hopefulness and of the unhopeful. The contest continued with all that +ready wit and philosophy, that mixture of pleasantry and profundity, +that extensive knowledge of books and character, with their ready +application in argument or illustration, and that perfect ease and +good nature which distinguish both of these men. The opponents were so +well matched that it was quite clear the contest would never come to +an end. But the night was far advanced, and the party broke up. They +all sallied forth, and leaving the close room, the candles and the +arguments behind them, suddenly found themselves in presence of a most +brilliant starlight night. They all looked up. 'Now,' thought Hunt, +'Carlyle's done for! he can have no answer to that!' 'There,' shouted +Hunt, 'look up there, look at that glorious harmony, that sings with +infinite voices an eternal song of Hope in the soul of man.' Carlyle +looked up. They all remained silent to hear what he would say. They +began to think he was silenced at last--he was a mortal man. But out +of that silence came a few low-toned words, in a broad Scotch accent. +And who on earth could have anticipated what the voice said? 'Eh! it's +a sad sight!' Hunt sat down on a stone step. They all laughed--then +looked very thoughtful. Had the finite measured itself with infinity, +instead of surrendering itself up to the influence? Again they +laughed--then bade each other good night, and betook themselves +homeward with slow and serious pace."[A] + +[Footnote A: "A New Spirit of the Age," by R.H. Home. London, 1844. +Vol. . p. 278.] + +In 1840 Leigh Hunt left Chelsea, and went to live at Kensington, but +Carlyle never altogether lost sight of him, and on several occasions +was able to do him very serviceable acts of kindness; as, for +instance, in writing certain Memoranda concerning him with the view of +procuring from Government a small provision for Leigh Hunt's declining +years, which we may as well give in this place:-- + + MEMORANDA + + CONCERNING MR. LEIGH HUNT. + +"1. That Mr. Hunt is a man of the most indisputedly superior worth; +a _Man of Genius_ in a very strict sense of that word, and in all +the senses which it bears or implies; of brilliant varied gifts, +of graceful fertility, of clearness, lovingness, truthfulness; of +childlike open character; also of most pure and even exemplary private +deportment; a man who can be other than _loved_ only by those who have +not seen him, or seen him from a distance through a false medium. + +"2. That, well seen into, he _has_ done much for the world;--as every +man possessed of such qualities, and freely speaking them forth in +the abundance of his heart for thirty years long, must needs do: _how_ +much, they that could judge best would perhaps estimate highest. + +"3. That, for one thing, his services in the cause of reform, as +Founder and long as Editor of the 'Examiner' newspaper; as Poet, +Essayist, Public Teacher in all ways open to him, are great and +evident: few now living in this kingdom, perhaps, could boast of +greater. + +"4. That his sufferings in that same cause have also been great; legal +prosecution and penalty (not dishonourable to him; nay, honourable, +were the whole truth known, as it will one day be): unlegal obloquy +and calumny through the Tory Press;--perhaps a greater quantity of +baseless, persevering, implacable calumny, than any other living +writer has undergone. Which long course of hostility (nearly the +cruellest conceivable, had it not been carried on in half, or almost +total misconception) may be regarded as the beginning of his other +worst distresses, and a main cause of them, down to this day. + +"5. That he is heavily laden with domestic burdens, more heavily than +most men, and his economical resources are gone from him. For the last +twelve years he has toiled continually, with passionate diligence, +with the cheerfullest spirit; refusing no task; yet hardly able with +all this to provide for the day that was passing over him; and now, +after some two years of incessant effort in a new enterprise ('The +London Journal') that seemed of good promise, it also has suddenly +broken down, and he remains in ill health, age creeping on him, +without employment, means, or outlook, in a situation of the +painfullest sort. Neither do his distresses, nor did they at any time, +arise from wastefulness, or the like, on his own part (he is a man of +humble wishes, and can live with dignity on little); but from +crosses of what is called Fortune, from injustice of other men, from +inexperience of his own, and a guileless trustfulness of nature, the +thing and things that have made him unsuccessful make him in reality +_more_ loveable, and plead for him in the minds of the candid. + +"6. That such a man is rare in a Nation, and of high value there; not +to be _procured_ for a whole Nation's revenue, or recovered when taken +from us, and some £200 a year is the price which this one, whom we +now have, is valued at: with that sum he were lifted above his +perplexities, perhaps saved from nameless wretchedness! It is believed +that, in hardly any other way could £200 abolish as much suffering, +create as much benefit, to one man, and through him to many and all. + +"Were these things set fitly before an English Minister, in whom great +part of England recognises (with surprise at such a novelty) a man of +insight, fidelity and decision, is it not probable or possible that +he, though from a quite opposite point of view, might see them in +somewhat of a similar light; and, so seeing, determine to do in +consequence? _Ut fiat_! + + "T.C." + +"Some years later," says a writer in "Macmillan's Magazine,"[A] "in +the 'mellow evening' of a life that had been so stormy, Mr. Leigh +Hunt himself told the story of his struggles, his victories, and +his defeats, with so singularly graceful a frankness, that the most +supercilious of critics could not but acknowledge that here was +an autobiographer whom it was possible to like. Here is Carlyle's +estimate of Leigh Hunt's Autobiography:-- + +[Footnote A: July, 1862.] + + "Chelsea, June 17, 1850. + +"DEAR HUNT, + +"I have just finished your Autobiography, which has been most +pleasantly occupying all my leisure these three days; and you must +permit me to write you a word upon it, out of the fulness of the +heart, while the impulse is still fresh to thank you. This good +book, in every sense one of the best I have read this long while, has +awakened many old thoughts which never were extinct, or even properly +asleep, but which (like so much else) have had to fall silent amid the +tempests of an evil time--Heaven mend it! A word from me once more, I +know, will not be unwelcome, while the world is talking of you. + +"Well, I call this an excellent good book, by far the best of the +autobiographic kind I remember to have read in the English language; +and indeed, except it be Boswell's of Johnson, I do not know where we +have such a picture drawn of a human life, as in these three volumes. + +"A pious, ingenious, altogether human and worthy book; imaging, with +graceful honesty and free felicity, many interesting objects and +persons on your life-path, and imaging throughout, what is best of +all, a gifted, gentle, patient, and valiant human soul, as it buffets +its way through the billows of the time, and will not drown though +often in danger; cannot _be_ drowned, but conquers and leaves a track +of radiance behind it: that, I think, conies out more clearly to me +than in any other of your books;--and that, I can venture to assure +you, is the best of all results to realise in a book or written +record. In fact, this book has been like an exercise of devotion to +me; I have not assisted at any sermon, liturgy or litany, this long +while, that has had so religious an effect on me. Thanks in the name +of all men. And believe, along with me, that this book will be welcome +to other generations as well as to ours. And long may you live to +write more books for us; and may the evening sun be softer on you (and +on me) than the noon sometimes was! + +"Adieu, dear Hunt (you must let me use this familiarity, for I am an +old fellow too now, as well as you). I have often thought of coming up +to see you once more; and perhaps I shall, one of these days +(though horribly sick and lonely, and beset with spectral lions, go +whitherward I may): but whether I do or not believe for ever in my +regard. And so, God bless you, + + "Prays heartily, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +On the other hand Leigh Hunt had an enthusiastic reverence for +Carlyle. There are several incidental allusions to the latter, of more +or less consequence, in Hunt's Autobiography, but the following is the +most interesting:-- + +"_Carlyle's Paramount Humanity_.--I believe that what Mr. Carlyle +loves better than his fault-finding, with all its eloquence, is the +face of any human creature that looks suffering, and loving, and +sincere; and I believe further, that if the fellow-creature were +suffering only, and neither loving nor sincere, but had come to a pass +of agony in this life which put him at the mercies of some good man +for some last help and consolation towards his grave, even at the risk +of loss to repute, and a sure amount of pain and vexation, that +man, if the groan reached him in its forlornness, would be Thomas +Carlyle."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Autobiography of Leigh Hunt, with Reminiscences of +friends and Contemporaries." (Lond. 1850.)] + +It was in "Leigh Hunt's Journal,"--a short-lived Weekly Miscellany +(1850--1851)--that Carlyle's sketch, entitled "Two Hundred and Fifty +Years Ago,"[A] first appeared. + +[Footnote A: "Two Hundred and Fifty Years Ago. From a waste paper bag +of T. Carlyle." Reprinted in Carlyle's Miscellanies, Ed. 1857.] + +It was during his residence at Craigenputtoch that "Sartor Resartus" +("The Tailor Done Over," the name of an old Scotch ballad) was +written, which, after being rejected by several publishers, finally +made its appearance in "Eraser's Magazine," 1833--34. The book, it +must be confessed, might well have puzzled the critical gentlemen--the +"book-tasters"--who decide for publishers what work to print among +those submitted in manuscript. It is a sort of philosophical romance, +in which the author undertakes to give, in the form of a review of a +German work on dress, and in a notice of the life of the writer, his +own opinions upon matters and things in general. The hero, Professor +Teufelsdroeckh ("Devil's Dirt"), seems to be intended for a portrait +of human nature as affected by the moral influence to which a +cultivated mind would be exposed by the transcendental philosophy of +Fichte. Mr. Carlyle works out his theory--the clothes philosophy--and +finds the world false and hollow, our institutions mere worn-out rags +or disguises, and that our only safety lies in flying from falsehood +to truth, and becoming in harmony with the "divine idea." There is +much fanciful, grotesque description in "Sartor," with deep thought +and beautiful imagery. "In this book," wrote John Sterling, "we always +feel that there is a mystic influence around us, bringing out into +sharp homely clearness what is noblest in the remote and infinite, +exalting into wonder what is commonest in the dust and toil of every +day." + +"Sartor" found but few admirers; those readers, however, were firm and +enthusiastic in their applause. In 1838 the "Sartor Resartus" papers, +already republished in the United States, were issued in a collected +form here; and in 1839-1840 his various scattered articles +in periodicals, after having similarly received the honour of +republication in America, were published here, first in four and +afterwards in five volumes, under the title of "Miscellanies." + +It was in the spring of 1837 that Carlyle's first great historical +work appeared, "The French Revolution:--Vol. I., The Bastile; Vol. II, +The Constitution; Vol. III., The Guillotine." The publication of this +book produced a profound impression on the public mind. A history +abounding in vivid and graphic descriptions, it was at the same time +a gorgeous "prose epic." It is perhaps the most readable of all +Carlyle's works, and indeed is one of the most remarkable books of the +age. There is no other account of the French Revolution that can be +compared with it for intensity of feeling and profoundness of thought. + +A great deal of information respecting Carlyle's manner of living and +personal history during these earlier years in London may be gleaned +incidentally from his "Life of John Sterling," a book, which, from the +nature of it, is necessarily partly autobiographical. + +Thomas Moore and others met him sometimes in London society at this +time. Moore thus briefly chronicles a breakfast at Lord Houghton's, at +which Carlyle was present:-- + +"22nd May, 1838.--Breakfasted at Milnes', and met rather a remarkable +party, consisting of Savage, Landor, and Carlyle (neither of whom +I had ever seen before), Robinson, Rogers, and Rice. A good deal of +conversation between Robinson and Carlyle about German authors, of +whom I knew nothing, nor (from what they paraded of them) felt that I +had lost much by my ignorance."[A] + +[Footnote A: Diary of Thomas Moore. (Lond. 1856.) Vol. vii., p. 224] + +In 1835, after the publication of "Sartor Resartus," Carlyle received +an invitation from some American admirers of his writings, to visit +their country, and he contemplated doing so, but his labours in +examining and collecting materials for his great work on "The French +Revolution," then hastening towards completion, prevented him. + +We may say that, for many reasons, it is to be regretted that this +design was never carried into execution. Had Carlyle witnessed with +his own eyes the admirable working of democratic institutions in the +United States, he might have done more justice to our Transatlantic +brethren, who were always his first and foremost admirers, and he +might also have acquired more faith in the future destinies of his own +countrymen. + +In December, 1837, Carlyle wrote a very remarkable letter to a +correspondent in India, which has never been printed in his works, +and which we are enabled to give here entire. It is addressed to Major +David Lester Richardson, in acknowledgment of his "Literary Leaves, +or Prose and Verse," published at Calcutta in 1836. These "Literary +Leaves" contain among other things an article on the Italian Opera +(taking much the same view of it as Carlyle does), and a sketch of +Edward Irving. These papers no doubt pleased Carlyle, and perhaps led +him to entertain a rather exaggeratedly high opinion of the rest of +the book. + + THOMAS CARLYLE TO DAVID LESTER RICHARDSON. + + "5, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London, + "_19th December_, 1837. + +"My DEAR SIR, + +"Your courteous gift, with the letter accompanying it, reached me only +about a week ago, though dated 20th of June, almost at the opposite +point of the year. Whether there has been undue delay or not is +unknown to me, but at any rate on my side there ought to be no delay. + +"I have read your volume--what little of it was known to me before, +and the much that was not known--I can say, with true pleasure. It +is written, as few volumes in these days are, with fidelity, with +successful care, with insight and conviction as to matter, with +clearness and graceful precision as to manner: in a word, it is the +impress of a mind stored with elegant accomplishments, gifted with +an eye to see, and a heart to understand; a welcome, altogether +recommendable book. More than once I have said to myself and others, +How many parlour firesides are there this winter in England, at which +this volume, could one give credible announcement of its quality, +would be right pleasant company? There are very many, _could_ one give +the announcement: but no such announcement _can_ be given; therefore +the parlour firesides must even put up with ---- or what other stuff +chance shovels in their way, and read, though with malediction all the +time. It is a great pity, but no man can help it. We are now arrived +seemingly pretty near the point when all criticism and proclamation +in matters literary has degenerated into an inane jargon, incredible, +unintelligible, inarticulate as the cawing of choughs and rooks; and +many things in that as in other provinces, are in a state of painful +and rapid transition. A good book has no way of recommending itself +except slowly and as it were accidentally from hand to hand. The man +that wrote it must abide his time. He needs, as indeed all men do, the +_faith_ that this world is built not on falsehood and jargon but on +truth and reason; that no good thing done by any creature of God was, +is, or ever can be _lost_, but will verily do the service appointed +for it, and be found among the general sum-total and all of things +after long times, nay after all time, and through eternity itself. Let +him 'cast his bread upon the waters,' therefore, cheerful of heart; +'he will find it after many days.' + +"I know not why I write all this to you; it comes very spontaneously +from me. Let it be your satisfaction, the highest a man can have in +this world, that the talent entrusted to you did not lie useless, +but was turned to account, and proved itself to be a talent; and the +'publishing world' can receive it altogether according to their own +pleasure, raise it high on the housetops, or trample it low into the +street-kennels; that is not the question at all, the _thing_ remains +precisely what it was after never such raising and never such +depressing and trampling, there is no change whatever in _it_. I bid +you go on, and prosper. + +"One thing grieves me: the tone of sadness, I might say of settled +melancholy that runs through all your utterances of yourself. It is +not right, it is wrong; and yet how shall I reprove you? If you knew +me, you would triumphantly[A] for any spiritual endowment bestowed +on a man, that it is accompanied, or one might say _preceded_ as the +first origin of it, always by a delicacy of organisation which in +a world like ours is sure to have itself manifoldly afflicted, +tormented, darkened down into sorrow and disease. You feel yourself an +exile, in the East; but in the West too it is exile; I know not where +under the sun it is not exile. Here in the Fog Babylon, amid mud +and smoke, in the infinite din of 'vociferous platitude,' and quack +outbellowing quack, with truth and pity on all hands ground under the +wheels, can one call it a home, or a world? It is a waste chaos, where +we have to swim painfully for our life. The utmost a man can do is +to swim there like a man, and hold his peace. For this seems to me +a great truth, in any exile or chaos whatsoever, that sorrow was not +given us for sorrow's sake, but always and infallibly as a lesson to +us from which we are to learn somewhat: and which, the somewhat +once _learned_, ceases to be sorrow. I do believe this; and study +in general to 'consume my own smoke,' not indeed without very ugly +out-puffs at times! Allan Cunningham is the best, he tells me that +always as one grows older, one grows happier: a thing also which I +really can believe. But as for you, my dear sir, you have other work +to do in the East than grieve. Are there not beautiful things there, +glorious things; wanting only an eye to note them, a hand to record +them? If I had the command over you, I would say, read _Paul et +Virginie_, then read the _Chaumière Indienne_; gird yourself together +for a right effort, and go and do likewise or better! I mean what I +say. The East has its own phases, there are things there which the +West yet knows not of; and one heaven covers both. He that has an eye +let him look! + +[Footnote A: There seems to be some omission or slip of the pen here.] + +"I hope you forgive me this style I have got into. It seems to me on +reading your book as if we had been long acquainted in some measure; +as if one might speak to you right from the heart. I hope we shall +meet some day or other. I send you my constant respect and good +wishes; and am and remain, + + "Yours very truly always, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle first appeared as a lecturer in 1837. His first course was on +'German Literature,' at Willis's Rooms; a series of six lectures, of +which the first was thus noticed in the _Spectator_ of Saturday, May +6, 1837.[A] + +[Footnote A: Facsimiled in "The Autographic Mirror," July, 1865.] + +"_Mr. Thomas Carlyle's Lectures_. + +"Mr. Carlyle delivered the first of a course of lectures on German +Literature, at Willis's Rooms, on Tuesday, to a very crowded and yet +a select audience of both sexes. Mr. Carlyle may be deficient in the +mere mechanism of oratory; but this minor defect is far more than +counterbalanced by his perfect mastery of his subject, the originality +of his manner, the perspicuity of his language, his simple but genuine +eloquence, and his vigorous grasp of a large and difficult question. +No person of taste or judgment could hear him without feeling that the +lecturer is a man of genius, deeply imbued with his great argument." + +"This course of lectures," says a writer already quoted, "was well +attended by the fashionables of the West End; and though they saw +in his manner something exceedingly awkward, they could not fail to +discern in his matter the impress of a mind of great originality and +superior gifts."[A] + +[Footnote A: JAMES GRANT: "Portraits of Public Characters." (Lond. +1841.) Vol. ii., p. 152.] + +The following year he delivered a second course on the 'History of +Literature, or the Successive Periods of European Culture,' at +the Literary Institution in Edwards-street, Portman-square. 'The +Revolutions of Modern Europe' was the title given to the third course, +delivered twelve months later. The fourth and last series, of six +lectures, is the best remembered, 'Heroes and Hero-worship.' This +course alone was published, and it became more immediately popular +than any of the works which had preceded it. Concerning these +lectures, Leigh Hunt remarked that it seemed "as if some Puritan +had come to life again, liberalized by German philosophy and his own +intense reflections and experience." Another critic, a Scotch writer, +could see nothing but wild impracticability in them, and exclaimed, +"Can any living man point to a single practical passage in any of +these lectures? If not, what is the real value of Mr. Carlyle's +teachings? What is Mr. Carlyle himself but a phantasm!" + +The vein of Puritanism running through his writings, composed upon +the model of the German school, impressed many critics with the belief +that their author, although full of fire and energy, was perplexed and +embarrassed with his own speculations. Concerning this Puritan element +in his reflections, Mr. James Hannay remarks, "That earnestness, that +grim humour--that queer, half-sarcastic, half-sympathetic fun--is +quite Scotch. It appears in Knox and Buchanan, and it appears in +Burns. I was not surprised when a school-fellow of Carlyle's told me +that his favourite poem was, when a boy, 'Death and Doctor Hornbook.' +And if I were asked to explain this originality, I should say that he +was a covenanter coming in the wake of the eighteenth century and the +transcendental philosophy. He has gone into the hills against 'shams,' +as they did against Prelacy, Erastianism, and so forth. But he lives +in a quieter age, and in a literary position. So he can give play +to the humour which existed in them as well, and he overflows with +a range of reading and speculation to which they were necessarily +strangers." + +'Chartism,' published in 1839, and which, to use the words of a critic +of the time, was the publication in which "he first broke ground on +the Condition of England question," appeared a short time before the +lectures on 'Heroes and Hero-worship' were delivered. If we +remember rightly, Mr. Carlyle gave forth "those grand utterances" +extemporaneously and without an abstract, notes, or a reminder of any +kind--utterances not beautiful to the flunkey-mind, or valet-soul, +occupied mainly with the fold of the hero's necktie, and the cut +of his coat. Flunkey-dom, by one of its mouthpieces, thus speaks of +them:-- + +"Perhaps his course for the present year, which was on Hero-worship, +was better attended than any previous one. Some of those who were +present estimated the average attendance at three hundred. They +chiefly consisted of persons of rank and wealth, as the number of +carriages which each day waited the conclusion of the lecture to +receive Mr. Carlyle's auditors, and to carry them to their homes, +conclusively testified. The locality of Mr. Carlyle's lectures has, I +believe, varied every year. The Hanover Rooms, Willis's Rooms, and +a place in the north of London, the name of which I forget, have +severally been chosen as the place whence to give utterance to his +profound and original trains of thought. + +"A few words will be expected here as to Mr. Carlyle's manner as a +lecturer. In so far as his mere manner is concerned, I can scarcely +bestow on him a word of commendation. There is something in his manner +which, if I may use a rather quaint term, must seem very uncouth to +London audiences of the most respectable class, _accustomed as they +are to the polished deportment[A] which is usually exhibited in +Willis's or the Hanover Rooms_. When he enters the room, and proceeds +to the sort of rostrum whence he delivers his lectures, he is, +according to the usual practice in such cases, generally received +with applause; but he very rarely takes any more notice of the mark +of approbation thus bestowed upon him, than if he were altogether +unconscious of it. And the same seeming want of respect for his +audience, or, at any rate, the same disregard for what I believe +he considers the troublesome forms of politeness, is visible at the +commencement of his lecture. Having ascended his desk, he gives a +hearty rub to his hands, and plunges at once into his subject. He +reads very closely, which, indeed, must be expected, considering +the nature of the topics which he undertakes to discuss. He is not +prodigal of gesture with his arms or body; but there is something in +his eye and countenance which indicates great earnestness of purpose, +and the most intense interest in his subject. _You can almost fancy, +in some of his more enthusiastic and energetic moments, that you +see his inmost soul in his face_. At times, indeed very often, he so +unnaturally distorts his features, as to give to his countenance a +very unpleasant expression. On such occasions, you would imagine that +he was suddenly seized with some violent paroxysms of pain. _He is +one of the most ungraceful speakers I have ever heard address a public +assemblage of persons_. In addition to the awkwardness of his general +manner, he 'makes mouths,' which would of themselves be sufficient to +mar the agreeableness of his delivery. And his manner of speaking, and +the ungracefulness of his gesticulation, are greatly aggravated by +his strong Scotch accent. Even to the generality of Scotchmen his +pronunciation is harsh in no ordinary degree. Need I say, then, what +it must be to an English ear? + +[Footnote A: Shade of Mr. Turveydrop senior, hear this man!] + +"I was present some months ago, during the delivery of a speech by Mr. +Carlyle at a meeting held in the Freemasons' Tavern, for the purpose +of forming a metropolitan library; and though that speech did not +occupy in its delivery more than five minutes, he made use of some of +the most extraordinary phraseology I ever heard employed by a +human being. He made use of the expression 'this London,' which he +pronounced 'this Loondun,' four or five times--a phrase which grated +grievously on the ears even of those of Mr. Carlyle's own countrymen +who were present, and which must have sounded doubly harsh in the ears +of an Englishman, considering the singularly broad Scotch accent with +which he spoke. + +"A good deal of uncertainty exists as to Mr. Carlyle's religious +opinions. I have heard him represented as a firm and entire believer +in revelation, and I have heard it affirmed with equal confidence that +he is a decided Deist. My own impression is," &c.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Portraits of Public Characters," by the author of +"Random Recollections of the Lords and Commons." Vol. ii. pp. +152-158.] + +In 1841 Carlyle superintended the publication of the English +edition of his friend Emerson's Essays,[B] to which he prefixed a +characteristic Preface of some length. + +[Footnote B: Essays: by R.W. Emerson, of Concord, Massachusetts. With +Preface by Thomas Carlyle. London: James Fraser, 1841.] + +"The name of Ralph Waldo Emerson," he writes, "is not entirely new +in England: distinguished travellers bring us tidings of such a man; +fractions of his writings have found their way into the hands of +the curious here; fitful hints that there is, in New England, some +spiritual notability called Emerson, glide through Reviews and +Magazines. Whether these hints were true or not true, readers are now +to judge for themselves a little better. + +"Emerson's writings and speakings amount to something: and yet +hitherto, as seems to me, this Emerson is perhaps far less notable for +what he has spoken or done, than for the many things he has not spoken +and has forborne to do. With uncommon interest I have learned that +this, and in such a never-resting, locomotive country too, is one of +those rare men who have withal the invaluable talent of sitting still! +That an educated man, of good gifts and opportunities, after looking +at the public arena, and even trying, not with ill success, what its +tasks and its prizes might amount to, should retire for long years +into rustic obscurity; and, amid the all-pervading jingle of dollars +and loud chaffering of ambitions and promotions, should quietly, +with cheerful deliberateness, sit down to spend _his_ life not in +Mammon-worship, or the hunt for reputation, influence, place, or any +outward advantage whatsoever: this, when we get a notice of it, is a +thing really worth noting." + +In 1843, "Past and Present" appeared--a work without the wild power +which "Sartor Resartus" possessed over the feelings of the reader, +but containing passages which look the same way, and breathe the +same spirit. The book contrasts, in a historico-philosophical spirit, +English society in the Middle Ages, with English society in our own +day. In both this and the preceding work the great measures advised +for the amelioration of the people are education and emigration. + +Another very admirable letter, addressed by Mr. Carlyle in 1843 to a +young man who had written to him desiring his advice as to a proper +choice of reading, and, it would appear also, as to his conduct in +general, we shall here bring forth from its hiding-place in an old +Scottish newspaper of a quarter of a century ago:-- + +"DEAR SIR, + +"Some time ago your letter was delivered me; I take literally the +first free half-hour I have had since to write you a word of answer. + +"It would give me true satisfaction could any advice of +mine contribute to forward you in your honourable course of +self-improvement, but a long experience has taught me that advice can +profit but little; that there is a good reason why advice is so seldom +followed; this reason namely, that it is so seldom, and can almost +never be, rightly given. No man knows the state of another; it is +always to some more or less imaginary man that the wisest and most +honest adviser is speaking. + +"As to the books which you--whom I know so little of--should read, +there is hardly anything definite that can be said. For one thing, you +may be strenuously advised to keep reading. Any good book, any book +that is wiser than yourself, will teach you something--a great many +things, indirectly and directly, if your mind be open to learn. +This old counsel of Johnson's is also good, and universally +applicable:--'Read the book you do honestly feel a wish and curiosity +to read.' The very wish and curiosity indicates that you, then and +there, are the person likely to get good of it. 'Our wishes are +presentiments of our capabilities;' that is a noble saying, of deep +encouragement to all true men; applicable to our wishes and efforts in +regard to reading as to other things. Among all the objects that look +wonderful or beautiful to you, follow with fresh hope the one which +looks wonderfullest, beautifullest. You will gradually find, by +various trials (which trials see that you make honest, manful ones, +not silly, short, fitful ones), what _is_ for you the wonderfullest, +beautifullest--what is _your_ true element and province, and be able +to profit by that. True desire, the monition of nature, is much to be +attended to. But here, also, you are to discriminate carefully between +_true_ desire and false. The medical men tell us we should eat what +we _truly_ have an appetite for; but what we only _falsely_ have an +appetite for we should resolutely avoid. It is very true; and flimsy, +desultory readers, who fly from foolish book to foolish book, and get +good of none, and mischief of all--are not these as foolish, unhealthy +eaters, who mistake their superficial false desire after spiceries and +confectioneries for their real appetite, of which even they are +not destitute, though it lies far deeper, far quieter, after solid +nutritive food? With these illustrations, I will recommend Johnson's +advice to you. + +"Another thing, and only one other, I will say. All books are properly +the record of the history of past men--what thoughts past men had in +them--what actions past men did: the summary of all books whatsoever +lies there. It is on this ground that the class of books specifically +named History can be safely recommended as the basis of all study of +books--the preliminary to all right and full understanding of anything +we can expect to find in books. Past history, and especially the past +history of one's own native country, everybody may be advised to begin +with that. Let him study that faithfully; innumerable inquiries will +branch out from it; he has a broad-beaten highway, from which all +the country is more or less visible; there travelling, let him choose +where he will dwell. + +"Neither let mistakes and wrong directions--of which every man, in +his studies and elsewhere, falls into many--discourage you. There is +precious instruction to be got by finding that we are wrong. Let a +man try faithfully, manfully, to be right, he will grow daily more +and more right. It is, at bottom, the condition which all men have +to cultivate themselves. Our very walking is an incessant falling--a +falling and a catching of ourselves before we come actually to the +pavement!--it is emblematic of all things a man does. + +"In conclusion, I will remind you that it is not by books alone, or +by books chiefly, that a man becomes in all points a man. Study to do +faithfully whatsoever thing in your actual situation, there and now, +you find either expressly or tacitly laid to your charge; that is +your post; stand in it like a true soldier. Silently devour the many +chagrins of it, as all human situations have many; and see you aim not +to quit it without doing all that _it_, at least, required of you. +A man perfects himself by work much more than by reading. They are a +growing kind of men that can wisely combine the two things--wisely, +valiantly, can do what is laid to their hand in their present sphere, +and prepare themselves withal for doing other wider things, if such +lie before them. + +"With many good wishes and encouragements, I remain, yours sincerely, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE. + + "Chelsea, 13th March, 1843." + +The publication of "Past and Present" elicited a paper "On the Genius +and Tendency of the Writings of Thomas Carlyle," from Mazzini, which +appeared in the "British and Foreign Review," of October, 1843.[A] It +is a candid and thoughtful piece of criticism, in which the writer, +while striving to do justice to Carlyle's genius, protests strongly +and uncompromisingly against the tendency of his teaching. + +[Footnote A: Reprinted in the "Life and Writings of Joseph Mazzini." +(London, 1867). Vol. iv. pp. 56-144.] + +Some months afterwards, when the House of Commons was occupied with +the illegal opening of Mazzini's letters, Carlyle spontaneously +stepped forward and paid the following tribute to his character:-- + +"TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"In your observations in yesterday's _Times_ on the late disgraceful +affair of Mr. Mazzini's letters and the Secretary of State, you +mention that Mr. Mazzini is entirely unknown to you, entirely +indifferent to you; and add, very justly, that if he were the most +contemptible of mankind, it would not affect your argument on the +subject.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Mr. Mazzini's character and habits and society are +nothing to the point, unless connected with some certain or probable +evidence of evil intentions or treasonable plots. We know nothing, +and care nothing about him. He may be the most worthless and the most +vicious creature in the world; but this is no reason of itself why +his letters should be detained and opened."--leading article, June 17, +1844.] + +"It may tend to throw farther light on this matter if I now certify +you, which I in some sort feel called upon to do, that Mr. Mazzini is +not unknown to various competent persons in this country; and that he +is very far indeed from being contemptible--none farther, or very few +of living men. I have had the honour to know Mr. Mazzini for a series +of years; and, whatever I may think of his practical insight and skill +in worldly affairs, I can with great freedom testify to all men that +he, if I have ever seen one such, is a man of genius and virtue, a man +of sterling veracity, humanity, and nobleness of mind; one of those +rare men, numerable unfortunately but as units in this world, who are +worthy to be called martyr-souls; who, in silence, piously in their +daily life, understand and practise what is meant by that. + +"Of Italian democracies and young Italy's sorrows, of extraneous +Austrian Emperors in Milan, or poor old chimerical Popes in Bologna, +I know nothing, and desire to know nothing; but this other thing I do +know, and can here declare publicly to be a fact, which fact all of +us that have occasion to comment on Mr. Mazzini and his affairs may do +well to take along with us, as a thing leading towards new clearness, +and not towards new additional darkness, regarding him and them. + +"Whether the extraneous Austrian Emperor and miserable old chimera +of a Pope shall maintain themselves in Italy, or be obliged to decamp +from Italy, is not a question in the least vital to Englishmen. But +it is a question vital to us that sealed letters in an English +post-office be, as we all fancied they were, respected as things +sacred; that opening of men's letters, a practice near of kin to +picking men's pockets, and to other still viler and far fataler forms +of scoundrelism be not resorted to in England, except in cases of the +very last extremity. When some new gunpowder plot may be in the +wind, some double-dyed high treason, or imminent national wreck not +avoidable otherwise, then let us open letters--not till then. + +"To all Austrian Kaisers and such like, in their time of trouble, +let us answer, as our fathers from of old have answered:--Not by such +means is help here for you. Such means, allied to picking of pockets +and viler forms of scoundrelism, are not permitted in this country for +your behoof. The right hon. Secretary does himself detest such, and +even is afraid to employ them. He dare not: it would be dangerous +for him! All British men that might chance to come in view of such +a transaction, would incline to spurn it, and trample on it, and +indignantly ask him what he meant by it? + +"I am, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE.[A] + + "Chelsea, June 18." + +[Footnote A: From _The Times_, Wednesday, June 19, 1844.] + +The autumn of this year was saddened for Carlyle by the loss of +the dear friend whose biography he afterwards wrote. On the 18th of +September, 1844--after a short career of melancholy promise, only half +fulfilled--John Sterling died, in his thirty-ninth year. + +The next work that appeared from Carlyle's pen--a special service +to history, and to the memory of one of England's greatest men--was +"Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, with Elucidations and a +Connecting Narrative," two volumes, published in 1845. If there were +any doubt remaining after the publication of the "French Revolution" +what position our author might occupy amongst the historians of the +age, it was fully removed on the appearance of "Cromwell's Letters." +The work obtained a great and an immediate popularity; and though +bulky and expensive, a very large impression was quickly sold. +These speeches and letters of Cromwell, the spelling and punctuation +corrected, and a few words added here and there for clearness' sake, +and to accommodate them to the language and style in use now, were +first made intelligible and effective by Mr. Carlyle. "The authentic +utterances of the man Oliver himself," he says, "I have gathered them +from far and near; fished them up from the foul Lethean quagmires +where they lay buried. I have washed, or endeavoured to wash them +clean from foreign stupidities--such a job of buckwashing as I do not +long to repeat--and the world shall now see them in their own shape." +The work was at once republished in America, and two editions were +called for here within the year. + +While engaged on this work, Carlyle went down to Rugby by express +invitation, on Friday, 13th May, 1842, and on the following day +explored the field of Naseby, in company with Dr. Arnold. The meeting +of two such remarkable men--only six weeks before the death of +the latter--has in it something solemn and touching, and unusually +interesting. Carlyle left the school-house, expressing the hope that +it might "long continue to be what was to him one of the rarest sights +in the world--a temple of industrious peace." + +Arnold, who, with the deep sympathy arising from kindred nobility of +soul, had long cherished a high reverence for Carlyle, was very proud +of having received such a guest under his roof, and during those few +last weeks of life was wont to be in high spirits, talking with his +several guests, and describing with much interest, his recent visit to +Naseby with Carlyle, "its position on some of the highest table-land +in England--the streams falling on the one side into the Atlantic, on +the other into the German Ocean--far away, too, from any town--Market +Harborough, the nearest, into which the cavaliers were chased late in +the long summer evening on the fourteenth of June." + +Perhaps the most graphic description of Carlyle's manner and +conversation ever published, is contained in the following passage +from a letter addressed to Emerson by an accomplished American, +Margaret Fuller, who visited England in the autumn of 1846, and whose +strange, beautiful history and tragical death on her homeward voyage, +are known to most readers. + +The letter is dated Paris, November 16, 1846. + +"Of the people I saw in London, you will wish me to speak first of the +Carlyles. Mr. C. came to see me at once, and appointed an evening to +be passed at their house. That first time, I was delighted with him. +He was in a very sweet humour,--full of wit and pathos, without being +overbearing or oppressive. I was quite carried away with the rich flow +of his discourse, and the hearty, noble earnestness of his personal +being brought back the charm which once was upon his writing, before I +wearied of it. I admired his Scotch, his way of singing his great full +sentences, so that each one was like the stanza of a narrative ballad. +He let me talk, now and then, enough to free my lungs and change my +position, so that I did not get tired. That evening, he talked of the +present state of things in England, giving light, witty sketches +of the men of the day, fanatics and others, and some sweet, homely +stories he told of things he had known of the Scotch peasantry. + +"Of you he spoke with hearty kindness; and he told, with beautiful +feeling, a story of some poor farmer, or artisan in the country, who +on Sunday lays aside the cark and care of that dirty English world, +and sits reading the Essays, and looking upon the sea. + +"I left him that night, intending to go out very often to their +house. I assure you there never was anything so witty as Carlyle's +description of ---- ----. It was enough to kill one with laughing. +I, on my side, contributed a story to his fund of anecdote on this +subject, and it was fully appreciated. Carlyle is worth a thousand of +you for that;--he is not ashamed to laugh when he is amused, but goes +on in a cordial, human fashion. + +"The second time Mr. C. had a dinner-party, at which was a witty, +French, flippant sort of man, author of a History of Philosophy,[A] +and now writing a Life of Goethe, a task for which he must be as unfit +as irreligion and sparkling shallowness can make him. But he told +stories admirably, and was allowed sometimes to interrupt Carlyle a +little, of which one was glad, for that night he was in his more acrid +mood, and though much more brilliant than on the former evening, grew +wearisome to me, who disclaimed and rejected almost everything he +said. + +[Footnote A: George Henry Lewes.] + +"For a couple of hours he was talking about poetry, and the whole +harangue was one eloquent proclamation of the defects in his own mind. +Tennyson wrote in verse because the schoolmasters had taught him that +it was great to do so, and had thus, unfortunately, been turned from +the true path for a man. Burns had, in like manner, been turned from +his vocation. Shakespeare had not had the good sense to see that +it would have been better to write straight on in prose;--and such +nonsense, which, though amusing enough at first, he ran to death after +a while. + +"The most amusing part is always when he comes back to some refrain, +as in the French Revolution of the _sea-green_. In this instance, it +was Petrarch and _Laura_, the last word pronounced with his ineffable +sarcasm of drawl. Although he said this over fifty times, I could not +help laughing when _Laura_ would come. Carlyle running his chin out +when he spoke it, and his eyes glancing till they looked like the eyes +and beak of a bird of prey. + +Poor Laura! Luckily for her that her poet had already got her safely +canonized beyond the reach of this Teufelsdröckh vulture. + +"The worst of hearing Carlyle is, that you cannot interrupt him. I +understand the habit and power of haranguing have increased very much +upon him, so that you are a perfect prisoner when he has once got hold +of you. To interrupt him is a physical impossibility. If you get a +chance to remonstrate for a moment, he raises his voice and bears +you down. True, he does you no injustice, and, with his admirable +penetration, sees the disclaimer in your mind, so that you are not +morally delinquent; but it is not pleasant to be unable to utter it. +The latter part of the evening, however, he paid us for this, by a +series of sketches, in his finest style of railing and raillery, of +modern French literature, not one of them, perhaps, perfectly just, +but all drawn with the finest, boldest strokes, and, from his point of +view, masterly. All were depreciating, except that of Béranger. Of him +he spoke with perfect justice, because with hearty sympathy. + +"I had, afterward, some talk with Mrs. C., whom hitherto I had only +_seen_, for who can speak while her husband is there? I like her very +much;--she is full of grace, sweetness, and talent. Her eyes are sad +and charming. + + * * * * * + +"After this, they went to stay at Lord Ashburton's, and I only saw +them once more, when they came to pass an evening with us. Unluckily, +Mazzini was with us, whose society, when he was there alone, I enjoyed +more than any. He is a beauteous and pure music: also, he is a dear +friend of Mrs. C., but his being there gave the conversation a turn to +'progress' and ideal subjects, and C. was fluent in invectives on +all our 'rose-water imbecilities.' We all felt distant from him, and +Mazzini, after some vain efforts to remonstrate, became very sad. Mrs. +C. said to me,-- + +"'These are but opinions to Carlyle, but to Mazzini, who has given his +all, and helped bring his friends to the scaffold, in pursuit of such +subjects, it is a matter of life and death.' + +"All Carlyle's talk, that evening, was a defence of mere +force,--success the test of right;--if people would not behave well, +put collars round their necks;--find a hero, and let them be his +slaves, &c. It was very Titanic, and anti-celestial. I wish the last +evening had been more melodious. However, I bid Carlyle farewell with +feelings of the warmest friendship and admiration. We cannot feel +otherwise to a great and noble nature, whether it harmonise with our +own or not. I never appreciated the work he has done for his age +till I saw England. I could not. You must stand in the shadow of that +mountain of shams, to know how hard it is to cast light across it. + +"Honour to Carlyle! _Hoch_! Although, in the wine with which we drink +this health, I, for one, must mingle the despised 'rose-water.' + +"And now, having to your eye shown the defects of my own mind, in +the sketch of another, I will pass on more lowly,--more willing to be +imperfect, since Fate permits such noble creatures, after all, to +be only this or that. It is much if one is not only a crow or +magpie;--Carlyle is only a lion. Some time we may, all in full, be +intelligent and humanely fair." + + * * * * * + +"_December_, 1846.--Accustomed to the infinite wit and exuberant +richness of his writings, his talk is still an amazement and +a splendour scarcely to be faced with steady eyes. He does not +converse;--only harangues. It is the usual misfortune of such marked +men,--happily not one invariable or inevitable,--that they cannot +allow other minds room to breathe, and show themselves in their +atmosphere, and thus miss the refreshment and instruction which the +greatest never cease to need from the experience of the humblest. + +"Carlyle allows no one a chance, but bears down all opposition, not +only by his wit and onset of words, resistless in their sharpness as +so many bayonets, but by actual physical superiority,--raising his +voice, and rushing on his opponent with a torrent of sound. This is +not in the least from unwillingness to allow freedom to others. On the +contrary, no man would more enjoy a manly resistance to his thought. +But it is the impulse of a mind accustomed to follow out its own +impulse, as the hawk its prey, and which knows not how to stop in +the chase. Carlyle, indeed, is arrogant and overbearing; but in his +arrogance there is no littleness,--no self-love. It is the heroic +arrogance of some old Scandinavian conqueror;--it is his nature, and +the untameable impulse that has given him power to crush the dragons. +You do not love him, perhaps, nor revere; and perhaps, also, he would +only laugh at you if you did; but you like him heartily, and like to +see him the powerful smith, the Siegfried, melting all the old iron +in his furnace till it glows to a sunset red, and burns you, if you +senselessly go too near. + +"He seems, to me, quite isolated,--lonely as the desert,--yet never +was a man more fitted to prize a man, could he find one to match +his mood. He finds them, but only in the past. He sings, rather than +talks. He pours upon you a kind of satirical, heroical, critical poem, +with regular cadences, and generally catching up, near the beginning, +some singular epithet, which serves as a _refrain_ when his song is +full, or with which, as with a knitting needle, he catches up the +stitches, if he has chanced, now and then, to let fall a row. + +"For the higher kinds of poetry he has no sense, and his talk on that +subject is delightfully and gorgeously absurd. He sometimes stops a +minute to laugh at it himself, then begins anew with fresh vigour; for +all the spirits he is driving before him seem to him as Fata Morganas, +ugly masks, in fact, if he can but make them turn about; but he laughs +that they seem to others such dainty Ariels. His talk, like his books, +is full of pictures; his critical strokes masterly. Allow for his +point of view, and his survey is admirable. He is a large subject. I +cannot speak more or wiselier of him now, nor needs it;--his works are +true, to blame and praise him,--the Siegfried of England,--great and +powerful, if not quite invulnerable, and of a might rather to destroy +evil, than legislate for good."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli." (Boston, 1852.) Vol. +iii., pp. 96-104.] + +In 1848 Mr. Carlyle contributed a series of articles to the _Examiner_ +and _Spectator_, principally on Irish affairs, which, as he has never +yet seen fit to reprint them in his Miscellanies, are apparently quite +unknown to the general public. With the exception of the last, they +may be considered as a sort of alarum note, sounded to herald +the approach of the Latter-Day Pamphlets, which appeared shortly +afterwards. + +The following is a list of these newspaper articles:-- + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + March 4. "Louis Philippe." + April 29. "Repeal of the Union." + May 13. "Legislation for Ireland." + +In _The Spectator_, 1848. + + May 13. "Ireland and the British Chief Governor." + " "Irish Regiments (of the New Era)." + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + Dec. 2. "Death of Charles Buller." + +The last-named paper, a tribute to the memory of his old pupil, we +shall give entire. Another man of genius,[A] now also gone to his +rest, sang sorrowfully on the same occasion: + +[Footnote A: W.M. Thackeray.] + + "Who knows the inscrutable design? + Blest be He who took and gave! + Why should your mother, Charles, not mine, + Be weeping at her darling's grave? + + We bow to Heaven that will'd it so, + That darkly rules the fate of all, + That sends the respite or the blow, + That's free to give, or to recall." + +Carlyle's paper reads like a solemn and touching funeral oration to +the uncovered mourners as they stand round the grave before it is +closed:-- + +"A very beautiful soul has suddenly been summoned from among us; one +of the clearest intellects, and most aërial activities in England, +has unexpectedly been called away. Charles Buller died on Wednesday +morning last, without previous sickness, reckoned of importance, till +a day or two before. An event of unmixed sadness, which has created a +just sorrow, private and public. The light of many a social circle +is dimmer henceforth, and will miss long a presence which was always +gladdening and beneficent; in the coming storms of political trouble, +which heap themselves more and more in ominous clouds on our horizon, +one radiant element is to be wanting now. + +"Mr. Buller was in his forty-third year, and had sat in Parliament +some twenty of those. A man long kept under by the peculiarities of +his endowment and position, but rising rapidly into importance of late +years; beginning to reap the fruits of long patience, and to see an +ever wider field open round him. He was what in party language is +called a 'Reformer,' from his earliest youth; and never swerved from +that faith, nor could swerve. His luminous sincere intellect laid bare +to him in all its abject incoherency the thing that was untrue, which +thenceforth became for him a thing that was not tenable, that it was +perilous and scandalous to attempt maintaining. Twenty years in +the dreary, weltering lake of parliamentary confusion, with its +disappointments and bewilderments, had not quenched this tendency, in +which, as we say, he persevered as by a law of nature itself, for the +essence of his mind was clearness, healthy purity, incompatibility +with fraud in any of its forms. What he accomplished, therefore, +whether great or little, was all to be _added_ to the sum of good; +none of it to be deducted. There shone mildly in his whole conduct +a beautiful veracity, as if it were unconscious of itself; a perfect +spontaneous absence of all cant, hypocrisy, and hollow pretence, +not in word and act only, but in thought and instinct. To a singular +extent it can be said of him that he was a spontaneous clear man. Very +gentle, too, though full of fire; simple, brave, graceful. What he +did, and what he said, came from him as light from a luminous body, +and had thus always in it a high and rare merit, which any of the more +discerning could appreciate fully. + +"To many, for a long while, Mr. Buller passed merely for a man of wit, +and certainly his beautiful natural gaiety of character, which by no +means meant _levity_, was commonly thought to mean it, and did for +many years, hinder the recognition of his intrinsic higher qualities. +Slowly it began to be discovered that, under all this many-coloured +radiancy and coruscation, there burnt a most steady light; a sound, +penetrating intellect, full of adroit resources, and loyal by nature +itself to all that was methodic, manful, true;--in brief, a mildly +resolute, chivalrous, and gallant character, capable of doing much +serious service. + +"A man of wit he indisputably was, whatever more amongst the wittiest +of men. His speech, and manner of being, played everywhere like soft +brilliancy of lambent fire round the common objects of the hour, and +was, beyond all others that English society could show, entitled to +the name of excellent, for it was spontaneous, like all else in him, +genuine, humane,--the glittering play of the soul of a real man. To +hear him, the most serious of men might think within himself, 'How +beautiful is human gaiety too!' Alone of wits, Buller never made wit; +he could be silent, or grave enough, where better was going; often +rather liked to be silent if permissible, and always was so where +needful. His wit, moreover, was ever the ally of wisdom, not of folly, +or unkindness, or injustice; no soul was ever hurt by it; never, we +believe, never, did his wit offend justly any man, and often have we +seen his ready resource relieve one ready to be offended, and light up +a pausing circle all into harmony again. In truth, it was beautiful to +see such clear, almost childlike simplicity of heart coexisting with +the finished dexterities, and long experiences, of a man of the world. +Honour to human worth, in whatever form we find it! This man was true +to his friends, true to his convictions,--and true without effort, +as the magnet is to the north. He was ever found on the right +side; helpful to it, not obstructive of it, in all he attempted or +performed. + +"Weak health; a faculty indeed brilliant, clear, prompt, not deficient +in depth either, or in any kind of active valour, but wanting the +stern energy that could long endure to _continue_ in the deep, in the +chaotic, new, and painfully incondite--this marked out for him his +limits; which, perhaps with regrets enough, his natural veracity and +practicality would lead him quietly to admit and stand by. He was not +the man to grapple, in its dark and deadly dens, with the Lernæan coil +of social Hydras; perhaps not under any circumstances: but he did, +unassisted, what he could; faithfully himself did something--nay, +something truly considerable;--and in his _patience_ with the much +that by him and his strength could not be done let us grant there was +something of beautiful too! + +"Properly, indeed, his career as a public man was but beginning. +In the office he last held, much was silently expected of him; he +himself, too, recognised well what a fearful and immense question this +of Pauperism is; with what ominous rapidity the demand for solution +of it is pressing on; and how little the world generally is yet +aware what methods and principles, new, strange, and altogether +contradictory to the shallow maxims and idle philosophies current at +present, would be needed for dealing with it! This task he perhaps +contemplated with apprehension; but he is not now to be tried with +this, or with any task more. He has fallen, at this point of the +march, an honourable soldier; and has left us here to fight along +without him. Be his memory dear and honourable to us, as that of +one so worthy ought. What in him was true and valiant endures for +evermore--beyond all memory or record. His light, airy brilliancy has +suddenly become solemn, fixed in the earnest stillness of Eternity. +_There_ shall we also, and our little works, all shortly be." + +In 1850 appeared the "Latter-Day Pamphlets," essays suggested by the +convulsions of 1848, in which, more than in any previous publication, +the author spoke out in the character of a social and political censor +of his own age. "He seemed to be the worshipper of mere brute force, +the advocate of all harsh, coercive measures. Model prisons and +schools for the reform of criminals, poor-laws, churches as at present +constituted, the aristocracy, parliament, and other institutions, were +assailed and ridiculed in unmeasured terms, and generally, the +English public was set down as composed of sham heroes, and a valet +or 'flunkey' world." From their very nature as stern denunciations +of what the author considered contemporary fallacies, wrongs, and +hypocrisies, these pamphlets produced a storm of critical indignation +against him. + +The life of John Sterling was published in the following year; and +Carlyle then began that long spell of work--the "History of Frederick +the Great"--which extended over thirteen years, the last, and perhaps +the greatest, monument of his genius. + +In 1856, when we may suppose his mind to be full of the details of +battles, and overflowing with military tactics, he received from Sir +W. Napier his "History of the Administration of Scinde," and wrote the +following letter to the author:-- + + "THOMAS CARLYLE TO SIR WILLIAM NAPIER. + + "Chelsea, May 12, 1856. + +"DEAR SIR, + +"I have read with attention, and with many feelings and reflections, +your record of Sir C. Napier's Administration of Scinde. You must +permit me to thank you, in the name of Britain at large, for writing +such a book; and in my own poor name to acknowledge the great +compliment and kindness implied in sending me a copy for myself. + +"It is a book which every living Englishman would be the better +for reading--for studying diligently till he saw into it, till he +recognised and believed the high and tragic phenomenon set forth +there! A book which may be called 'profitable' in the old Scripture +sense; profitable for reproof, for correction and admonition, for +great sorrow, yet for 'building up in righteousness' too--in heroic, +manful endeavour to do well, and not ill, in one's time and place. +One feels it a kind of possession to know that one has had such a +fellow-citizen and contemporary in these evil days. + +"The fine and noble qualities of the man are very recognisable to me; +his subtle, piercing intellect turned all to the practical, giving +him just insight into men and into things; his inexhaustible adroit +contrivances; his fiery valour; sharp promptitude to seize the good +moment that will not return. A lynx-eyed, fiery man, with the spirit +of an old knight in him; more of a hero than any modern I have seen +for a long time. + +"A singular veracity one finds in him; not in his words alone--which, +however, I like much for their fine rough _naïveté_--but in his +actions, judgments, aims; in all that he thinks, and does, and +says--which, indeed, I have observed is the root of all greatness or +real worth in human creatures, and properly the first (and also the +rarest) attribute of what we call _genius_ among men. + +"The path of such a man through the foul jungle of this world--the +struggle of Heaven's inspiration against the terrestrial fooleries, +cupidities, and cowardices--cannot be other than tragical: but the man +does tear out a bit of way for himself too; strives towards the good +goal, inflexibly persistent till his long rest come: the man does +leave his mark behind him, ineffaceable, beneficent to all good men, +maleficent to none: and we must not complain. The British nation of +this time, in India or elsewhere--God knows no nation ever had more +need of such men, in every region of its affairs! But also perhaps no +nation ever had a much worse chance to get hold of them, to recognise +and loyally second them, even when they are there. + +"Anarchic stupidity is wide as the night; victorious wisdom is but as +a lamp in it shining here and there. Contrast a Napier even in Scinde +with, for example, a Lally at Pondicherry or on the Place de Grève; +one has to admit that it is the common lot, that it might have been +far worse! + +"There is great talent in this book apart from its subject. The +narrative moves on with strong, weighty step, like a marching phalanx, +with the gleam of clear steel in it--sheers down the opponent objects +and tramples them out of sight in a very potent manner. The writer, +it is evident, had in him a lively, glowing image, complete in all its +parts, of the transaction to be told; and that is his grand secret +of giving the reader so lively a conception of it. I was surprised to +find how much I had carried away with me, even of the Hill campaign +and of Trukkee itself; though without a map the attempt to understand +such a thing seemed to me desperate at first. + +"With many thanks, and gratified to have made this reflex +acquaintance, which, if it should ever chance to become a direct one, +might gratify me still more, + + "I remain always yours sincerely, + + "T. CARLYLE."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Life of General Sir William Napier, K.C.B." Edited by +H.A. Bruce, M.P. London: Murray, 1864. Vol. ii. pp. 312-314.] + +In June, 1861, a few days after the great fire in which Inspector +Braidwood perished in the discharge of his duty, Carlyle broke a long +silence with the following letter:-- + + "TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"There is a great deal of public sympathy, and of deeper sort than +usual, awake at present on the subject of Inspector Braidwood. It is +a beautiful emotion, and apparently a perfectly just one, and well +bestowed. Judging by whatever light one gets, Braidwood seems to have +been a man of singular worth in his department, and otherwise; such a +servant as the public seldom has. Thoroughly skilled in his function, +nobly valiant in it, and faithful to it--faithful to the death. +In rude, modest form, actually a kind of hero, who has perished in +serving us! + +"Probably his sorrowing family is not left in wealthy circumstances. +Most certainly it is pity when a generous emotion, in many men, or in +any man, has to die out futile, and leave no _action_ behind it. The +question, therefore, suggests itself--Should not there be a 'Braidwood +Testimonial,' the proper parties undertaking it, in a modest, serious +manner, the public silently testifying (to such extent, at least) what +worth its emotion has? + +"I venture to throw out this hint, and, if it be acted on, will, with +great satisfaction, give my mite among other people; but must, for +good reasons, say further, that this [is] all I can do in the matter +(of which, indeed, I know nothing but what everybody knows, and a +great deal less than every reader of the newspapers knows); and that, +in particular, I cannot answer any letters on the subject, should such +happen to be sent me. + +"In haste, I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "T. CARLYLE.[A] + + "5, Cheyne-row, Chelsea, June 30." + +[Footnote A: (Printed in _The Times_, Tuesday, July 2, 1861.)] + +The "History of Frederick the Great" was completed early in 1865. +Later in the same year the students of Edinburgh University elected +Carlyle as Lord Rector. We cannot do better than describe the +proceedings and the subsequent address in the words of the late +Alexander Smith:-- + +"Mr. Gladstone demitted office, and then it behoved the students of +the University to cast about for a worthy successor. Two candidates +were proposed, Mr. Carlyle and Mr. Disraeli; and on the election day +Mr. Carlyle was returned by a large and enthusiastic majority. This +was all very well, but a doubt lingered in the minds of many whether +Mr. Carlyle would accept the office, or if accepting it, whether he +would deliver an address--said address being the sole apple which the +Rectorial tree is capable of bearing. The hare was indeed caught, but +it was doubtful somewhat whether the hare would allow itself to be +_cooked_ after the approved academical fashion. It was tolerably well +known that Mr. Carlyle had emerged from his long spell of work on +"Frederick," in a condition of health the reverse of robust; that +he had once or twice before declined similar honours from Scottish +Universities--from Glasgow some twelve or fourteen years ago, and from +Aberdeen some seven or eight; and that he was constitutionally opposed +to all varieties of popular displays, more especially those of the +oratorical sort. + +"But all dispute was ended when it was officially announced that Mr. +Carlyle had accepted the office of Lord Rector, that he would conform +to all its requirements, and that the Rectorial address would be +delivered late in spring. And so when the days began to lengthen in +these northern latitudes, and crocuses to show their yellow and purple +heads, people began to talk about the visit of the great writer, and +to speculate on what manner and fashion of speech he would deliver. + +"Edinburgh has no University Hall, and accordingly when speech-day +approached, the largest public room in the city was chartered by the +University authorities. This public room--the Music Hall in George +Street--will contain, under severe pressure, from eighteen hundred to +nineteen hundred persons, and tickets to that extent were secured by +the students and members of the General Council. Curious stories are +told of the eagerness on every side manifested to hear Mr. Carlyle. +Country clergymen from beyond Aberdeen came into Edinburgh for the +sole purpose of hearing and seeing. Gentlemen came down from London +by train the night before, and returned to London by train the night +after. + +"In a very few minutes after the doors were opened the large hall was +filled in every part, and when up the central passage the Principal, +the Lord Rector, the Members of the Senate, and other gentlemen +advanced towards the platform, the cheering was vociferous and hearty. +The Principal occupied the chair of course, the Lord Rector on his +right, the Lord Provost on his left. Every eye was fixed on the +Rector. To all appearance, as he sat, time and labour had dealt +tenderly with him. His face had not yet lost the country bronze which +he brought up with him from Dumfriesshire as a student fifty-six years +ago. His long residence in London had not touched his Annandale look, +nor had it--as we soon learned--touched his Annandale accent. His +countenance was striking, homely, sincere, truthful--the countenance +of a man on whom 'the burden of the unintelligible world' had weighed +more heavily than on most. His hair was yet almost dark; his moustache +and short beard were iron grey. His eyes were wide, melancholy, +sorrowful; and seemed as if they had been at times a-weary of the +sun. Altogether in his aspect there was something aboriginal, as of +a piece, of unhewn granite, which had never been polished to any +approved pattern, whose natural and original vitality had never +been tampered with. In a word, there seemed no passivity about Mr. +Carlyle--he was the diamond, and the world was his pane of glass; he +was a graving tool rather than a thing graven upon--a man to set his +mark on the world--a man on whom the world could not set _its_ mark. +And just as, glancing towards Fife a few minutes before, one could not +help thinking of his early connection with Edward Irving, so seeing +him sit beside the venerable Principal of the University, one could +not help thinking of his earliest connection with literature. + +"Time brings men into the most unexpected relationships. When the +Principal was plain Mr. Brewster, editor of the Edinburgh Cyclopædia, +little dreaming that he should ever be Knight of Hanover and head +of the Northern Metropolitan University, Mr. Carlyle--just as little +dreaming that he should be the foremost man of letters of his day and +Lord Rector of the same University--was his contributor, writing for +said Cyclopædia biographies of Montesquieu and other notables. And so +it came about that after years of separation and of honourable labour, +the old editor and contributor were brought together again--in new +aspects. + +"The proceedings began by the conferring of the degree of LL.D. on Mr. +Erskine of Linlathen--an old friend of Mr. Carlyle's--on Professors +Huxley, Tyndall, and Ramsay, and on Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer. That +done, amid a tempest of cheering and hats enthusiastically waved, Mr. +Carlyle, slipping off his Rectorial robe--which must have been a very +shirt of Nessus to him--advanced to the table and began to speak in +low, wavering, melancholy tones, which were in accordance with +the melancholy eyes, and in the Annandale accent, with which his +playfellows must have been familiar long ago. So self-contained +was he, so impregnable to outward influences, that all his years +of Edinburgh and London life could not impair even in the slightest +degree, _that_. + +"The opening sentences were lost in the applause. What need of quoting +a speech which by this time has been read by everybody? Appraise it as +you please, it was a thing _per se_. Just as, if you wish a purple dye +you must fish up the Murex; if you wish ivory you must go to the east; +so if you desire an address such as Edinburgh listened to the other +day, you must go to Chelsea for it. It may not be quite to your taste, +but, in any case, there is no other intellectual warehouse in which +that kind of article is kept in stock. + +"The gratitude I owe to him is--or should be--equal to that of most. +He has been to me only a voice, sometimes sad, sometimes wrathful, +sometimes scornful; and when I saw him for the first time with the +eye of flesh stand up amongst us the other day, and heard him speak +kindly, brotherly, affectionate words--his first appearance of that +kind, I suppose, since he discoursed of Heroes and Hero Worship to the +London people--I am not ashamed to confess that I felt moved towards +him, as I do not think in any possible combination of circumstances I +could have felt moved towards any other living man."[A] + +[Footnote A: _The Argosy_, May, 1866.] + +The Edinburgh correspondent to a London paper thus describes what took +place:-- + +"A vast interest among the intelligent public has been excited by the +prospect of Mr. Thomas Carlyle's appearance to be installed as Lord +Rector of the University of Edinburgh. With the exception of the +delivery of his lectures on Heroes and Hero-worship, he has avoided +oratory; and to many of his admirers the present occasion seemed +likely to afford their only chance of ever seeing him in the flesh, +and hearing his living voice. The result has been, that the University +authorities have been beset by applications in number altogether +unprecedented--to nearly all of which they could only give the +reluctant answer, that admission for strangers was impossible. The +students who elect Mr. Carlyle received tickets, if they applied +within the specified time, and the members of the University +council, or graduates, obtained the residue according to priority of +application. Ladies' tickets to the number of one hundred and fifty +were issued, each professor obtaining four, and the remaining thirty +being placed at the disposal of Sir David Brewster, the Principal. And +the one hundred and fifty lucky ladies were conspicuous in the front +of the gallery to-day, having been admitted before the doors for +students and other males were open. + +"The hour appointed for letting them in was kept precisely--it was +half-past one P.M., but an hour before it, despite occasional +showers of rain, a crowd had begun to gather at the front door of +the music-hall, and at the opening of the door it had gathered to +proportions sufficient to half fill the building, its capacity under +severe crushing being about two thousand. + +"When the door was opened, they rushed in as crowds of young men +only can and dare rush, and up the double stairs they streamed like +a torrent; which torrent, however, policemen and check-gates soon +moderated. I chanced to fall into a lucky current of the crowd, and +got in amongst the first two or three hundred, and got forward to the +fourth seat from the platform, as good a place for seeing and hearing +as any. + +"The proceedings of the day were fixed to commence at two P.M., and +the half-hour of waiting was filled up by the students in throwing +occasional volleys of peas, whistling _en masse_ various lively tunes, +and in clambering, like small escalading parties, on to and over the +platform to take advantage of the seats in the organ gallery behind. +For Edinburgh students, however, let me say that these proceedings +were singularly decorous. They did indulge in a little fun when +nothing else was doing, but they did not come for that alone. Any +student who wanted fun could have sold his ticket at a handsome +profit, for which better fun could be had elsewhere. I heard among the +crowd that some students had got so high a price as a guinea each for +their tickets, and I heard of others who had been offered no less +but had refused it. And I must say further, that they listened to Mr. +Carlyle's address with as much attention and reverence as they could +have bestowed on a prophet--only I daresay most prophets would have +elicited less applause and laughter. + +"Shortly before two, the city magistrates and a few other personages +mounted the platform, and, with as much quietness as the fancy of the +students directed, took the seats which had been marked out for them +by large red pasteboard tickets. At two precisely the students in +the organ gallery started to the tops of the seats and began to cheer +vociferously, and almost instantly all the audience followed their +example. The procession was on its way through the hall, and in half +a minute Lord Provost Chambers, in his official robes, mounted the +platform stair; then Principal Sir David Brewster and Lord Rector +Carlyle, both in their gold-laced robes of office; then the Rev. Dr. +Lee, and the other professors, in their gowns; also the LL.D.'s to be, +in black gowns. Lord Neaves and Dr. Guthrie were there in an LL.D.'s +black gown and blue ribbons; Mr. Harvey, the President of the Royal +Academy, and Sir D. Baxter, Bart.--men conspicuous in their plain +clothes. + +"Dr. Lee offered up a prayer of a minute and a half, at the 'Amen' of +which I could see Mr. Carlyle bow very low. Then the business of the +occasion commenced. Mr. Gibson--a tall, thin, pale-faced, beardless, +acute, composed-looking young gentleman, in an M.A.'s gown--introduced +Mr. Carlyle, 'the most distinguished son of the University,' to the +Principal, Sir David Brewster, as the Lord Rector elected by the +students. Sir David saluted him as such, thinking, perhaps, of the +time when, an unknown young man, Thomas Carlyle wrote articles for +Brewster's 'Cyclopædia,' and got Brewster's name to introduce to +public notice his translation of Legendre's 'Geometry.' Next Professor +Muirhead, for the time being the Dean of the Faculty of Laws in the +University, introduced various gentlemen to the Principal in order, +as persons whom the senate had thought worthy of the degree of LL.D., +giving a dignified, but not always very happy, account of the merits +of each. There was Mr. Erskine, of Linlathen, Mr. Carlyle's host for +the time being, and often previously, an old friend of Irving and +Chalmers, himself the writer of various elegant and sincere religious +books, and one of the best and most amiable of men. If intelligent +goodness ever entitled any one to the degree of LL.D., he certainly +deserves it; and when I say this, I do not insinuate that on grounds +of pure intellect he is not well entitled to the honour. He is now, I +should think, nearer eighty than seventy years of age--a mild-looking, +full-eyed old man, with a face somewhat of the type of Lord Derby's. +There was Professor Huxley, young in years, dark, heavy-browed, alert +and resolute, but not moulded after any high ideal; and there was +Professor Tyndall, also young, lithe of limb, and nonchalant in +manner. When his name was called he sat as if he had no concern +in what was going on, and then rose with an easy smile, partly of +modesty, but in great measure of indifference. + +"Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer and first discoverer of the fate of Sir +John Franklin, who is an M.D. of Edinburgh, was now made LL.D. He is +of tall, wiry, energetic figure, slightly baldish, with greyish, curly +hair, keen, handsome face, high crown and sloping forehead, and his +bearing is that of a soldier--of a man who has both given and obeyed +commands, and been drilled to stand steady and upright. Carlyle +himself was offered the degree of LL.D., but he declined the honour, +laughing it off, in fact, in a letter, with such excuses as that he +had a brother a Dr. Carlyle (an M.D., also a man of genius, I insert +parenthetically, and known in literature as a translator of 'Dante'), +and that if two Dr. Carlyles should appear at Paradise, mistakes might +arise. + +"After all the LL.D's had heard their merits enumerated, and had had +a black hood or wallet of some kind, with a blue ribbon conspicuous in +it, flung over their heads, Principal Brewster announced that the Lord +Rector would now deliver his address. Thereupon Mr. Carlyle rose at +once, shook himself out of his gold-laced rectorial gown, left it on +his chair, and stepped quietly to the table, and drawing his tall, +bony frame into a position of straight perpendicularity not possible +to one man in five hundred at seventy years of age, he began to speak +quietly and distinctly, but nervously. There was a slight flush on +his face, but he bore himself with composure and dignity, and in the +course of half an hour he was obviously beginning to feel at his ease, +so far at least as to have adequate command over the current of his +thought. + +"He spoke on quite freely and easily, hardly ever repeated a word, +never looked at a note, and only once returned to finish up a topic +from which he had deviated. He apologised for not having come with +a written discourse. It was usual, and 'it would have been more +comfortable for me just at present,' but he had tried it, and could +not satisfy himself, and 'as the spoken word comes from the heart,' he +had resolved to try that method. What he said in words will be learned +otherwise than from me. I could not well describe it; but I do not +think I ever heard any address that I should be so unwilling to blot +from my memory. Not that there was much in it that cannot be found in +his writings, or inferred from them; but the manner of the man was a +key to the writings, and for naturalness and quiet power, I have never +seen anything to compare with it. He did not deal in rhetoric. He +talked--it was continuous, strong, quiet talk--like a patriarch about +to leave the world to the young lads who had chosen him and were just +entering the world. His voice is a soft, downy voice--not a tone in +it is of the shrill, fierce kind that one would expect it to be in +reading the Latter-day Pamphlets. + +"There was not a trace of effort or of affectation, or even of +extravagance. Shrewd common sense there was in abundance. There was +the involved disrupted style also, but it looked so natural that +reflection was needed to recognise in it that very style which purists +find to be un-English and unintelligible. Over the angles of this +disrupted style rolled out a few cascades of humour--quite as if +by accident. He let them go, talking on in his soft, downy accents, +without a smile; occasionally for an instant looking very serious, +with his dark eyes beating like pulses, but generally looking merely +composed and kindly, and so, to speak, father-like. He concluded by +reciting his own translation of a poem of Goethe-- + + "'The future hides in it gladness and sorrow.' + +And this he did in a style of melancholy grandeur not to be described, +but still less to be forgotten. It was then alone that the personality +of the philosopher and poet were revealed continuously in his manner +of utterance. The features of his face are familiar to all from his +portraits. But I do not think any portrait, unless, perhaps, Woolner's +medallion, gives full expression to the resolution that is visible +in his face. Besides, they all make him look sadder and older than he +appears. Although he be threescore and ten, his hair is still abundant +and tolerably black, and there is considerable colour in his cheek. +Not a man of his age on that platform to-day looked so young, and he +had done more work than any ten on it." + +The correspondent of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ gives some interesting +particulars:-- + +"Mr. Carlyle had not spoken in public before yesterday, since those +grand utterances on Heroes and Hero-worship in the institute in +Edwards Street, Marylebone, which one can scarcely believe, whilst +reading them, to have been, in the best sense, extemporaneously +delivered. In that case Mr. Carlyle began the series, as we have +heard, by bringing a manuscript which he evidently found much in his +way, and presently abandoned. On the second evening he brought some +notes or headings; but these also tripped him until he had left them. +The remaining lectures were given like his conversation, which no +one can hear without feeling that, with all its glow and inspiration, +every sentence would be, if taken down, found faultless. It was so +in his remarkable extemporaneous address yesterday. He had no notes +whatever. 'But,' says our correspondent, in transmitting the report, +'I have never heard a speech of whose more remarkable qualities so few +can be conveyed on paper. You will read of "applause" and "laughter," +but you will little realize the eloquent blood flaming up the +speaker's cheek, the kindling of his eye, or the inexpressible +voice and look when the drolleries were coming out. When he spoke +of clap-trap books exciting astonishment 'in the minds of foolish +persons,' the evident halting at the word '_fools_,' and the smoothing +of his hair, as if he must be decorous, which preceded the change +to 'foolish persons,' were exceedingly comical. As for the flaming +bursts, they took shape in grand tones, whose impression was made +deeper, not by raising, but by lowering the voice. Your correspondent +here declares that he should hold it worth his coming all the way +from London in the rain in the Sunday night train were it only to have +heard Carlyle say, "There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of all +California, or the getting of all the suffrages that are on the planet +just now!"' In the first few minutes of the address there was some +hesitation, and much of the shrinking that one might expect in a +secluded scholar; but these very soon cleared away, and during the +larger part, and to the close of the oration, it was evident that he +was receiving a sympathetic influence from his listeners, which he +did not fail to return tenfold. The applause became less frequent; +the silence became that of a woven spell; and the recitation of +the beautiful lines from Goethe, at the end, was so masterly--so +marvellous--that one felt in it that Carlyle's real anathemas against +rhetoric were but the expression of his knowledge that there is a +rhetoric beyond all other arts." + +In the _Times_ the following leader appeared upon Mr. Carlyle's +address:-- + +"There is something in the return of a man to the haunts of his youth, +after he has acquired fame and a recognised position in the world, +which is of itself sufficient to arrest attention. We are interested +in the retrospect and the contrast, the juxtaposition of the old and +the new, the hopes of early years, the memory of the struggles and +contests of manhood, the repose of victory. A man may differ as much +as he pleases from the doctrines of Mr. Carlyle, he may reject his +historical teachings, and may distrust his politics, but he must be +of a very unkindly disposition not to be touched by his reception +at Edinburgh. It is fifty-four years, he told the students of the +University, since he, a boy of fourteen, came as a student, 'full of +wonder and expectation,' to the old capital of his native country, and +now he returns, having accomplished the days of man spoken of by the +Psalmist, that he may be honoured by students of this generation, +and may give them a few words of advice on the life which lies before +them. + +"The discourse of the new Lord Rector squared very well with the +occasion. There was no novelty in it. New truths are not the gifts +which the old offer the young; the lesson we learn last is but the +fulness of the meaning of what was only partially apprehended at +first. Mr. Carlyle brought out things familiar enough to everyone who +has read his works; there were the old platitudes and the old truths, +and, it must be owned, mingled here and there with them the old +errors. Time has, however, its recompenses, and if the freshness of +youth seemed to be wanting in the address of the Rector, so also was +its crudity. There was a singular mellowness in Mr. Carlyle's speech, +which was reflected in the homely language in which it was couched. +The chief lessons he had to enforce were to avoid cram, and to be +painstaking, diligent, and patient in the acquisition of knowledge. +Students are not to try to make themselves acquainted with the +outsides of as many things as possible, and 'to go flourishing about' +upon the strength of their acquisitions, but to count a thing as known +only when it is stamped on their mind. The doctrine is only a new +reading of the old maxim, _non multa sed multum_, but it is as much +needed now as ever it was. Still more appropriate to the present day +was Mr. Carlyle's protest against the notion that a University is +the place where a man is to be fitted for the special work of a +profession. A University, as he puts it, teaches a man how to read, +or, as we may say more generally, how to learn. It is not the function +of such a place to offer particular and technical knowledge, but to +prepare a man for mastering any science by teaching him the method of +all. A child learns the use of his body, not the art of a carpenter or +smith, and the University student learns the use of his mind, not the +professional lore of a lawyer or a physician. It is pleasant to meet +with a strong reassertion of doctrines which the utilitarianism of a +commercial and manufacturing age is too apt to make us all forget. +Mr. Carlyle is essentially conservative in his notions on academic +functions. Accuracy, discrimination, judgment, are with him the be-all +and end-all of educational training. If a man has learnt to know a +thing in itself, and in its relation to surrounding phenomena, he +has got from a University what it is its proper duty to teach. +Accordingly, we find him bestowing a good word on poor old Arthur +Collins, who showed that he possessed these valuable qualities in the +humble work of compiling a Peerage. + +"The new Lord Rector is, however, as conservative in his choice of the +implements of study as he is in the determination of its objects. The +languages and the history of the great nations of antiquity he puts +foremost, like any other pedagogue. The Greeks and the Romans are, +he tells the Edinburgh students, 'a pair of nations shining in the +records left by themselves as a kind of pillar to light up life in the +darkness of the past ages;' and he adds that it would be well worth +their while to get an understanding of what these people were, and +what they did. It is here, however, that an old error of Mr. +Carlyle's crops up among his well-remembered truths. He quotes from +Machiavelli--evidently agreeing himself with the sentiment, though he +refrained from asking the assent of his audience to it--the statement +that the history of Rome showed that a democracy could not permanently +exist without the occasional intervention of a Dictator. It is +possible that if Machiavelli had had the experience of the centuries +which have elapsed since his day, he would have seen fit to alter his +conclusion, and it is to be regretted that the admiration which Mr. +Carlyle feels for the great men of history will not allow him to +believe in the possibility of a political society where each might +find his proper sphere and duty without disturbing the order and +natural succession of the commonwealth. His judgment on this point +is like that of a man who had only known the steam-engine before +the invention of governor balls, and was ready to declare that its +mechanism would be shattered if a boy were not always at hand to +regulate the pressure of the steam. + + * * * * * + +"We may turn, however, from this difference to another of Mr. +Carlyle's doctrines, which mark at once his independence of thought +and his respect for experience, where he declares the necessity for +recognising the hereditary principle in government, if there is to be +'any fixity in things.' In the same way we find him almost lamenting +the fact that Oxford, once apparently so fast-anchored as to be +immovable, has begun to twist and toss on the eddy of new ideas. + +"It is impossible to glance at Mr. Carlyle's Easter Monday discourse +without recalling the oration which his predecessor pronounced on +resigning office last autumn. * * * Mr. Carlyle is as simple and +practical as his predecessor was dazzling and rhetorical. An ounce of +mother wit, quotes the new Lord Rector, is worth a pound of clergy, +and while he admires Demosthenes, he prefers the eloquence of Phocion. +A little later he repeats his old doctrine on the virtue of silence, +laments the fact that 'the finest nations in the world--the English +and the American--are going all away into wind and tongue,' and +protests that a man is not to be esteemed wise because he has poured +out speech copiously. Mr. Carlyle has so often inculcated these +sentiments in his books that there can be no suspicion of an _arrière +pensée_ in their utterance now, but the contrast between him and his +predecessor is at the least instructive. Each does, however, in some +measure, supply what is deficient in the other. No one would claim +for the Chancellor of the Exchequer the intensity of power of his +successor, but in his abundant energy, his wide sympathy with popular +movement, and his real, if vague and indiscriminating, faith in the +activity and progress of modern life, he conveys lessons of trust +in the present, and hopefulness in the future, which would be +ill-exchanged for the patient and somewhat sad stoicism of Mr. +Carlyle." + +Carlyle was still in Scotland on April 21, and there the terrible and +solemn news had to be conveyed to him of the sudden death of her who +had been his true and faithful life-companion for forty years. + +Mrs. Carlyle died on Saturday, April 21, under very peculiar +circumstances. She was taking her usual drive in Hyde Park about four +o'clock, when her little favourite dog--which was running by the side +of the brougham--was run over by a carriage. She was greatly alarmed, +though the dog was not seriously hurt. She lifted the dog into the +carriage, and the man drove on. Not receiving any call or direction +from his mistress, as was usual, he stopped the carriage and +discovered her, as he thought, in a fit, or ill, and drove to +St. George's Hospital, which was near at hand. When there it was +discovered that she must have been dead some little time. Mrs. +Carlyle's health had been for several months feeble, but not in a +state to excite anxiety or alarm. + +On the following Wednesday her remains were conveyed from London to +Haddington for interment there, and the funeral took place on Thursday +afternoon. Mr. Carlyle was accompanied from London (whither he had +returned immediately on the receipt of that solemn message) by his +brother, Dr. Carlyle, Mr. John Forster, and the Hon. Mr. Twistleton. +The funeral cortège was followed on foot by a large number of +gentlemen who had known Mrs. Carlyle and her father, Dr. Welsh, +who was held in high estimation in the town, where he had practised +medicine till his death, in 1819. The grave, which is the same as +that occupied by Dr. Welsh's remains, lies in the centre of the ruined +choir of the old cathedral at Haddington. In accordance with the +Scottish practice, there was no service read, and Mr. Carlyle threw +a handful of earth on the coffin after it had been lowered into the +grave. + + * * * * * + +Carlyle wrote the following inscription to be placed on his wife's +tombstone:-- + + "Here likewise now rests Jane Welsh Carlyle, spouse of Thomas + Carlyle, Chelsea, London. She was born at Haddington 14th + July, 1801; only child of the above John Welsh and of Grace + Welsh, Caplegell, Dumfriesshire, his wife. In her bright + existence she had more sorrows than are common, but also a + soft invincibility, a clearness of discernment, and a noble + loyalty of heart which are rare. For forty years she was the + true and loving helpmate of her husband, and by act and word + unweariedly forwarded him as none else could in all of worthy + that he did or attempted. She died at London, 21st April, + 1866, suddenly snatched away from him, and the light of his + life as if gone out." + +Later in the same year, weighed down as he was by his great sorrow, +Carlyle nevertheless thought it a public duty to come forward +in defence of Governor Eyre, when the quelling of the Jamaica +insurrection excited so much controversy, and seemed to divide England +into two parties. He acted as Vice-President of the Defence Fund. The +following is a letter written to Mr. Hamilton Hume, giving his views +on the subject in full: + + "Ripple Court, Ringwould, Dover, + + "_August 23_, 1866. + +"SIR, + +"The clamour raised against Governor Eyre appears to me to be +disgraceful to the good sense of England; and if it rested on any +depth of conviction, and were not rather (as I always flatter myself +it is) a thing of rumour and hearsay, of repetition and reverberation, +mostly from the teeth outward, I should consider it of evil omen to +the country and to its highest interests in these times. For my own +share, all the light that has yet reached me on Mr. Eyre and his +history in the world goes steadily to establish the conclusion that he +is a just, humane, and valiant man, faithful to his trusts everywhere, +and with no ordinary faculty of executing them; that his late services +in Jamaica were of great, perhaps of incalculable value, as certainly +they were of perilous and appalling difficulty--something like the +case of 'fire,' suddenly reported, 'in the ship's powder room,' in +mid-ocean where the moments mean the ages, and life and death hang +on your use or misuse of the moments; and, in short, that penalty and +clamour are not the thing this Governor merits from any of us, but +honour and thanks, and wise imitation (I will farther say), should +similar emergencies arise, on the great scale or on the small, in +whatever we are governing! + +"The English nation never loved anarchy, nor was wont to spend its +sympathy on miserable mad seditions, especially of this inhuman and +half-brutish type; but always loved order, and the prompt suppression +of seditions, and reserved its tears for something worthier than +promoters of such delirious and fatal enterprises who had got their +wages for their sad industry. Has the English nation changed, then, +altogether? I flatter myself it is not, not yet quite; but only that +certain loose, superficial portions of it have become a great deal +louder, and not any wiser, than they formerly used to be. + +"At any rate, though much averse, at any time, and at this time in +particular, to figure on committees, or run into public noises without +call, I do at once, and feel that as a British citizen I should, and +must, make you welcome to my name for your committee, and to whatever +good it can do you. With the hope only that many other British men, of +far more significance in such a matter, will at once or gradually do +the like; and that, in fine, by wise effort and persistence, a blind +and disgraceful act of public injustice may be prevented; and an +egregrious folly as well--not to say, for none can say or compute, +what a vital detriment throughout the British Empire, in such an +example set to all the colonies and governors the British Empire has! + +"Farther service, I fear, I am not in a state to promise, but the +whole weight of my conviction and good wishes is with you; and if +other service possible to me do present itself, I shall not want for +willingness in case of need. Enclosed is my mite of contribution to + your fund."I have the honour to be yours truly, + + "T. CARLYLE." + + "To HAMILTON HUME, Esq., + "Hon. Sec. 'Eyre Defence Fund.'" + +In August, 1867, Carlyle broke silence again with an utterance in the +style of the _Latter-Day Pamphlets_, entitled "Shooting Niagara: and +After?" published anonymously (though everyone, of course, knew it to +be his) in _Macmillan's Magazine_. Shortly afterwards it was reprinted +as a separate pamphlet, with additions, and with the author's name on +the title-page. + +In February, 1868, Carlyle wrote some Recollections of Sir William +Hamilton, as a contribution to Professor Veitch's Memoir of that +accomplished metaphysician. + +In November, 1870, he addressed a long and very remarkable letter +to the _Times_, on the French-German war, which is reprinted in the +latest edition of his collected Miscellanies. + +Two years later (November, 1872) he added a very beautiful Supplement +to the People's Edition of his "Life of Schiller," founded on Saupe's +"Schiller and his Father's Household," and other more recent books on +Schiller that had appeared in Germany. + +His last literary productions were a series of papers on "The Early +Kings of Norway," and an Essay on "The Portraits of John Knox," which +appeared, in instalments, in _Fraser's Magazine_, in the first four +months of 1875. On the 4th December of that year, Carlyle attained +his eightieth year, and this anniversary was signalised by some of the +more distinguished of his friends and admirers by striking a medal, +the head being executed by Mr. Boehm, whose noble statue of Carlyle, +exhibited in the Royal Academy in the previous year, had won so much +merited praise from Mr. Ruskin and others. The medal was accompanied +by an address, signed by the subscribers. Carlyle seems to have been +much gratified with this honour, which took him quite by surprise, and +he expressed his acknowledgments as follows:-- + +"This of the medal and formal address of friends was an altogether +unexpected event, to be received as a conspicuous and peculiar honour, +without example hitherto anywhere in my life.... To you ... I address +my thankful acknowledgments, which surely are deep and sincere, and +will beg you to convey the same to all the kind friends so beautifully +concerned in it. Let no one of you be other than assured that the +beautiful transaction, in result, management, and intention, was +altogether gratifying, welcome, and honourable to me, and that I +cordially thank one and all of you for what you have been pleased +to do. Your fine and noble gift shall remain among my precious +possessions, and be the symbol to me of something still more _golden_ +than itself, on the part of my many dear and too generous friends, so +long as I continue in this world. + + "Yours and theirs, from the heart, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle's last public utterances were a letter on the Eastern +Question, addressed to Mr. George Howard, and printed in the _Times_ +of November 28, 1876, and a letter to the Editor of the _Times_, on +"The Crisis," printed in that journal on May 5, 1877. + +He was now beginning to feel the effects of his great age. Yearly and +monthly he grew more feeble. His wonted walking exercise had to be +curtailed, and at last abandoned. He was affectionately and piously +tended during these last years by his niece, Mary Aitken, now Mrs. +Alexander Carlyle. In the autumn of 1879 he lost his brother, Dr. John +Aitken Carlyle, the translator of Dante's "Inferno." + +The end came at last, after a long and gradual decay of strength. The +great writer and noble-hearted man passed away peacefully at about +half-past eight o'clock on the morning of Saturday, February 5, 1881, +in the eighty-sixth year of his age. + +His remains were conveyed to Scotland, and were laid in the +burial-ground at Ecclefechan, where the ashes of his father and +mother, and of others of his kindred, repose. He had executed what is +known in Scotch law as a "deed of mortification," by virtue of +which he bequeathed to Edinburgh University the estate of +Craigenputtoch--which had come to him through his wife--for the +foundation of ten Bursaries in the Faculty of Arts, to be called the +"John Welsh Bursaries." In his Will he bequeathed the books which +he had used in writing on Cromwell and Friedrich to Harvard College, +Massachusetts. + +In less than a month after his death, with a haste on many accounts +to be deplored, and which has excited much animadversion, his literary +executor, Mr. James Anthony Froude, the historian, issued two volumes +of posthumous "Reminiscences," written by Carlyle, partly in 1832, +and partly in 1866-67. The first section consists of a memorial paper, +written immediately after his father's death; the second contains +Reminiscences of his early friend, Edward Irving, commenced at Cheyne +Row in the autumn of 1866, and finished at Mentone on the 2nd January, +1867. The Reminiscences of Lord Jeffrey were begun on the following +day, and finished on January 19. The paper on Southey and Wordsworth, +relegated to the Appendix, was also written at Mentone between the +28th January and the 8th March, 1867. The Memorials of his wife, which +fill the greater part of the second volume, were written at Cheyne +Row, during the month after her death. + +Of the earlier portraits of Carlyle three are specially interesting, +1. The full-length sketch by "Croquis" (Daniel Maclise) which formed +one of the _Fraser_ Gallery portraits, and was published in the +magazine in June, 1833. (The original sketch of this is now deposited +in the Forster Collection at South Kensington.) 2. Count D'Orsay's +sketch, published by Mitchell in 1839, is highly characteristic of +the artist. It was taken when no man of position was counted a dutiful +subject who did not wear a black satin stock and a Petersham coat. +The great author's own favourite among the early portraits was 3. +the sketch by Samuel Laurence, engraved in Horne's "New Spirit of the +Age," published in 1844. Since the art of photography came into vogue, +a series of photographs of various degrees of merit and success have +been executed by Messrs. Elliott and Fry, and by Watkins. The late +Mrs. Cameron also produced a photograph of him in her peculiar style, +but it was not so successful as her fine portrait of Tennyson. An +oil-painting by Mr. Watts, exhibited some fifteen years ago, and now +also forming part of the Forster Collection at South Kensington, is +remarkable for its weird wildness; but it gave great displeasure to +the old philosopher himself! More lately we have a remarkable portrait +by Mr. Whistler, who seized the _tout ensemble_ of his illustrious +sitter's character and costume in a very effective manner. The _terra +cotta_ statue by Mr. Boehm, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1875, +has received such merited meed of enthusiastic praise from Mr. +Ruskin that it needs no added praise of ours. It has been excellently +photographed from two points of view by Mr. Hedderly, of Riley Street, +Chelsea. + +One of the best and happiest of the many likenesses of Mr. Carlyle +that appeared during the last decade of his life was a sketch by Mrs. +Allingham--a picture as well as a portrait--representing the venerable +philosopher in a long and picturesque dressing-gown, seated on a chair +and poring over a folio, in the garden at the back of the quaint old +house at Chelsea, which will henceforth, as long as it stands, be +associated with his memory. Beside him on the grass lies a long clay +pipe (a churchwarden) which he has been smoking in the sweet +morning air. So that altogether, as far as pictorial, graphic, and +photographic art can go, the features, form, and bodily semblance of +Carlyle will be as well known to future generations as they are to our +own. + + * * * * * + +The impression of his brilliant and eloquent talk, though it will +perhaps remain, for at least half a century to come, more or less +vivid to some of those of the new generation who were privileged to +hear it, will, of course, gradually fade away. But it seems +hardly probable that the rich legacy of his long roll of +writings--historical, biographical, critical--can be regarded as other +than a permanent one, in which each succeeding generation will find +fresh delight and instruction. The series of vivid pictures he has +left behind in his "French Revolution," in his "Cromwell," in his +"Frederick," can hardly become obsolete or cease to be attractive; nor +is such power of word-painting likely soon to be equalled or ever +to be surpassed. The salt of humour that savours nearly all he wrote +(that lambent humour that lightens and plays over the grimmest and +sternest of his pages) will also serve to keep his writings fresh and +readable. Many of his _dicta_ and opinions will doubtless be more and +more called in question, especially in those of his works which are +more directly of a didactic than a narrative character, and in regard +to subjects which he was by habit, by mental constitution, and by that +prejudice from which the greatest can never wholly free themselves, +incapable of judging broadly or soundly,--such, for instance, as the +scope and functions of painting and the fine arts generally, the value +of modern poetry, or the working of Constitutional and Parliamentary +institutions. + + RICHARD HERNE SHEPHERD. + + _Chelsea, June, 1881_. + + + + +ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS. + +[Illustration] + + + + + ADDRESS + DELIVERED TO THE + STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY, + APRIL 2, 1866. + + +GENTLEMEN, + +I have accepted the office you have elected me to, and have now the +duty to return thanks for the great honour done me. Your enthusiasm +towards me, I admit, is very beautiful in itself, however undesirable +it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling honourable +to all men, and one well known to myself when I was in a position +analogous to your own. I can only hope that it may endure to the +end--that noble desire to honour those whom you think worthy of +honour, and come to be more and more select and discriminate in the +choice of the object of it; for I can well understand that you +will modify your opinions of me and many things else as you go +on. (Laughter and cheers.) There are now fifty-six years gone +last November since I first entered your city, a boy of not quite +fourteen--fifty-six years ago--to attend classes here and gain +knowledge of all kinds, I know not what, with feelings of wonder and +awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this +is what we have come to. (Cheers.) There is something touching +and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third +generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up and +saying, "Well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the +vineyard: you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and +have had many judges." As the old proverb says, "He that builds by the +wayside has many masters." We must expect a variety of judges; but the +voice of young Scotland, through you, is really of some value to +me, and I return you many thanks for it, though I cannot describe my +emotions to you, and perhaps they will be much more conceivable if +expressed in silence. (Cheers.) + +When this office was proposed to me, some of you know that I was not +very ambitious to accept it, at first. I was taught to believe that +there were more or less certain important duties which would lie in +my power. This, I confess, was my chief motive in going into it--at +least, in reconciling the objections felt to such things; for if I can +do anything to honour you and my dear old _Alma Mater_, why should I +not do so? (Loud cheers.) Well, but on practically looking into the +matter when the office actually came into my hands, I find it grows +more and more uncertain and abstruse to me whether there is much real +duty that I can do at all. I live four hundred miles away from you, +in an entirely different state of things; and my weak health--now for +many years accumulating upon me--and a total unacquaintance with +such subjects as concern your affairs here,--all this fills me +with apprehension that there is really nothing worth the least +consideration that I can do on that score. You may, however, depend +upon it that if any such duty does arise in any form, I will use my +most faithful endeavour to do whatever is right and proper, according +to the best of my judgment. (Cheers.) + +In the meanwhile, the duty I have at present--which might be very +pleasant, but which is quite the reverse, as you may fancy--is to +address some words to you on some subjects more or less cognate to the +pursuits you are engaged in. In fact, I had meant to throw out some +loose observations--loose in point of order, I mean--in such a way as +they may occur to me--the truths I have in me about the business you +are engaged in, the race you have started on, what kind of race it is +you young gentlemen have begun, and what sort of arena you are likely +to find in this world. I ought, I believe, according to custom, to +have written all that down on paper, and had it read out. That would +have been much handier for me at the present moment (a laugh), but +when I attempted to write, I found that I was not accustomed to write +speeches, and that I did not get on very well. So I flung that away, +and resolved to trust to the inspiration of the moment--just to what +came uppermost. You will therefore have to accept what is readiest, +what comes direct from the heart, and you must just take that in +compensation for any good order of arrangement there might have been +in it. + +I will endeavour to say nothing that is not true, as far as I can +manage, and that is pretty much all that I can engage for. (A laugh.) +Advices, I believe, to young men--and to all men--are very seldom much +valued. There is a great deal of advising, and very little faithful +performing. And talk that does not end in any kind of action, is +better suppressed altogether. I would not, therefore, go much into +advising; but there is one advice I must give you. It is, in fact, the +summary of all advices, and you have heard it a thousand times, I dare +say; but I must, nevertheless, let you hear it the thousand and first +time, for it is most intensely true, whether you will believe it at +present or not--namely, that above all things the interest of your own +life depends upon being diligent now, while it is called to-day, +in this place where you have come to get education. Diligent! That +includes all virtues in it that a student can have; I mean to include +in it all qualities that lead into the acquirement of real instruction +and improvement in such a place. If you will believe me, you who +are young, yours is the golden season of life. As you have heard it +called, so it verily is, the seed-time of life, in which, if you do +not sow, or if you sow tares instead of wheat, you cannot expect to +reap well afterwards, and you will arrive at indeed little; while in +the course of years, when you come to look back, and if you have +not done what you have heard from your advisers--and among many +counsellers there is wisdom--you will bitterly repent when it is too +late. The habits of study acquired at Universities are of the highest +importance in after-life. At the season when you are in young years +the whole mind is, as it were, fluid, and is capable of forming itself +into any shape that the owner of the mind pleases to order it to form +itself into. The mind is in a fluid state, but it hardens up gradually +to the consistency of rock or iron, and you cannot alter the habits of +an old man, but as he has begun he will proceed and go on to the last. +By diligence, I mean among other things--and very chiefly--honesty in +all your inquiries into what you are about. Pursue your studies in the +way your conscience calls honest. More and more endeavour to do that. +Keep, I mean to say, an accurate separation of what you have really +come to know in your own minds, and what is still unknown. Leave all +that on the hypothetical side of the barrier, as things afterwards to +be acquired, if acquired at all; and be careful not to stamp a thing +as known when you do not yet know it. Count a thing known only when it +is stamped on your mind, so that you may survey it on all sides with +intelligence. + +There is such a thing as a man endeavouring to persuade himself, and +endeavouring to persuade others, that he knows about things when +he does not know more than the outside skin of them; and he goes +flourishing about with them. ("Hear, hear," and a laugh.) There is +also a process called cramming in some Universities (a laugh)--that +is, getting up such points of things as the examiner is likely to put +questions about. Avoid all that as entirely unworthy of an honourable +habit. Be modest, and humble, and diligent in your attention to what +your teachers tell you, who are profoundly interested in trying to +bring you forward in the right way, so far as they have been able +to understand it. Try all things they set before you, in order, if +possible, to understand them, and to value them in proportion to your +fitness for them. Gradually see what kind of work you can do; for it +is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work +he is to do in this universe. In fact, morality as regards study is, +as in all other things, the primary consideration, and overrides +all others. A dishonest man cannot do anything real; and it would be +greatly better if he were tied up from doing any such thing. He does +nothing but darken counsel by the words he utters. That is a very old +doctrine, but a very true one; and you will find it confirmed by +all the thinking men that have ever lived in this long series of +generations of which we are the latest. + +I daresay you know, very many of you, that it is now seven hundred +years since Universities were first set up in this world of ours. +Abelard and other people had risen up with doctrines in them the +people wished to hear of, and students flocked towards them from all +parts of the world. There was no getting the thing recorded in books +as you may now. You had to hear him speaking to you vocally, or else +you could not learn at all what it was that he wanted to say. And so +they gathered together the various people who had anything to teach, +and formed themselves gradually, under the patronage of kings +and other potentates who were anxious about the culture of their +populations, nobly anxious for their benefit, and became a University. + +I daresay, perhaps, you have heard it said that all that is greatly +altered by the invention of printing, which took place about midway +between us and the origin of Universities. A man has not now to go +away to where a professor is actually speaking, because in most cases +he can get his doctrine out of him through a book, and can read it, +and read it again and again, and study it. I don't know that I know of +any way in which the whole facts of a subject may be more completely +taken in, if our studies are moulded in conformity with it. +Nevertheless, Universities have, and will continue to have, an +indispensable value in society--a very high value. I consider the very +highest interests of man vitally intrusted to them. + +In regard to theology, as you are aware, it has been the study of the +deepest heads that have come into the world--what is the nature of +this stupendous universe, and what its relations to all things, as +known to man, and as only known to the awful Author of it. In +fact, the members of the Church keep theology in a lively condition +(laughter), for the benefit of the whole population, which is the +great object of our Universities. I consider it is the same now +intrinsically, though very much forgotten, from many causes, and +not so successful as might be wished at all. (A laugh.) It remains, +however, a very curious truth, what has been said by observant people, +that the main use of the Universities in the present age is that, +after you have done with all your classes, the next thing is a +collection of books, a great library of good books, which you proceed +to study and to read. What the Universities have mainly done--what I +have found the University did for me, was that it taught me to read +in various languages and various sciences, so that I could go into the +books that treated of these things, and try anything I wanted to make +myself master of gradually, as I found it suit me. Whatever you may +think of all that, the clearest and most imperative duty lies on +every one of you to be assiduous in your reading; and learn to be good +readers, which is, perhaps, a more difficult thing than you imagine. +Learn to be discriminative in your reading--to read all kinds of +things that you have an interest in, and that you find to be really +fit for what you are engaged in. Of course, at the present time, in a +great deal of the reading incumbent on you you must be guided by the +books recommended to you by your professors for assistance towards the +prelections. And then, when you get out of the University, and go into +studies of your own, you will find it very important that you have +selected a field, a province in which you can study and work. + +The most unhappy of all men is the man that cannot tell what he is +going to do, that has got no work cut out for him in the world, and +does not go into it. For work is the grand cure of all the maladies +and miseries that ever beset mankind--honest work, which you intend +getting done. If you are in a strait, a very good indication as to +choice--perhaps the best you could get--is a book you have a great +curiosity about. You are then in the readiest and best of all possible +conditions to improve by that book. It is analogous to what doctors +tell us about the physical health and appetites of the patient. You +must learn to distinguish between false appetite and real. There is +such a thing as a false appetite, which will lead a man into vagaries +with regard to diet, will tempt him to eat spicy things which he +should not eat at all, and would not but that it is toothsome, and for +the moment in baseness of mind. A man ought to inquire and find +out what he really and truly has an appetite for--what suits his +constitution; and that, doctors tell him, is the very thing he ought +to have in general. And so with books. As applicable to almost all +of you, I will say that it is highly expedient to go into history--to +inquire into what has passed before you in the families of men. The +history of the Romans and Greeks will first of all concern you; and +you will find that all the knowledge you have got will be extremely +applicable to elucidate that. There you have the most remarkable race +of men in the world set before you, to say nothing of the languages, +which your professors can better explain, and which, I believe, are +admitted to be the most perfect orders of speech we have yet found +to exist among men. And you will find, if you read well, a pair of +extremely remarkable nations shining in the records left by themselves +as a kind of pillar to light up life in the darkness of the past +ages; and it will be well worth your while if you can get into the +understanding of what these people were and what they did. You will +find a great deal of hearsay, as I have found, that does not touch on +the matter; but perhaps some of you will get to see a Roman face to +face; you will know in some measure how they contrived to exist, and +to perform these feats in the world; I believe, also, you will find +a thing not much noted, that there was a very great deal of deep +religion in its form in both nations. That is noted by the wisest of +historians, and particularly by Ferguson, who is particularly well +worth reading on Roman history; and I believe he was an alumnus in our +own University. His book is a very creditable book. He points out the +profoundly religious nature of the Roman people, notwithstanding the +wildness and ferociousness of their nature. They believed that Jupiter +Optimus--Jupiter Maximus--was lord of the universe, and that he +had appointed the Romans to become the chief of men, provided they +followed his commands--to brave all difficulty, and to stand up with +an invincible front--to be ready to do and die; and also to have the +same sacred regard to veracity, to promise, to integrity, and all the +virtues that surround that noblest quality of men--courage--to +which the Romans gave the name of virtue, manhood, as the one thing +ennobling for a man. + +In the literary ages of Rome, that had very much decayed away; but +still it had retained its place among the lower classes of the Roman +people. Of the deeply religious nature of the Greeks, along with their +beautiful and sunny effulgences of art, you have a striking proof, if +you look for it. + +In the tragedies of Sophocles, there is a most distinct recognition of +the eternal justice of Heaven, and the unfailing punishment of crime +against the laws of God. + +I believe you will find in all histories that that has been at the +head and foundation of them all, and that no nation that did +not contemplate this wonderful universe with an awe-stricken and +reverential feeling that there was a great unknown, omnipotent, and +all-wise, and all-virtuous Being, superintending all men in it, and +all interests in it--no nation ever came to very much, nor did any man +either, who forgot that. If a man did forget that, he forgot the most +important part of his mission in this world. + +In our own history of England, which you will take a great deal of +natural pains to make yourselves acquainted with, you will find it +beyond all others worthy of your study; because I believe that the +British nation--and I include in them the Scottish nation--produced +a finer set of men than any you will find it possible to get anywhere +else in the world. (Applause.) I don't know in any history of +Greece or Rome where you will get so fine a man as Oliver Cromwell. +(Applause.) And we have had men worthy of memory in our little corner +of the island here as well as others, and our history has been strong +at least in being connected with the world itself--for if you examine +well you will find that John Knox was the author, as it were, of +Oliver Cromwell; that the Puritan revolution would never have taken +place in England at all if it had not been for that Scotchman. +(Applause.) This is an arithmetical fact, and is not prompted by +national vanity on my part at all. (Laughter and applause.) And it +is very possible, if you look at the struggle that was going on in +England, as I have had to do in my time, you will see that people were +overawed with the immense impediments lying in the way. + +A small minority of God-fearing men in the country were flying away +with any ship they could get to New England, rather than take the lion +by the beard. They durstn't confront the powers with their most just +complaint to be delivered from idolatry. They wanted to make the +nation altogether conformable to the Hebrew Bible, which they +understood to be according to the will of God; and there could be no +aim more legitimate. However, they could not have got their desire +fulfilled at all if Knox had not succeeded by the firmness and +nobleness of his mind. For he is also of the select of the earth to +me--John Knox. (Applause.) What he has suffered from the ungrateful +generations that have followed him should really make us humble +ourselves to the dust, to think that the most excellent man our +country has produced, to whom we owe everything that distinguishes +us among modern nations, should have been sneered at and abused by +people. Knox was heard by Scotland--the people heard him with the +marrow of their bones--they took up his doctrine, and they defied +principalities and powers to move them from it. "We must have it," +they said. + +It was at that time the Puritan struggle arose in England, and you +know well that the Scottish Earls and nobility, with their tenantry, +marched away to Dunse-hill, and sat down there; and just in the course +of that struggle, when it was either to be suppressed or brought +into greater vitality, they encamped on the top of Dunse-hill thirty +thousand armed men, drilled for that occasion, each regiment around +its landlord, its earl, or whatever he might be called, and eager +for Christ's Crown and Covenant. That was the signal for all England +rising up into unappeasable determination to have the Gospel there +also, and you know it went on and came to be a contest whether +the Parliament or the King should rule--whether it should be old +formalities and use and wont, or something that had been of new +conceived in the souls of men--namely, a divine determination to walk +according to the laws of God here as the sum of all prosperity--which +of these should have the mastery; and after a long, long agony of +struggle, it was decided--the way we know. I should say also of that +Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell's--notwithstanding the abuse it has +encountered, and the denial of everybody that it was able to get on in +the world, and so on--it appears to me to have been the most salutary +thing in the modern history of England on the whole. If Oliver +Cromwell had continued it out, I don't know what it would have come +to. It would have got corrupted perhaps in other hands, and could +not have gone on, but it was pure and true to the last fibre in his +mind--there was truth in it when he ruled over it. + +Machiavelli has remarked, in speaking about the Romans, that +democracy cannot exist anywhere in the world; as a Government it is an +impossibility that it should be continued, and he goes on proving that +in his own way. I do not ask you all to follow him in his conviction +(hear); but it is to him a clear truth that it is a solecism and +impossibility that the universal mass of men should govern themselves. +He says of the Romans that they continued a long time, but it was +purely in virtue of this item in their constitution--namely, that they +had all the conviction in their minds that it was solemnly necessary +at times to appoint a Dictator--a man who had the power of life and +death over everything--who degraded men out of their places, ordered +them to execution, and did whatever seemed to him good in the name +of God above him. He was commanded to take care that the Republic +suffered no detriment, and Machiavelli calculates that that was the +thing that purified the social system from time to time, and enabled +it to hang on as it did--an extremely likely thing if it was composed +of nothing but bad and tumultuous men triumphing in general over the +better, and all going the bad road, in fact. Well, Oliver Cromwell's +Protectorate, or Dictatorate if you will, lasted for about ten years, +and you will find that nothing that was contrary to the laws of Heaven +was allowed to live by Oliver. (A laugh, and applause.) For example, +it was found by his Parliament, called "Barebones"--the most zealous +of all Parliaments probably--the Court of Chancery in England was in +a state that was really capable of no apology--no man could get up and +say that that was a right court. There were, I think, fifteen thousand +or fifteen hundred--(laughter)--I don't really remember which, but +we shall call it by the last (renewed laughter)--there were fifteen +hundred cases lying in it undecided; and one of them, I remember, for +a large amount of money, was eighty-three years old, and it was going +on still. Wigs were waving over it, and lawyers were taking their +fees, and there was no end of it, upon which the Barebones people, +after deliberation about it, thought it was expedient, and commanded +by the Author of Man and the Fountain of Justice, and for the true +and right, to abolish the court. Really, I don't know who could have +dissented from that opinion. At the same time, it was thought by those +who were wiser, and had more experience of the world, that it was a +very dangerous thing, and would never suit at all. The lawyers began +to make an immense noise about it. (Laughter.) All the public, the +great mass of solid and well-disposed people who had got no deep +insight into such matters, were very adverse to it, and the president +of it, old Sir Francis Rous, who translated the Psalms--those that +we sing every Sunday in the church yet--a very good man and a wise +man--the Provost of Eton--he got the minority, or I don't know whether +or no he did not persuade the majority--he, at any rate, got a great +number of the Parliament to go to Oliver the Dictator, and lay +down their functions altogether, and declare officially with their +signature on Monday morning that the Parliament was dissolved. + +The thing was passed on Saturday night, and on Monday morning Rous +came and said, "We cannot carry on the affair any longer, and we +remit it into the hands of your Highness." Oliver in that way became +Protector a second time. + +I give you this as an instance that Oliver felt that the Parliament +that had been dismissed had been perfectly right with regard to +Chancery, and that there was no doubt of the propriety of abolishing +Chancery, or reforming it in some kind of way. He considered it, and +this is what he did. He assembled sixty of the wisest lawyers to be +found in England. Happily, there were men great in the law--men who +valued the laws as much as anybody does now, I suppose. (A laugh.) +Oliver said to them, "Go and examine this thing, and in the name of +God inform me what is necessary to be done with regard to it. You will +see how we may clean out the foul things in it that render it poison +to everybody." Well, they sat down then, and in the course of six +weeks--there was no public speaking then, no reporting of speeches, +and no trouble of any kind; there was just the business in hand--they +got sixty propositions fixed in their minds of the things that +required to be done. And upon these sixty propositions Chancery was +reconstituted and remodelled, and so it has lasted to our time. It had +become a nuisance, and could not have continued much longer. + +That is an instance of the manner in which things were done when a +Dictatorship prevailed in the country, and that was what the Dictator +did. Upon the whole, I do not think that, in general, out of common +history books, you will ever get into the real history of this +country, or anything particular which it would beseem you to know. You +may read very ingenious and very clever books by men whom it would be +the height of insolence in me to do any other thing than express +my respect for. But their position is essentially sceptical. Man +is unhappily in that condition that he will make only a temporary +explanation of anything, and you will not be able, if you are like the +man, to understand how this island came to be what it is. You will not +find it recorded in books. You will find recorded in books a jumble +of tumults, disastrous ineptitudes, and all that kind of thing. But to +get what you want you will have to look into side sources, and inquire +in all directions. + +I remember getting Collins' _Peerage_ to read--a very poor peerage as +a work of genius, but an excellent book for diligence and fidelity--I +was writing on Oliver Cromwell at the time. (Applause.) I could get no +biographical dictionary, and I thought the peerage book would help +me, at least tell me whether people were old or young; and about all +persons concerned in the actions about which I wrote. I got a great +deal of help out of poor Collins. He was a diligent and dark London +bookseller of about a hundred years ago, who compiled out of all kinds +of treasury chests, archives, books that were authentic, and out +of all kinds of things out of which he could get the information he +wanted. He was a very meritorious man. I not only found the solution +of anything I wanted there, but I began gradually to perceive this +immense fact, which I really advise every one of you who read history +to look out for and read for--if he has not found it--it was that +the kings of England all the way from the Norman Conquest down to +the times of Charles I. had appointed, so far as they knew, those who +deserved to be appointed, peers. They were all Royal men, with minds +full of justice and valour and humanity, and all kinds of qualities +that are good for men to have who ought to rule over others. Then +their genealogy was remarkable--and there is a great deal more in +genealogies than is generally believed at present. + +I never heard tell of any clever man that came out of entirely stupid +people. If you look around the families of your acquaintance, you will +see such cases in all directions. I know that it has been the case in +mine. I can trace the father, and the son, and the grandson, and the +family stamp is quite distinctly legible upon each of them, so that +it goes for a great deal--the hereditary principle in Government as in +other things; and it must be recognised so soon as there is any fixity +in things. + +You will remark that if at any time the genealogy of a peerage +fails--if the man that actually holds the peerage is a fool in these +earnest striking times, the man gets into mischief and gets into +treason--he gets himself extinguished altogether, in fact. (Laughter.) + +From these documents of old Collins it seems that a peer conducts +himself in a solemn, good, pious, manly kind of way when he takes +leave of life, and when he has hospitable habits, and is valiant in +his procedure throughout; and that in general a King, with a noble +approximation to what was right, had nominated this man, saying "Come +you to me, sir; come out of the common level of the people, where +you are liable to be trampled upon; come here and take a district of +country and make it into your own image more or less; be a king under +me, and understand that that is your function." I say this is the most +divine thing that a human being can do to other human beings, and no +kind of being whatever has so much of the character of God Almighty's +Divine Government as that thing we see that went all over England, and +that is the grand soul of England's history. + +It is historically true that down to the time of Charles I., it was +not understood that any man was made a peer without having a merit in +him to constitute him a proper subject for a peerage. In Charles +I.'s time it grew to be known or said that if a man was by birth a +gentleman, and was worth £10,000 a-year, and bestowed his gifts up and +down among courtiers, he could be made a peer. Under Charles II. it +went on with still more rapidity, and has been going on with ever +increasing velocity until we see the perfect break-neck pace at which +they are now going. (A laugh.) And now a peerage is a paltry kind of +thing to what it was in these old times, I could go into a great many +more details about things of that sort, but I must turn to another +branch of the subject. + +One remark more about your reading. I do not know whether it has been +sufficiently brought home to you that there are two kinds of books. +When a man is reading on any kind of subject, in most departments of +books--in all books, if you take it in a wide sense--you will find +that there is a division of good books and bad books--there is a good +kind of a book and a bad kind of a book. I am not to assume that you +are all ill acquainted with this; but I may remind you that it is a +very important consideration at present. It casts aside altogether the +idea that people have that if they are reading any book--that if +an ignorant man is reading any book, he is doing rather better than +nothing at all. I entirely call that in question. I even venture to +deny it. (Laughter and cheers.) It would be much safer and better +would he have no concern with books at all than with some of them. You +know these are my views. There are a number, an increasing number, of +books that are decidedly to him not useful. (Hear.) But he will learn +also that a certain number of books were written by a supreme, noble +kind of people--not a very great number--but a great number adhere +more or less to that side of things. In short, as I have written +it down somewhere else, I conceive that books are like men's +souls--divided into sheep and goats. (Laughter and applause.) Some +of them are calculated to be of very great advantage in teaching--in +forwarding the teaching of all generations. Others are going down, +down, doing more and more, wilder and wilder mischief. + +And for the rest, in regard to all your studies here, and whatever +you may learn, you are to remember that the object is not particular +knowledge--that you are going to get higher in technical perfections, +and all that sort of thing. There is a higher aim lies at the rear of +all that, especially among those who are intended for literary, for +speaking pursuits--the sacred profession. You are ever to bear in +mind that there lies behind that the acquisition of what may be called +wisdom--namely, sound appreciation and just decision as to all the +objects that come round about you, and the habit of behaving with +justice and wisdom. In short, great is wisdom--great is the value +of wisdom. It cannot be exaggerated. The highest achievement of +man--"Blessed is he that getteth understanding." And that, I believe, +occasionally may be missed very easily; but never more easily than +now, I think. If that is a failure, all is a failure. However, I will +not touch further upon that matter. + +In this University I learn from many sides that there is a great and +considerable stir about endowments. Oh, I should have said in regard +to book reading, if it be so very important, how very useful would +an excellent library be in every University. I hope that will not be +neglected by those gentlemen who have charge of you--and, indeed, I am +happy to hear that your library is very much improved since the time I +knew it; and I hope it will go on improving more and more. You require +money to do that, and you require also judgment in the selectors of +the books--pious insight into what is really for the advantage of +human souls, and the exclusion of all kinds of clap-trap books which +merely excite the astonishment of foolish people. (Laughter.) Wise +books--as much as possible good books. + +As I was saying, there appears to be a great demand for endowments--an +assiduous and praiseworthy industry for getting new funds collected +for encouraging the ingenious youth of Universities, especially +in this the chief University of the country. (Hear, hear.) Well, I +entirely participate in everybody's approval of the movement. It +is very desirable. It should be responded to, and one expects most +assuredly will. At least, if it is not, it will be shameful to the +country of Scotland, which never was so rich in money as at the +present moment, and never stood so much in need of getting noble +Universities to counteract many influences that are springing up +alongside of money. It should not be backward in coming forward in +the way of endowments (a laugh)--at least, in rivalry to our rude +old barbarous ancestors, as we have been pleased to call them. Such +munificence as theirs is beyond all praise, to whom I am sorry to say +we are not yet by any manner of means equal or approaching equality. +(Laughter.) There is an overabundance of money, and sometimes I cannot +help thinking that, probably, never has there been at any other time +in Scotland the hundredth part of the money that now is, or even the +thousandth part, for wherever I go there is that gold-nuggeting (a +laugh)--that prosperity. + +Many men are counting their balances by millions. Money was never so +abundant, and nothing that is good to be done with it. ("Hear, hear," +and a laugh.) No man knows--or very few men know--what benefit to get +out of his money. In fact, it too often is secretly a curse to him. +Much better for him never to have had any. But I do not expect that +generally to be believed. (Laughter.) Nevertheless, I should think it +a beautiful relief to any man that has an honest purpose struggling +in him to bequeath a handsome house of refuge, so to speak, for some +meritorious man who may hereafter be born into the world, to enable +him a little to get on his way. To do, in fact, as those old Norman +kings whom I have described to you--to raise a man out of the dirt and +mud where he is getting trampled, unworthily on his part, into some +kind of position where he may acquire the power to do some good in his +generation. I hope that as much as possible will be done in that way; +that efforts will not be relaxed till the thing is in a satisfactory +state. At the same time, in regard to the classical department of +things, it is to be desired that it were properly supported--that +we could allow people to go and devote more leisure possibly to the +cultivation of particular departments. + +We might have more of this from Scotch Universities than we have. I +am bound, however, to say that it does not appear as if of late times +endowment was the real soul of the matter. The English, for example, +are the richest people for endowments on the face of the earth in +their Universities; and it is a remarkable fact that since the time +of Bentley you cannot name anybody that has gained a great name in +scholarship among them, or constituted a point of revolution in the +pursuits of men in that way. The man that did that is a man worthy +of being remembered among men, although he may be a poor man, and not +endowed with worldly wealth. One man that actually did constitute +a revolution was the son of a poor weaver in Saxony, who edited his +"Tibullus" in Dresden in the room of a poor comrade, and who, while he +was editing his "Tibullus," had to gather his pease-cod shells on the +streets and boil them for his dinner. That was his endowment. But he +was recognised soon to have done a great thing. His name was Heyne. + +I can remember it was quite a revolution in my mind when I got hold +of that man's book on Virgil. I found that for the first time I had +understood him--that he had introduced me for the first time into +an insight of Roman life, and pointed out the circumstances in which +these were written, and here was interpretation; and it has gone on in +all manner of development, and has spread out into other countries. + +Upon the whole, there is one reason why endowments are not given now +as they were in old days, when they founded abbeys, colleges, and all +kinds of things of that description, with such success as we know. All +that has changed now. Why that has decayed away may in part be that +people have become doubtful that colleges are now the real sources +of that which I call wisdom, whether they are anything more--anything +much more--than a cultivating of man in the specific arts. In fact, +there has been a suspicion of that kind in the world for a long time. +(A laugh.) That is an old saying, an old proverb, "An ounce of mother +wit is worth a pound of clergy." (Laughter.) There is a suspicion that +a man is perhaps not nearly so wise as he looks, or because he has +poured out speech so copiously. (Laughter.) + +When the seven free Arts on which the old Universities were based came +to be modified a little, in order to be convenient for or to promote +the wants of modern society--though, perhaps, some of them are +obsolete enough even yet for some of us--there arose a feeling that +mere vocality, mere culture of speech, if that is what comes out of a +man, though he may be a great speaker, an eloquent orator, yet there +is no real substance there--if that is what was required and aimed at +by the man himself, and by the community that set him upon becoming +a learned man. Maid-servants, I hear people complaining, are getting +instructed in the "ologies," and so on, and are apparently totally +ignorant of brewing, boiling, and baking (laughter); above all things, +not taught what is necessary to be known, from the highest to the +lowest--strict obedience, humility, and correct moral conduct. Oh, it +is a dismal chapter, all that, if one went into it! + +What has been done by rushing after fine speech? I have written down +some very fierce things about that, perhaps considerably more emphatic +than I would wish them to be now; but they are deeply my conviction. +(Hear, hear.) There is very great necessity indeed of getting a little +more silent than we are. It seems to me the finest nations of the +world--the English and the American--are going all away into wind +and tongue. (Applause and laughter.) But it will appear sufficiently +tragical by-and-bye, long after I am away out of it. Silence is the +eternal duty of a man. He wont get to any real understanding of +what is complex, and, what is more than any other, pertinent to his +interests, without maintaining silence. "Watch the tongue," is a very +old precept, and a most true one. I do not want to discourage any +of you from your Demosthenes, and your studies of the niceties of +language, and all that. Believe me, I value that as much as any of +you. I consider it a very graceful thing, and a proper thing, for +every human creature to know what the implement which he uses in +communicating his thoughts is, and how to make the very utmost of it. +I want you to study Demosthenes, and know all his excellencies. At the +same time, I must say that speech does not seem to me, on the whole, +to have turned to any good account. + +Why tell me that a man is a fine speaker if it is not the truth that +he is speaking? Phocion, who did not speak at all, was a great deal +nearer hitting the mark than Demosthenes. (Laughter.) He used to tell +the Athenians--"You can't fight Philip. You have not the slightest +chance with him. He is a man who holds his tongue; he has great +disciplined armies; he can brag anybody you like in your cities here; +and he is going on steadily with an unvarying aim towards his object: +and he will infallibly beat any kind of men such as you, going +on raging from shore to shore with all that rampant nonsense." +Demosthenes said to him one day--"The Athenians will get mad some day +and kill you." "Yes," Phocion says, "when they are mad; and you as +soon as they get sane again." (Laughter.) + +It is also told about him going to Messina on some deputation that +the Athenians wanted on some kind of matter of an intricate and +contentious nature, that Phocion went with some story in his mouth to +speak about. He was a man of few words--no unveracity; and after he +had gone on telling the story a certain time there was one burst of +interruption. One man interrupted with something he tried to answer, +and then another; and, finally, the people began bragging and bawling, +and no end of debate, till it ended in the want of power in the people +to say any more. Phocion drew back altogether, struck dumb, and would +not speak another word to any man; and he left it to them to decide in +any way they liked. + +It appears to me there is a kind of eloquence in that which is equal +to anything Demosthenes ever said--"Take your own way, and let me out +altogether." (Applause.) + +All these considerations, and manifold more connected with +them--innumerable considerations, resulting from observation of the +world at this moment--have led many people to doubt of the salutary +effect of vocal education altogether. I do not mean to say it should +be entirely excluded; but I look to something that will take hold +of the matter much more closely, and not allow it slip out of our +fingers, and remain worse than it was. For if a good speaker--an +eloquent speaker--is not speaking the truth, is there a more horrid +kind of object in creation? (Loud cheers.) Of such speech I hear all +manner and kind of people say it is excellent; but I care very little +about how he said it, provided I understand it, and it be true. +Excellent speaker! but what if he is telling me things that are +untrue, that are not the fact about it--if he has formed a wrong +judgment about it--if he has no judgment in his mind to form a right +conclusion in regard to the matter? An excellent speaker of that kind +is, as it were, saying--"Ho, every one that wants to be persuaded +of the thing that is not true, come hither." (Great laughter and +applause.) I would recommend you to be very chary of that kind of +excellent speech. (Renewed laughter.) + +Well, all that being the too well-known product of our method of vocal +education--the mouth merely operating on the tongue of the pupil, and +teaching him to wag it in a particular way (laughter)--it had made a +great many thinking men entertain a very great distrust of this not +very salutary way of procedure, and they have longed for some kind of +practical way of working out the business. There would be room for +a great deal of description about it if I went into it; but I must +content myself with saying that the most remarkable piece of reading +that you may be recommended to take and try if you can study is a book +by Goethe--one of his last books, which he wrote when he was an old +man, about seventy years of age--I think one of the most beautiful +he ever wrote, full of mild wisdom, and which is found to be very +touching by those who have eyes to discern and hearts to feel it. It +is one of the pieces in "Wilhelm Meister's Travels." I read it through +many years ago; and, of course, I had to read into it very hard when +I was translating it (applause), and it has always dwelt in my mind +as about the most remarkable bit of writing that I have known to be +executed in these late centuries. I have often said, there are ten +pages of that which, if ambition had been my only rule, I would rather +have written than have written all the books that have appeared since +I came into the world. (Cheers.) Deep, deep is the meaning of what +is said there. They turn on the Christian religion and the religious +phenomena of Christian life--altogether sketched out in the most airy, +graceful, delicately-wise kind of way, so as to keep himself out +of the common controversies of the street and of the forum, yet to +indicate what was the result of things he had been long meditating +upon. Among others, he introduces, in an aërial, flighty kind of way, +here and there a touch which grows into a beautiful picture--a scheme +of entirely mute education, at least with no more speech than is +absolutely necessary for what they have to do. + +Three of the wisest men that can be got are met to consider what is +the function which transcends all others in importance to build up +the young generation, which shall be free from all that perilous stuff +that has been weighing us down and clogging every step, and which is +the only thing we can hope to go on with if we would leave the world +a little better, and not the worse of our having been in it for those +who are to follow. The man who is the eldest of the three says to +Goethe, "You give by nature to the well-formed children you bring into +the world a great many precious gifts, and very frequently these are +best of all developed by nature herself, with a very slight assistance +where assistance is seen to be wise and profitable, and forbearance +very often on the part of the overlooker of the process of education; +but there is one thing that no child brings into the world with it, +and without which all other things are of no use." Wilhelm, who is +there beside him, says, "What is that?" "All who enter the world want +it," says the eldest; "perhaps you yourself." Wilhelm says, +"Well, tell me what it is." "It is," says the eldest, +"reverence--_Ehrfurcht_--Reverence! Honour done to those who are +grander and better than you, without fear; distinct from fear." +_Ehrfurcht_--"the soul of all religion that ever has been among +men, or ever will be." And he goes into practicality. He practically +distinguishes the kinds of religion that are in the world, and he +makes out three reverences. The boys are all trained to go through +certain gesticulations, to lay their hands on their breast and look +up to heaven, and they give their three reverences. The first and +simplest is that of reverence for what is above us. It is the soul +of all the Pagan religions; there is nothing better in man than that. +Then there is reverence for what is around us or about us--reverence +for our equals, and to which he attributes an immense power in the +culture of man. The third is reverence for what is beneath us--to +learn to recognise in pain, sorrow, and contradiction, even in those +things, odious as they are to flesh and blood--to learn that there +lies in these a priceless blessing. And he defines that as being +the soul of the Christian religion--the highest of all religions; a +height, as Goethe says--and that is very true, even to the letter, as +I consider--a height to which the human species was fated and enabled +to attain, and from which, having once attained it, it can never +retrograde. It cannot descend down below that permanently, Goethe's +idea is. + +Often one thinks it was good to have a faith of that kind--that +always, even in the most degraded, sunken, and unbelieving times, he +calculates there will be found some few souls who will recognise what +that meant; and that the world, having once received it, there is no +fear of its retrograding. He goes on then to tell us the way in which +they seek to teach boys, in the sciences particularly, whatever the +boy is fit for. Wilhelm left his own boy there, expecting they would +make him a Master of Arts, or something of that kind; and when he came +back for him he saw a thundering cloud of dust coming over the plain, +of which he could make nothing. It turned out to be a tempest of wild +horses, managed by young lads who had a turn for hunting with their +grooms. His own son was among them, and he found that the breaking of +colts was the thing he was most suited for. (Laughter.) This is +what Goethe calls Art, which I should not make clear to you by any +definition unless it is clear already. (A laugh.) I would not attempt +to define it as music, painting, and poetry, and so on; it is in quite +a higher sense than the common one, and in which, I am afraid, most of +our painters, poets, and music men would not pass muster. (A laugh.) +He considers that the highest pitch to which human culture can go; and +he watches with great industry how it is to be brought about with men +who have a turn for it. + +Very wise and beautiful it is. It gives one an idea that something +greatly better is possible for man in the world. I confess it seems to +me it is a shadow of what will come, unless the world is to come to +a conclusion that is perfectly frightful; some kind of scheme of +education like that, presided over by the wisest and most sacred men +that can be got in the world, and watching from a distance--a training +in practicality at every turn; no speech in it except that speech that +is to be followed by action, for that ought to be the rule as nearly +as possible among them. For rarely should men speak at all unless it +is to say that thing that is to be done; and let him go and do his +part in it, and to say no more about it. I should say there is nothing +in the world you can conceive so difficult, _prima facie_, as that +of getting a set of men gathered together--rough, rude, and ignorant +people--gather them together, promise them a shilling a day, rank +them up, give them very severe and sharp drill, and by bullying and +drill--for the word "drill" seems as if it meant the treatment that +would force them to learn--they learn what it is necessary to learn; +and there is the man, a piece of an animated machine, a wonder of +wonders to look at. He will go and obey one man, and walk into the +cannon's mouth for him, and do anything whatever that is commanded of +him by his general officer. And I believe all manner of things in +this way could be done if there were anything like the same attention +bestowed. Very many things could be regimented and organized into the +mute system of education that Goethe evidently adumbrates there. But I +believe, when people look into it, it will be found that they will not +be very long in trying to make some efforts in that direction; for the +saving of human labour, and the avoidance of human misery, would be +uncountable if it were set about and begun even in part. + +Alas! it is painful to think how very far away it is--any fulfilment +of such things; for I need not hide from you, young gentlemen--and +that is one of the last things I am going to tell you--that you have +got into a very troublous epoch of the world; and I don't think +you will find it improve the footing you have, though you have many +advantages which we had not. You have careers open to you, by public +examinations and so on, which is a thing much to be approved, and +which we hope to see perfected more and more. All that was entirely +unknown in my time, and you have many things to recognise as +advantages. But you will find the ways of the world more anarchical +than ever, I think. As far as I have noticed, revolution has come upon +us. We have got into the age of revolutions. All kinds of things are +coming to be subjected to fire, as it were; hotter and hotter the wind +rises around everything. + +Curious to say, now in Oxford and other places that used to seem to +live at anchor in the stream of time, regardless of all changes, they +are getting into the highest humour of mutation, and all sorts of new +ideas are getting afloat. It is evident that whatever is not made of +asbestos will have to be burnt in this world. It will not stand the +heat it is getting exposed to. And in saying that, it is but saying +in other words that we are in an epoch of anarchy--anarchy _plus_ the +constable. (Laughter.) There is nobody that picks one's pocket without +some policeman being ready to take him up. (Renewed laughter.) But in +every other thing he is the son, not of Kosmos, but of Chaos. He is +a disobedient, and reckless, and altogether a waste kind of +object--commonplace man in these epochs; and the wiser kind of +man--the select, of whom I hope you will be part--has more and more a +set time to it to look forward, and will require to move with double +wisdom; and will find, in short, that the crooked things that he has +to pull straight in his own life, or round about, wherever he may be, +are manifold, and will task all his strength wherever he may go. + +But why should I complain of that either?--for that is a thing a +man is born to in all epochs. He is born to expend every particle of +strength that God Almighty has given him, in doing the work he finds +he is fit for--to stand it out to the last breath of life, and do his +best. We are called upon to do that; and the reward we all get--which +we are perfectly sure of if we have merited it--is that we have got +the work done, or, at least, that we have tried to do the work; for +that is a great blessing in itself; and I should say there is not very +much more reward than that going in this world. If the man gets meat +and clothes, what matters it whether he have £10,000, or £10,000,000, +or £70 a-year. He can get meat and clothes for that; and he will find +very little difference intrinsically, if he is a wise man. + +I warmly second the advice of the wisest of men--"Don't be ambitious; +don't be at all too desirous to success; be loyal and modest." Cut +down the proud towering thoughts that you get into you, or see they be +pure as well as high. There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of +all California would be, or the getting of all the suffrages that are +on the planet just now. (Loud and prolonged cheers.) + +Finally, gentlemen, I have one advice to give you, which is +practically of very great importance, though a very humble one. + +I have no doubt you will have among you people ardently bent to +consider life cheap, for the purpose of getting forward in what they +are aiming at of high; and you are to consider throughout, much more +than is done at present, that health is a thing to be attended to +continually--that you are to regard that as the very highest of all +temporal things for you. (Applause.) There is no kind of achievement +you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. What are +nuggets and millions? The French financier said, "Alas! why is there +no sleep to be sold?" Sleep was not in the market at any quotation. +(Laughter and applause.) + +It is a curious thing that I remarked long ago, and have often +turned in my head, that the old word for "holy" in the German +language--_heilig_--also means "healthy." And so _Heil-bronn_ means +"holy-well," or "healthy-well." We have in the Scotch "hale;" and, +I suppose our English word "whole"--with a "w"--all of one piece, +without any hole in it--is the same word. I find that you could +not get any better definition of what "holy" really is than +"healthy--completely healthy." _Mens sana in corpore sano_. +(Applause.) + +A man with his intellect a clear, plain, geometric mirror, brilliantly +sensitive of all objects and impressions around it, and imagining all +things in their correct proportions--not twisted up into convex or +concave, and distorting everything, so that he cannot see the truth of +the matter without endless groping and manipulation--healthy, clear, +and free, and all round about him. We never can attain that at all. +In fact, the operations we have got into are destructive of it. You +cannot, if you are going to do any decisive intellectual operation--if +you are going to write a book--at least, I never could--without +getting decidedly made ill by it, and really you must if it is your +business--and you must follow out what you are at--and it sometimes +is at the expense of health. Only remember at all times to get back +as fast as possible out of it into health, and regard the real +equilibrium as the centre of things. You should always look at the +_heilig_, which means holy, and holy means healthy. + +Well, that old etymology--what a lesson it is against certain gloomy, +austere, ascetic people, that have gone about as if this world were +all a dismal-prison house! It has, indeed, got all the ugly things in +it that I have been alluding to; but there is an eternal sky over it, +and the blessed sunshine, verdure of spring, and rich autumn, and all +that in it, too. Piety does not mean that a man should make a sour +face about things, and refuse to enjoy in moderation what his Maker +has given. Neither do you find it to have been so with old Knox. If +you look into him you will find a beautiful Scotch humour in him, as +well as the grimmest and sternest truth when necessary, and a great +deal of laughter. We find really some of the sunniest glimpses of +things come out of Knox that I have seen in any man; for instance, in +his "History of the Reformation," which is a book I hope every one of +you will read--a glorious book. + +On the whole, I would bid you stand up to your work, whatever it may +be, and not be afraid of it--not in sorrows or contradiction to yield, +but pushing on towards the goal. And don't suppose that people are +hostile to you in the world. You will rarely find anybody designedly +doing you ill. You may feel often as if the whole world is obstructing +you, more or less; but you will find that to be because the world +is travelling in a different way from you, and rushing on in its own +path. Each man has only an extremely good-will to himself--which he +has a right to have--and is moving on towards his object. Keep out of +literature as a general rule, I should say also. (Laughter.) If you +find many people who are hard and indifferent to you in a world that +you consider to be unhospitable and cruel--as often, indeed, happens +to a tender-hearted, stirring young creature--you will also find there +are noble hearts who will look kindly on you, and their help will be +precious to you beyond price. You will get good and evil as you go on, +and have the success that has been appointed to you. + +I will wind up with a small bit of verse that is from Goethe also, +and has often gone through my mind. To me it has the tone of a modern +psalm in it in some measure. It is sweet and clear. The clearest +of sceptical men had not anything like so clear a mind as that man +had--freer from cant and misdirected notion of any kind than any man +in these ages has been This is what the poet says:-- + + The Future hides in it + Gladness and sorrow: + We press still thorow; + Nought that abides in it + Daunting us--Onward! + + And solemn before us, + Veiled, the dark Portal, + Goal of all mortal. + Stars silent rest o'er us-- + Graves under us, silent. + + While earnest thou gazest + Comes boding of terror, + Come phantasm and error; + Perplexes the bravest + With doubt and misgiving. + + But heard are the voices, + Heard are the Sages, + The Worlds and the Ages: + "Choose well: your choice is + Brief, and yet endless." + + Here eyes do regard you + In Eternity's stillness; + Here is all fulness, + Ye brave, to reward you. + Work, and despair not.[A] + +[Footnote A: Originally published in Carlyle's "Past and Present," +(Lond. 1843,) p. 318, and introduced there by the following words:-- + +"My candid readers, we will march out of this Third Book with a +rhythmic word of Goethe's on our tongue; a word which perhaps has +already sung itself, in dark hours and in bright, through many a +heart. To me, finding it devout yet wholly credible and veritable, +full of piety yet free of cant; to me joyfully finding much in it, and +joyfully missing so much in it, this little snatch of music, by the +greatest German man, sounds like a stanza in the grand _Road Song_ +and _Marching Song_ of our great Teutonic kindred,--wending, wending, +valiant and victorious, through the undiscovered Deeps of Time!"] + +One last word. _Wir heissen euch hoffen_--we bid you be of hope. Adieu +for this time. + + + + +THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY. + + +The following is a letter addressed by Mr. Carlyle to Dr. Hutchison +Stirling, late one of the candidates for the Chair of Moral Philosophy +in the University of Edinburgh:-- + + "Chelsea, 16th June, 1868. + + "DEAR STIRLING,-- + +"You well know how reluctant I have been to interfere at all in the +election now close on us, and that in stating, as bound, what my own +clear knowledge of your qualities was, I have strictly held by that, +and abstained from more. But the news I now have from Edinburgh is of +such a complexion, so dubious, and so surprising to me; and I now find +I shall privately have so much regret in a certain event--which +seems to be reckoned possible, and to depend on one gentleman of the +seven--that, to secure my own conscience in the matter, a few plainer +words seem needful. To whatever I have said of you already, therefore, +I now volunteer to add, that I think you not only the one man in +Britain capable of bringing Metaphysical Philosophy, in the ultimate, +German or European, and highest actual form of it, distinctly home to +the understanding of British men who wish to understand it, but that +I notice in you farther, on the moral side, a sound strength of +intellectual discernment, a noble valour and reverence of mind, which +seems to me to mark you out as the man capable of doing us the highest +service in Ethical science too: that of restoring, or decisively +beginning to restore, the doctrine of morals to what I must ever +reckon its one true and everlasting basis (namely, the divine or +supra-sensual one), and thus of victoriously reconciling and rendering +identical the latest dictates of modern science with the earliest +dawnings of wisdom among the race of men. + +"This is truly my opinion, and how important to me, not for the sake +of Edinburgh University alone, but of the whole world for ages to +come, I need not say to you! I have not the honour of any personal +acquaintance with Mr. Adam Black, late member for Edinburgh, but for +fifty years back have known him, in the distance, and by current and +credible report, as a man of solid sense, independence, probity, and +public spirit; and if, in your better knowledge of the circumstances, +you judge it suitable to read this note to him--to him, or indeed to +any other person--you are perfectly at liberty to do so. + + "Yours sincerely always, + + "T. CARLYLE." +[Illustration] + + + + +FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS. + + +Mr. Carlyle, ex-Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, being +asked before the expiration of his term of office, to deliver a +valedictory address to the students, he sent the following letter to +Mr. Robertson, Vice-President of the Committee for his election:-- + + "Chelsea, December 6, 1868. + +"DEAR SIR,-- + +"I much regret that a valedictory speech from me, in present +circumstances, is a thing I must not think of. Be pleased to advise +the young gentlemen who were so friendly towards me that I have +already sent them, in silence, but with emotions deep enough, perhaps +too deep, my loving farewell, and that ingratitude or want of regard +is by no means among the causes that keep me absent. With a fine +youthful enthusiasm, beautiful to look upon, they bestowed on me that +bit of honour, loyally all they had; and it has now, for reasons one +and another, become touchingly memorable to me--touchingly, and even +grandly and tragically--never to be forgotten for the remainder of +my life. Bid them, in my name, if they still love me, fight the good +fight, and quit themselves like men in the warfare to which they are +as if conscript and consecrated, and which lies ahead. Tell them to +consult the eternal oracles (not yet inaudible, nor ever to become so, +when worthily inquired of); and to disregard, nearly altogether, in +comparison, the temporary noises, menacings, and deliriums. May they +love wisdom, as wisdom, if she is to yield her treasures, must be +loved, piously, valiantly, humbly, beyond life itself, or the prizes +of life, with all one's heart and all one's soul. In that case (I will +say again), and not in any other case, it shall be well with them. + +"Adieu, my young friends, a long adieu, yours with great sincerity, + + "T. CARLYLE" + + + + +BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE. + + +At a meeting of the Senatus Academicus of Edinburgh University, a few +weeks after his decease, a deed of mortification by Thomas Carlyle +in favour of that body, for the foundation of ten Bursaries in the +Faculty of Arts, was read. The document opens as follows:-- + +"I, Thomas Carlyle, residing at Chelsea, presently Rector in the +University of Edinburgh, from the love, favour and affection which I +bear to that University, and from my interest in the advancement of +education in my native Scotland, as elsewhere, for these and for other +more peculiar reasons, which also I wish to record, do intend, and +am now in the act of making to the said University, a bequest, +as underwritten, of the estate of Craigenputtoch, which is now my +property. Craigenputtoch lies at the head of the parish of Dunscore, +in Nithsdale, Dumfriesshire. The extent is of about 1,800 acres; +rental at present, on lease of nineteen years, is £250; the annual +worth, with the improvements now in progress, is probably £300. +Craigenputtoch was for many generations the patrimony of a family +named Welsh, the eldest son usually a 'John Welsh,' in series going +back, think some, to the famous John Welsh, son-in-law of the reformer +Knox. The last male heir of the family was John Welsh, Esq., surgeon, +Haddington. His one child and heiress was my late dear, magnanimous, +much-loving, and, to me, inestimable wife, in memory of whom, and +of her constant nobleness and piety towards him and towards me, I am +now--she having been the last of her kindred--about to bequeath to +Edinburgh University with whatever piety is in me this Craigenputtoch, +which was theirs and hers, on the terms, and for the purposes, and +under the conditions underwritten. Therefore I do mortify and +dispose to and in favour of the said University of Edinburgh, for +the foundation and endowment of ten equal Bursaries, to be called +the 'John Welsh Bursaries,' in the said University, heritably and +irredeemably, all and whole the lands of Upper Craigenputtoch. The +said estate is not to be sold, but to be kept and administered as +land, the net annual revenue of it to be divided into ten equal +Bursaries, to be called, as aforesaid, the 'John Welsh Bursaries.' The +Senatus Academicus shall bestow them on the ten applicants entering +the University who, on strict and thorough examination and open +competitive trial by examiners whom the Senatus will appoint for that +end, are judged to show the best attainment of actual proficiency and +the best likelihood of more in the department or faculty called of +arts, as taught there. Examiners to be actual professors in said +faculty, the fittest whom the Senatus can select, with fit assessors +or coadjutors and witnesses, if the Senatus see good, and always the +report of the said examiners to be minuted and signed, and to govern +the appointments made, and to be recorded therewith. More specially I +appoint that five of the 'John Welsh Bursaries' shall be given for the +best proficiency in mathematics--I would rather say 'in mathesis,' if +that were a thing to be judged of from competition--but practically +above all in pure geometry, such being perennial, the symptom not +only of steady application, but of a clear, methodic intellect, +and offering in all epochs good promise for all manner of arts and +pursuits. The other five Bursaries I appoint to depend (for the +present and indefinitely onwards) on proficiency in classical +learning, that is to say, in knowledge of Latin, Greek, and English, +all of these, or any two of them. This also gives good promise of a +young mind, but as I do not feel certain that it gives perennially or +will perennially be thought in universities to give the best promise, +I am willing that the Senatus of the University, in case of a change +of its opinion on this point hereafter in the course of generations, +shall bestow these latter five Bursaries on what it does then consider +the most excellent proficiency in matters classical, or the best proof +of a classical mind, which directs its own highest effort towards +teaching and diffusing in the new generations that will come. The +Bursaries to be open to free competition of all who come to study in +Edinburgh University, and who have never been of any other University, +the competition to be held on or directly before or after their first +matriculation there. Bursaries to be always given on solemnly strict +and faithful trial to the worthiest, or if (what in justice can never +happen, though it illustrates my intention) the claims of two +were absolutely equal, and could not be settled by further trial, +preference is to fall in favour of the more unrecommended and +unfriended under penalties graver than I, or any highest mortal, can +pretend to impose, but which I can never doubt--as the law of eternal +justice, inexorably valid, whether noticed or unnoticed, pervades all +corners of space and of time--are very sure to be punctually exacted +if incurred. This is to be the perpetual rule for the Senatus in +deciding." + +After stating some other conditions, the document thus concludes: + +"And so may a little trace of help to the young heroic soul struggling +for what is highest spring from this poor arrangement and bequest. +May it run for ever, if it can, as a thread of pure water from the +Scottish rocks, trickling into its little basin by the thirsty wayside +for those to whom it veritably belongs. Amen. Such is my bequest to +Edinburgh University. In witness whereof these presents, written upon +this and the two preceding pages by James Steven Burns, clerk to John +Cook, writer to the signet, are subscribed by me at Chelsea, the +20th day of June, 1867, before these witnesses: John Forster, +barrister-at-law, man of letters, etc., residing at Palace-gate House, +Kensington, London; and James Anthony Froude, man of letters, residing +at No. 5, Onslow Gardens, Brompton, London. + + "_(Signed)_ T. CARLYLE. + + "JOHN FORSTER,} + "J.A. FROUDE, } _Witnesses_. + +[Illustration] + + + + +INDEX. + + + Abelard, 134. + Aitken, Mary, 117. + Allingham, Mrs., her sketch of Carlyle, 121. + Annan, Academy, 9. + Anspach's _History_ of Newfoundland, 13. + Arnold, Thomas, visits the field of Naseby with Carlyle, 63, 64. + + Baillie, Joanna, her Metrical Legends, 13. + Bentley, Richard, the last of English scholars, 162. + Black, Adam, 191. + Boehm, Mr., his medallion and statue of Carlyle, 116, 120, 121. + Braidwood Testimonial, 85, 86. + Brewster, Sir David, his Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, 10, 11; + writes a Preface to Carlyle's Translation of Legendre, 13; + presides at Carlyle's installation as Rector of Edinburgh + University, 90, 93, 96. + Buchanan, George, 47. + Buller, Charles, Carlyle becomes tutor to, 15; + his death, 74; + Carlyle's tribute to, 75-80. + Burns, Robert, 67. + + Cameron, Mrs., her photograph of Carlyle, 120. + Carlyle, Jane Welsh, Goethe's verses to, 20; + described by Margaret Fuller, 68, 69; + death of, 109; + funeral, 110; + inscription on her tombstone, 111. + Carlyle, Thomas, birth and parentage, 8; + early studies, 9; + school-mastering, 9-10; + first attempts in literature, 10-14; + Buller tutorship, 15; + German translations, 15-17; + his marriage, 17; + life at Craigenputtoch, 17-18; + removes to London, 25; + his affection for Leigh Hunt, 26; + letter to Major Richardson, 40; + his Lectures, 45; + advice to a young man, 54; + defence of Mazzini, 59; + visit to Rugby, 63; + his letter to Sir William Napier, 81; + the Edinburgh Rectorship and Address, 87-109; + death of his wife, 109; + on the Jamaica insurrection, 112; + latest writings, 115; + medal and address, 116; + closing years of life, 117; + his _Reminiscences_, 118; + portraits of, 119. + Carlyle, John A., his Translation of Dante, 98; + death of, 117. + Chelsea, old memories of, 25; + Carlyle fixes his residence there, 25, 26. + Collins's Peerage, 152. + Craigenputtoch, 17; + description of by Carlyle, in a letter to Goethe, 18. + Cromwell, Oliver, Letters and Speeches, 68; + his Protectorate, 145 + Cunningham, Allan, on old age, 44: + + Demosthenes, 166. + De Quincey, Thomas, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16 + D'Orsay, Count, his Portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Dumfries, 18. + + Emerson, Ralph Waldo, his visit to Carlyle at Craigenputtoch, 21; + his Essays introduced to the English public by Carlyle, 52; + Margaret Fuller's letter to him, 64. + Eyre, Edward John, Carlyle's defence of, 112. + + Ferguson's Roman History, 140. + Fichte, 37. + Forster, John, 200. + Fraser's Magazine, 20, 22, 115, 119. + Frederick the Great, History of, 81, 87. + French Revolution, History of the, 38. + Froude, James Anthony, 118, 200. + Fuller, Margaret, her Letter to Emerson describing Carlyle's + conversation, 65-73. + + German Romance, 16. + Gibbon, 23. + Goethe, his _Faust_, 13; + his _Wilhelm Meister_ translated by Carlyle, 15; + Carlyle's letters to him, 18; + writes an Introduction to the German translation of Carlyle's Life + of Schiller, 20; + his verses to Mrs. Carlyle, _ib_.; + Wilhelm Meister's Travels, 170-171; + Verses by him, quoted, 186, 187. + Grant, James, quoted, 46, 48-52. + + Hannay, James, on Carlyle, 47. + Heyne, his Tibullus and Virgil, 162-163. + Hoffmann, Carlyle's translation from, 16. + Horne, R.H., quoted, 27, 28. + Houghton, Lord, breakfast party at his house, 38. + Hunt, Leigh, invited by Carlyle to visit him in Dumfriesshire. 26; + settles at Chelsea, _ib_.; + characteristic anecdote, 27; + leaves Chelsea, 28; + Carlyle's eulogium on, 29; + Carlyle's opinion + of his Autobiography, 33; + quoted, 35, 46. + + Ireland, Carlyle's papers on, 74. + Irving, Edward, 10, 40. + + Jeffrey, Lord, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16; + Carlyle's Reminiscences of, 119. + Johnson, Samuel, advice as to reading, 55. + + Kirkcaldy, 10. + Knox, John, an ancestor of Carlyle's wife, 17, 196; + grim humour of, 47; + the portraits of, 115; + belongs to the select of the earth, 142-143; + his History of the Reformation, 184-185. + + Lally, at Pondicherry, 84. + La Motte Fouqué, Carlyle's Translations from, 16. + Landor, Walter Savage, 23, 38. + Latter-Day Pamphlets, 80. + Laurence, Samuel, his portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Legendre's Geometry, translated by Carlyle, 13, 14. + Leslie, Sir John, 9. + Lewes, George Henry, 66. + London Magazine, The, 15, 16. + Louis Philippe, 74. + + Machiavelli on Democracy, 107, 146. + Maclise, Daniel, 119. + Mazzini, his articles on Carlyle, 58; + Carlyle's defence of his character, 59; + remonstrates vainly with Carlyle, 69. + Milnes, R. M., see _Houghton_, Lord. + Mirabeau, 23. + Moore, Thomas, meets Carlyle at a breakfast party, 38. + Musæus, Carlyle's translations from, 17. + + Napier, Sir William, his History of the Administration of Scinde 81; + Carlyle's letter to him, 81-85. + Necker, Carlyle's biography of him, quoted, 11. + Nero, death of, 22. + Newfoundland, Carlyle's account of, quoted, 12. + + Ossoli, see _Fuller_. + + _Past and Present_, 53; + quoted, 187-188. + _Paul et Virginie_, 44. + Petrarch and _Laura_, 67. + Phocion, 167. + + Quincey, see _De Quincey_. + + Richardson, David Lester, his _Literary Leaves_, 40; + Carlyle's letter to him, 40-44. + Richter, Jean Paul, 17. + Robinson, Henry Crabb, 38, 39. + Rous, Sir Francis, 148. + Rousseau, at St. Pierre, 19; + his Confessions, 23. + Ruskin, John, his praise of Boehm's statue of Carlyle, 116, 121. + Rugby School, 63, 64. + + _Sartor Resartus_, 36, 37. + Schiller, Friedrich, Carlyle's life of him, 15; + Supplement to, 115. + Shakespeare, 67. + Smith, Alexander, his account of the delivery of Carlyle's Address at + Edinburgh, 87-92. + Socrates, disparaged by Carlyle, 23. + Sophocles, the tragedies of, 141. + Sterling, John, 37, 38; + death of, 62; + Carlyle's life of him, 81. + Stirling, Dr., Carlyle's letter to, 189-191. + + Tennyson, why he wrote in verse, 67. + Teufelsdröckh, 36, 68. + Thackeray, W.M., his verses on the death of Charles Buller, 15, 74-75. + Tieck, 17. + Turveydrop senior, on Polished Deportment, 49. + + University of Edinburgh, 125. + + Watts, G.F., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + Welsh family, 17. + Whistler, J.A., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + + Youth, the golden season of life, 130. + + Zoilus, 19. + +THE END. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's On the Choice of Books, by Thomas Carlyle + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS *** + +***** This file should be named 13435-8.txt or 13435-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/3/4/3/13435/ + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, S.R.Ellison and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: On the Choice of Books + +Author: Thomas Carlyle + +Release Date: September 11, 2004 [EBook #13435] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, S.R.Ellison and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + + ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS + + THOMAS CARLYLE + + _WITH A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR_ + +[Illustration: _No_. 5 _Great Cheyne Row. + +The Residence of Mr. Carlyle from_ 1834 _until his Death_] + + _A NEW EDITION_ + + CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY + +[Illustration] + + + + CONTENTS. PAGE + BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION 7 + + ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY, APRIL 2, 1866 125 + + THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH + UNIVERSITY 189 + + FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS 192 + + BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE 195 + + INDEX 201 + +[Illustration] + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION. + +There comes a time in the career of every man of genius who has +devoted a long life to the instruction and enlightenment of his +fellow-creatures, when he receives before his death all the honours +paid by posterity. Thus when a great essayist or historian lives to +attain a classic and world-wide fame, his own biography becomes as +interesting to the public as those he himself has written, and by +which he achieved his laurels. + +This is almost always the case when a man of such cosmopolitan +celebrity outlives the ordinary allotted period of threescore years +and ten; for a younger generation has then sprung up, who only hear +of his great fame, and are ignorant of the long and painful steps +by which it was achieved. These remarks are peculiarly applicable +in regard to the man whose career we are now to dwell on for a short +time: his genius was of slow growth and development, and his fame was +even more tardy in coming; but since the world some forty years ago +fairly recognised him as a great and original thinker and teacher, +few men have left so indelible an impress on the public mind, or +have influenced to so great a degree the most thoughtful of their +contemporaries. + +Thomas Carlyle was born on Tuesday, December 4th, 1795, at +Ecclefechan, a small village in the district of Annandale, +Dumfriesshire. His father, a stone-mason, was noted for quickness of +mental perception, and great energy and decision of character; +his mother, as affectionate, pious, and more than ordinarily +intelligent;[A] and thus accepting his own theory, that "the history +of a man's childhood is the description of his parents' environment," +Carlyle entered upon the "mystery of life" under happy and enviable +circumstances. After preliminary instruction, first at the parish +school, and afterwards at Annan, he went, in November, 1809, and when +he was fourteen years old, to the University of Edinburgh. Here +he remained till the summer of 1814, distinguishing himself by his +devotion to mathematical studies then taught there by Professor +Leslie. As a student, he was irregular in his application, but when he +did set to work, it was with his whole energy. He appears to have been +a great reader of general literature at this time, and the stories +that are told of the books that he got through are scarcely to be +credited. In the summer of 1814, on the resignation of Mr. Waugh, +Carlyle obtained, by competitive examination at Dumfries, the post of +mathematical master at Annan Academy. Although he had, at his parents' +desire, commenced his studies with a view to entering the Scottish +Church, the idea of becoming a minister was growingly distasteful to +him. A fellow-student describes his habits at this time as lonely and +contemplative; and we know from another source that his vacations +were principally spent among the hills and by the rivers of his +native county. In the summer of 1816 he was promoted to the post of +"classical and mathematical master" at the old Burgh or Grammar School +at Kirkcaldy. At the new school in that town Edward Irving, whose +acquaintance Carlyle first made at Edinburgh, about Christmas, 1815, +had been established since the year 1812; they were thus brought +closely together, and their intimacy soon ripened into a friendship +destined to become famous. At Kirkcaldy Carlyle remained over two +years, becoming more and more convinced that neither as minister nor +as schoolmaster was he to successfully fight his way up in the world. +It had become clear to him that literature was his true vocation, +and he would have started in the profession at once, had it been +convenient for him to do so. + +[Footnote A: James Carlyle was born in August, 1758, and died January +23, 1832. His second wife (whose maiden name was Margaret Aitken), was +born in September, 1771, and died on Christmas Day, 1853. There +were nine children of this marriage, "whereof four sons and three +daughters," says the inscription en the tombstone in the burial-ground +at Ecclefechan, "survived, gratefully reverent of such a father and +such a mother."] + +He had already written several articles and essays, and a few of them +had appeared in print; but they gave little promise or indication of +the power he was afterwards to exhibit. During the years 1820--1823, +he contributed a series of articles (biographical and topographical) +to Brewster's "Edinburgh Encyclopaedia,"[1] viz.:-- + +[Footnote 1: Vols. XIV. to XVI. The fourteenth volume bears at the end +the imprint, "Edinburgh, printed by Balfour and Clarke, 1820;" and the +sixteenth volume, "Printed by A. Balfour and Co., Edinburgh, 1823." +Most of these articles are distinguished by the initials "T.C."; but +they are all attributed to Carlyle in the List of the Authors of the +Principal Articles, prefixed to the work on its completion.] + + 1. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu + 2. Montaigne + 3. Montesquieu + 4. Montfaucon + 5. Dr. Moore + 6. Sir John Moore + 7. Necker + 8. Nelson + 9. Netherlands + 10. Newfoundland + 11. Norfolk + 12. Northamptonshire + 13. Northumberland + 14. Mungo Park + 15. Lord Chatham + 16. William Pitt. + +The following is from the article on _Necker_:-- + +"As an author, Necker displays much irregular force of imagination, +united with considerable perspicuity and compass of thought; though +his speculations are deformed by an undue attachment to certain +leading ideas, which, harmonizing with his habits of mind, had +acquired an excessive preponderance in the course of his long and +uncontroverted meditations. He possessed extensive knowledge, and +his works bespeak a philosophical spirit; but their great and +characteristic excellence proceeds from that glow of fresh and +youthful admiration for everything that is amiable or august in the +character of man, which, in Necker's heart, survived all the blighting +vicissitudes it had passed through, _combining, in a singular union, +the fervour of the stripling with the experience of the sage_."[A] + +[Footnote A: "In the earliest authorship of Mr. Carlyle," says Mr. +James Russell Lowell, alluding to these papers, "we find some not +obscure hints of the future man. The outward fashion of them is that +of the period; but they are distinguished by a certain security of +judgment, remarkable at any time, remarkable especially in one so +young. Carlyle, in these first essays, already shows the influence of +his master Goethe, the most widely receptive of critics. In a +compact notice of Montaigne there is not a word as to his religious +scepticism. The character is looked at purely from its human and +literary sides."] + +Here is a passage from the article on _Newfoundland_, interesting as +containing perhaps the earliest germ of the later style:-- + +"The ships intended for the fishery on the southeast coast, arrive +early in June. Each takes her station opposite any unoccupied part of +the beach where the fish may be most conveniently cured, and retains +it till the end of the season. Formerly the master who arrived first +on any station was constituted _fishing-admiral_, and had by law the +power of settling disputes among the other crews. But the jurisdiction +of those _admirals_ is now happily superseded by the regular +functionaries who reside on shore. Each captain directs his whole +attention to the collection of his own cargo, without minding the +concerns of his neighbour. Having taken down what part of the rigging +is removable, they set about their laborious calling, and must pursue +it zealously. Their mode of proceeding is thus described by Mr. +Anspach, _a clerical person, who lived in the island several years, +and has since written a meagre and very confused book, which he calls +a_ HISTORY _of it_." + +To the "New Edinburgh Review" (1821-22) Carlyle also contributed +two papers--one on Joanna Baillie's "Metrical Legends," and one on +Goethe's "Faust." + +In the year 1822 he made a translation of "Legendre's Geometry," to +which he prefixed an Essay on Proportion; and the book appeared a +year or two afterwards under the auspices of the late Sir David +Brewster.[A] The Essay on Proportion remains to this day the most +lucid and succinct exposition of the subject hitherto published. + +[Footnote A: "Elements of Geometry and Trigonometry," with Notes. +Translated from the French of A.M. Legendre. Edited by David Brewster, +LL.D. With Notes and Additions, and an Introductory Chapter on +Proportion. Edinburgh: published by Oliver and Boyd; and G. and W.B. +Whittaker, London. 1824, pp. xvi., 367. Sir David Brewster's +Preface, in which he speaks of "an Introduction on Proportion, by the +Translator," is dated _Edinburgh, August_ 1, 1822.] + +"I was already," says Carlyle in his _Reminiscences_, "getting my head +a little up, translating 'Legendre's Geometry' for Brewster. I still +remember a happy forenoon in which I did a _Fifth Book_ (or complete +'doctrine of proportion') for that work, complete really and lucid, +and yet one of the briefest ever known. It was begun and done that +forenoon, and I have (except correcting the press next week) never +seen it since; but still I feel as if it were right enough and +felicitous in its kind! I only got L50 for my entire trouble in that +'Legendre;' but it was an honest job of work, honestly done."[A] + +[Footnote A: _Reminiscences by Thomas Carlyle_, Edited by James +Anthony Froude. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1881, Vol. 1., pp. +198-199.] + +The late Professor de Morgan--an excellent authority--pronounced a +high eulogium upon this Essay on Proportion. + +In 1822 Carlyle accepted the post of tutor to Charles Buller, of whose +early death and honourable promise, two touching records remain to us, +one in verse by Thackeray, and one in prose by Carlyle. + +For the next four years Carlyle devoted his attention almost +exclusively to German literature. + +His Life of Schiller first appeared under the title of "Schiller's +Life and Writings," in the London Magazine. + + Part I.--October, 1823. + Part II.--January, 1824. + Part III.--July, 1824. + " August, 1824. + " September, 1824. + +It was enlarged, and separately published by Messrs. Taylor and +Hessey, the proprietors of the Magazine, in 1825. + +The translation of "Wilhelm Meister," in 1824,[A] was the first real +introduction of Goethe to the reading world of Great Britain. It +appeared without the name of the translator, but its merits were too +palpable to be overlooked, though some critics objected to the strong +infusion of German phraseology which had been imported into the +English version. This acquired idiom never left our author, even in +his original works, although the "Life of Schiller," written but a few +months before, is almost entirely free from the peculiarity. "Wilhelm +Meister," in its English dress, was better received by the English +reading public than by English critics. De Quincey, in one of his +dyspeptic fits, fell upon the book, its author, and the translator,[B] +and Lord Jeffrey, in the Edinburgh Review, although admitting Carlyle +to be a talented person, heaped condemnation upon the work. + +[Footnote A: Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship. 3 Vols., Edinburgh, +1824.] + +[Footnote B: Curiously enough in the very numbers of the "London +Magazine" containing the later instalments of Carlyle's Life of +Schiller.] + +Carlyle's next work was a series of translations, entitled "German +Romance: Specimens of the chief Authors; with Biographical and +Critical Notices." 4 vols. Edinburgh, 1827. The Preface and +Introductions are reprinted in the second volume of Carlyle's +Collected Works: the Specimens translated from Hoffmann and La Motte +Fouque, have not been reprinted. + +"This," says Carlyle, in 1857, "was a Book of Translations, not of my +suggesting or desiring, but of my executing as honest journey-work in +defect of better. The pieces selected were the suitablest discoverable +on such terms: not quite of _less_ than no worth (I considered) any +piece of them; nor, alas, of a very high worth any, except one only. +Four of these lots, or quotas to the adventure, Musaeus's, Tieck's, +Richter's, Goethe's, will be given in the final stage of this Series; +the rest we willingly leave, afloat or stranded, as waste driftwood, +to those whom they may farther concern." + +It was in 1826 that Mr. Carlyle married Miss Jane Welsh, the only +child of Dr. John Welsh, of Haddington,[A] a lineal descendant of John +Knox, and a lady fitted in every way to be the wife of such a man. For +some time after marriage he continued to reside at Edinburgh, but +in May, 1828, he took up his residence in his native county, at +Craigenputtoch--a solitary farmhouse on a small estate belonging to +his wife's mother, about fifteen miles from Dumfries, and in one of +the most secluded parts of the country. Most of his letters to Goethe +were written from this place. + +[Footnote A: Her father had been dead some seven years when Carlyle +and she were married, and the life interest of her inheritance in the +farm of Craigenputtoch had been made over to her mother, who survived +until 1842, when it reverted to Carlyle.] + +In one of the letters sent from Craigenputtoch to Weimar, bearing +the date of 25th September, 1828, we have a charming picture of our +author's seclusion and retired literary life at this period:-- + +"You inquire with such warm interest respecting our present abode and +occupations, that I feel bound to say a few words about both, while +there is still room left. Dumfries is a pleasant town, containing +about fifteen thousand inhabitants, and may be considered the centre +of the trade and judicial system of a district which possesses some +importance in the sphere of Scottish industry. Our residence is not +in the town itself, but fifteen miles to the north-west, among the +granite hills and the black morasses which stretch westward through +Galloway, almost to the Irish Sea. In this wilderness of heath and +rock, our estate stands forth a green oasis, a tract of ploughed, +partly enclosed, and planted ground, where corn ripens, and trees +afford a shade, although surrounded by sea-mews and rough-woolled +sheep. Here, with no small effort, have we built and furnished a neat, +substantial dwelling; here, in the absence of professorial or other +office, we live to cultivate literature according to our strength, +and in our own peculiar way. We wish a joyful growth to the rose and +flowers of our garden; we hope for health and peaceful thoughts to +further our aims. The roses, indeed, are still in part to be planted, +but they blossom already in anticipation. Two ponies, which carry +us everywhere, and the mountain air, are the best medicines for weak +nerves. This daily exercise--to which I am much devoted--is my only +recreation: for this nook of ours is the loneliest in Britain--six +miles removed from any one likely to visit me. Here Rousseau would +have been as happy as on his island of St. Pierre. My town friends, +indeed, ascribe my sojourn here to a similar disposition, and forbode +me no good result. But I came hither solely with the design to +simplify my way of life, and to secure the independence through which +I could be enabled to remain true to myself. This bit of earth is our +own; here we can live, write, and think, as best pleases ourselves, +even though Zoilus himself were to be crowned the monarch of +literature. Nor is the solitude of such great importance; for a +stage-coach takes us speedily to Edinburgh, which we look upon as our +British Weimar. And have I not, too, at this moment piled up upon +the table of my little library a whole cart-load of French, German, +American, and English journals and periodicals--whatever may be their +worth? Of antiquarian studies, too, there is no lack. From some of +our heights I can descry, about a day's journey to the west, the hill +where Agricola and his Romans left a camp behind them. At the foot of +it I was born, and there both father and mother still live to love me. +And so one must let time work." + +The above letter was printed by Goethe himself, in his Preface to +a German transition of Carlyle's "Life of Schiller," published at +Frankfort in 1830. Other pleasant records of the intercourse between +them exist in the shape of sundry graceful copies of verses addressed +by Goethe to Mrs. Carlyle, which will be found in the collection of +his poems. + +Carlyle had now fairly started as an original writer. From the lonely +farm of Craigenputtoch went forth the brilliant series of Essays +contributed to the Edinburgh, Westminster, and Foreign Reviews, and to +Fraser's Magazine, which were not long in gaining for him a literary +reputation in both hemispheres. To this lonely farm came one day in +August, 1833, armed with a letter of introduction, a visitor from the +other side of the Atlantic: a young American, then unknown to fame, by +name Ralph Waldo Emerson. The meeting of these two remarkable men was +thus described by the younger of them, many years afterwards:-- + +"I came from Glasgow to Dumfries, and being intent on delivering a +letter which I had brought from Rome, inquired for Craigenputtoch. +It was a farm in Nithsdale, in the parish of Dunscore, sixteen miles +distant. No public coach passed near it, so I took a private carriage +from the inn. I found the house amid desolate heathery hills, where +the lonely scholar nourished his mighty heart. Carlyle was a man from +his youth, an author who did not need to hide from his readers, and as +absolute a man of the world, unknown and exiled on that hill-farm, as +if holding on his own terms what is best in London. He was tall +and gaunt, with a cliff-like brow, self-possessed, and holding his +extraordinary powers of conversation in easy command; clinging to his +northern accent with evident relish; full of lively anecdote, and with +a streaming humour, which floated everything he looked upon. His talk +playfully exalting the familiar objects, put the companion at once +into an acquaintance with his Lars and Lemurs, and it was very +pleasant to learn what was predestined to be a pretty mythology. Few +were the objects and lonely the man, 'not a person to speak to +within sixteen miles except the minister of Dunscore; so that books +inevitably made his topics. + +"He had names of his own for all the matters familiar to his +discourse. 'Blackwood's' was the 'sand magazine;' 'Fraser's' nearer +approach to possibility of life was the 'mud magazine;' a piece of +road near by that marked some failed enterprise was 'the grave of the +last sixpence.' When too much praise of any genius annoyed him, he +professed hugely to admire the talent shewn by his pig. He had spent +much time and contrivance in confining the poor beast to one enclosure +in his pen, but pig, by great strokes of judgment, had found out +how to let a board down, and had foiled him. For all that, he still +thought man the most plastic little fellow in the planet, and he liked +Nero's death, 'Qualis artifex pereo!' better than most history. He +worships a man that will manifest any truth to him. At one time he had +inquired and read a good deal about America. Landor's principle was +mere rebellion, and that he feared was the American principle. The +best thing he knew of that country was, that in it a man can have meat +for his labour. He had read in Stewart's book, that when he inquired +in a New York hotel for the Boots, he had been shown across the +street, and had found Mungo in his own house dining on roast turkey. + +"We talked of books. Plato he does not read, and he disparaged +Socrates; and, when pressed, persisted in making Mirabeau a hero. +Gibbon he called the splendid bridge from the old world to the new. +His own reading had been multifarious. Tristram Shandy was one of his +first books after Robinson Crusoe, and Robertson's America an early +favourite. Rousseau's Confessions had discovered to him that he was +not a dunce; and it was now ten years since he had learned German, by +the advice of a man who told him he would find in that language what +he wanted. + +"He took despairing or satirical views of literature at this +moment; recounted the incredible sums paid in one year by the great +booksellers for puffing. Hence it comes that no newspaper is trusted +now, no books are bought, and the booksellers are on the eve of +bankruptcy. + +"He still returned to English pauperism, the crowded country, the +selfish abdication by public men of all that public persons should +perform. 'Government should direct poor men what to do. Poor Irish +folk come wandering over these moors. My dame makes it a rule to give +to every son of Adam bread to eat, and supplies his wants to the next +house. But here are thousands of acres which might give them all meat, +and nobody to bid these poor Irish go to the moor and till it. They +burned the stacks, and so found a way to force the rich people to +attend to them.' + +"We went out to walk over long hills, and looked at Criffel, then +without his cap, and down into Wordsworth's country. There we sat +down, and talked of the immortality of the soul. It was not +Carlyle's fault that we talked on that topic, for he had the natural +disinclination of every nimble spirit to bruise itself against walls, +and did not like to place himself where no step can be taken. But he +was honest and true, and cognizant of the subtile links that bind ages +together, and saw how every event affects all the future. 'Christ died +on the tree: that built Dunscore kirk yonder: that brought you and me +together. Time has only a relative existence.' + +"He was already turning his eyes towards London with a scholar's +appreciation. London is the heart of the world, he said, wonderful +only from the mass of human beings. He liked the huge machine. Each +keeps its own round. The baker's boy brings muffins to the window at a +fixed hour every day, and that is all the Londoner knows, or wishes +to know, on the subject. But it turned out good men. He named certain +individuals, especially one man of letters, his friend, the best mind +he knew, whom London had well served."[A] + +[Footnote A: "English Traits," by R.W. Emerson. First Visit to +England.] + +"Carlyle," says Emerson, "was already turning his eyes towards +London," and a few months after the interview just described he did +finally fix his residence there, in a quiet street in Chelsea, leading +down to the river-side. Here, in an old-fashioned house, built in the +reign of Queen Anne, he and his wife settled down in the early summer +of 1834; here they continued to live together until she died; and here +Carlyle afterwards lived on alone till the end of his life. + +With another man, of whom he now became the neighbour--Leigh Hunt--he +had already formed a slight acquaintance, which soon ripened into +a warm friendship and affection on both sides, in spite of their +singular difference of temperament and character. + +"It was on the 8th of February, 1832," says Mr. Thornton Hunt, "that +the writer of the essays named 'Characteristics' received, apparently +from Mr. Leigh Hunt, a volume entitled 'Christianism,' for which he +begged to express his thanks. By the 20th of February, Carlyle, then +lodging in London, was inviting Leigh Hunt to tea, as the means of +their first meeting; and by the 20th of November, Carlyle wrote from +Dumfries, urging Leigh Hunt to 'come hither and see us when you want +to rusticate a month. Is that for ever impossible?' The philosopher +afterwards came to live in the next street to his correspondent, in +Chelsea, and proved to be one of Leigh Hunt's kindest, most faithful, +and most considerate friends."[A] + +[Footnote A: From "The Correspondence of Leigh Hunt," edited by his +eldest son. London: Smith, Elder and Co. 1862. Vol. 1., p. 321.] + +Mr. Horne tells a story very characteristic of both men. Soon after +the publication of "Heroes and Hero Worship," they were at a small +party, when a conversation was started between these two concerning +the heroism of man. "Leigh Hunt had said something about the islands +of the blest, or El Dorado, or the Millennium, and was flowing on his +bright and hopeful way, when Carlyle dropped some heavy tree-trunk +across Hunt's pleasant stream, and banked it up with philosophical +doubts and objections at every interval of the speaker's joyous +progress. But the unmitigated Hunt never ceased his overflowing +anticipations, nor the saturnine Carlyle his infinite demurs to those +finite flourishings. The listeners laughed and applauded by turns; and +had now fairly pitted them against each other, as the philosopher of +hopefulness and of the unhopeful. The contest continued with all that +ready wit and philosophy, that mixture of pleasantry and profundity, +that extensive knowledge of books and character, with their ready +application in argument or illustration, and that perfect ease and +good nature which distinguish both of these men. The opponents were so +well matched that it was quite clear the contest would never come to +an end. But the night was far advanced, and the party broke up. They +all sallied forth, and leaving the close room, the candles and the +arguments behind them, suddenly found themselves in presence of a most +brilliant starlight night. They all looked up. 'Now,' thought Hunt, +'Carlyle's done for! he can have no answer to that!' 'There,' shouted +Hunt, 'look up there, look at that glorious harmony, that sings with +infinite voices an eternal song of Hope in the soul of man.' Carlyle +looked up. They all remained silent to hear what he would say. They +began to think he was silenced at last--he was a mortal man. But out +of that silence came a few low-toned words, in a broad Scotch accent. +And who on earth could have anticipated what the voice said? 'Eh! it's +a sad sight!' Hunt sat down on a stone step. They all laughed--then +looked very thoughtful. Had the finite measured itself with infinity, +instead of surrendering itself up to the influence? Again they +laughed--then bade each other good night, and betook themselves +homeward with slow and serious pace."[A] + +[Footnote A: "A New Spirit of the Age," by R.H. Home. London, 1844. +Vol. . p. 278.] + +In 1840 Leigh Hunt left Chelsea, and went to live at Kensington, but +Carlyle never altogether lost sight of him, and on several occasions +was able to do him very serviceable acts of kindness; as, for +instance, in writing certain Memoranda concerning him with the view of +procuring from Government a small provision for Leigh Hunt's declining +years, which we may as well give in this place:-- + + MEMORANDA + + CONCERNING MR. LEIGH HUNT. + +"1. That Mr. Hunt is a man of the most indisputedly superior worth; +a _Man of Genius_ in a very strict sense of that word, and in all +the senses which it bears or implies; of brilliant varied gifts, +of graceful fertility, of clearness, lovingness, truthfulness; of +childlike open character; also of most pure and even exemplary private +deportment; a man who can be other than _loved_ only by those who have +not seen him, or seen him from a distance through a false medium. + +"2. That, well seen into, he _has_ done much for the world;--as every +man possessed of such qualities, and freely speaking them forth in +the abundance of his heart for thirty years long, must needs do: _how_ +much, they that could judge best would perhaps estimate highest. + +"3. That, for one thing, his services in the cause of reform, as +Founder and long as Editor of the 'Examiner' newspaper; as Poet, +Essayist, Public Teacher in all ways open to him, are great and +evident: few now living in this kingdom, perhaps, could boast of +greater. + +"4. That his sufferings in that same cause have also been great; legal +prosecution and penalty (not dishonourable to him; nay, honourable, +were the whole truth known, as it will one day be): unlegal obloquy +and calumny through the Tory Press;--perhaps a greater quantity of +baseless, persevering, implacable calumny, than any other living +writer has undergone. Which long course of hostility (nearly the +cruellest conceivable, had it not been carried on in half, or almost +total misconception) may be regarded as the beginning of his other +worst distresses, and a main cause of them, down to this day. + +"5. That he is heavily laden with domestic burdens, more heavily than +most men, and his economical resources are gone from him. For the last +twelve years he has toiled continually, with passionate diligence, +with the cheerfullest spirit; refusing no task; yet hardly able with +all this to provide for the day that was passing over him; and now, +after some two years of incessant effort in a new enterprise ('The +London Journal') that seemed of good promise, it also has suddenly +broken down, and he remains in ill health, age creeping on him, +without employment, means, or outlook, in a situation of the +painfullest sort. Neither do his distresses, nor did they at any time, +arise from wastefulness, or the like, on his own part (he is a man of +humble wishes, and can live with dignity on little); but from +crosses of what is called Fortune, from injustice of other men, from +inexperience of his own, and a guileless trustfulness of nature, the +thing and things that have made him unsuccessful make him in reality +_more_ loveable, and plead for him in the minds of the candid. + +"6. That such a man is rare in a Nation, and of high value there; not +to be _procured_ for a whole Nation's revenue, or recovered when taken +from us, and some L200 a year is the price which this one, whom we +now have, is valued at: with that sum he were lifted above his +perplexities, perhaps saved from nameless wretchedness! It is believed +that, in hardly any other way could L200 abolish as much suffering, +create as much benefit, to one man, and through him to many and all. + +"Were these things set fitly before an English Minister, in whom great +part of England recognises (with surprise at such a novelty) a man of +insight, fidelity and decision, is it not probable or possible that +he, though from a quite opposite point of view, might see them in +somewhat of a similar light; and, so seeing, determine to do in +consequence? _Ut fiat_! + + "T.C." + +"Some years later," says a writer in "Macmillan's Magazine,"[A] "in +the 'mellow evening' of a life that had been so stormy, Mr. Leigh +Hunt himself told the story of his struggles, his victories, and +his defeats, with so singularly graceful a frankness, that the most +supercilious of critics could not but acknowledge that here was +an autobiographer whom it was possible to like. Here is Carlyle's +estimate of Leigh Hunt's Autobiography:-- + +[Footnote A: July, 1862.] + + "Chelsea, June 17, 1850. + +"DEAR HUNT, + +"I have just finished your Autobiography, which has been most +pleasantly occupying all my leisure these three days; and you must +permit me to write you a word upon it, out of the fulness of the +heart, while the impulse is still fresh to thank you. This good +book, in every sense one of the best I have read this long while, has +awakened many old thoughts which never were extinct, or even properly +asleep, but which (like so much else) have had to fall silent amid the +tempests of an evil time--Heaven mend it! A word from me once more, I +know, will not be unwelcome, while the world is talking of you. + +"Well, I call this an excellent good book, by far the best of the +autobiographic kind I remember to have read in the English language; +and indeed, except it be Boswell's of Johnson, I do not know where we +have such a picture drawn of a human life, as in these three volumes. + +"A pious, ingenious, altogether human and worthy book; imaging, with +graceful honesty and free felicity, many interesting objects and +persons on your life-path, and imaging throughout, what is best of +all, a gifted, gentle, patient, and valiant human soul, as it buffets +its way through the billows of the time, and will not drown though +often in danger; cannot _be_ drowned, but conquers and leaves a track +of radiance behind it: that, I think, conies out more clearly to me +than in any other of your books;--and that, I can venture to assure +you, is the best of all results to realise in a book or written +record. In fact, this book has been like an exercise of devotion to +me; I have not assisted at any sermon, liturgy or litany, this long +while, that has had so religious an effect on me. Thanks in the name +of all men. And believe, along with me, that this book will be welcome +to other generations as well as to ours. And long may you live to +write more books for us; and may the evening sun be softer on you (and +on me) than the noon sometimes was! + +"Adieu, dear Hunt (you must let me use this familiarity, for I am an +old fellow too now, as well as you). I have often thought of coming up +to see you once more; and perhaps I shall, one of these days +(though horribly sick and lonely, and beset with spectral lions, go +whitherward I may): but whether I do or not believe for ever in my +regard. And so, God bless you, + + "Prays heartily, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +On the other hand Leigh Hunt had an enthusiastic reverence for +Carlyle. There are several incidental allusions to the latter, of more +or less consequence, in Hunt's Autobiography, but the following is the +most interesting:-- + +"_Carlyle's Paramount Humanity_.--I believe that what Mr. Carlyle +loves better than his fault-finding, with all its eloquence, is the +face of any human creature that looks suffering, and loving, and +sincere; and I believe further, that if the fellow-creature were +suffering only, and neither loving nor sincere, but had come to a pass +of agony in this life which put him at the mercies of some good man +for some last help and consolation towards his grave, even at the risk +of loss to repute, and a sure amount of pain and vexation, that +man, if the groan reached him in its forlornness, would be Thomas +Carlyle."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Autobiography of Leigh Hunt, with Reminiscences of +friends and Contemporaries." (Lond. 1850.)] + +It was in "Leigh Hunt's Journal,"--a short-lived Weekly Miscellany +(1850--1851)--that Carlyle's sketch, entitled "Two Hundred and Fifty +Years Ago,"[A] first appeared. + +[Footnote A: "Two Hundred and Fifty Years Ago. From a waste paper bag +of T. Carlyle." Reprinted in Carlyle's Miscellanies, Ed. 1857.] + +It was during his residence at Craigenputtoch that "Sartor Resartus" +("The Tailor Done Over," the name of an old Scotch ballad) was +written, which, after being rejected by several publishers, finally +made its appearance in "Eraser's Magazine," 1833--34. The book, it +must be confessed, might well have puzzled the critical gentlemen--the +"book-tasters"--who decide for publishers what work to print among +those submitted in manuscript. It is a sort of philosophical romance, +in which the author undertakes to give, in the form of a review of a +German work on dress, and in a notice of the life of the writer, his +own opinions upon matters and things in general. The hero, Professor +Teufelsdroeckh ("Devil's Dirt"), seems to be intended for a portrait +of human nature as affected by the moral influence to which a +cultivated mind would be exposed by the transcendental philosophy of +Fichte. Mr. Carlyle works out his theory--the clothes philosophy--and +finds the world false and hollow, our institutions mere worn-out rags +or disguises, and that our only safety lies in flying from falsehood +to truth, and becoming in harmony with the "divine idea." There is +much fanciful, grotesque description in "Sartor," with deep thought +and beautiful imagery. "In this book," wrote John Sterling, "we always +feel that there is a mystic influence around us, bringing out into +sharp homely clearness what is noblest in the remote and infinite, +exalting into wonder what is commonest in the dust and toil of every +day." + +"Sartor" found but few admirers; those readers, however, were firm and +enthusiastic in their applause. In 1838 the "Sartor Resartus" papers, +already republished in the United States, were issued in a collected +form here; and in 1839-1840 his various scattered articles +in periodicals, after having similarly received the honour of +republication in America, were published here, first in four and +afterwards in five volumes, under the title of "Miscellanies." + +It was in the spring of 1837 that Carlyle's first great historical +work appeared, "The French Revolution:--Vol. I., The Bastile; Vol. II, +The Constitution; Vol. III., The Guillotine." The publication of this +book produced a profound impression on the public mind. A history +abounding in vivid and graphic descriptions, it was at the same time +a gorgeous "prose epic." It is perhaps the most readable of all +Carlyle's works, and indeed is one of the most remarkable books of the +age. There is no other account of the French Revolution that can be +compared with it for intensity of feeling and profoundness of thought. + +A great deal of information respecting Carlyle's manner of living and +personal history during these earlier years in London may be gleaned +incidentally from his "Life of John Sterling," a book, which, from the +nature of it, is necessarily partly autobiographical. + +Thomas Moore and others met him sometimes in London society at this +time. Moore thus briefly chronicles a breakfast at Lord Houghton's, at +which Carlyle was present:-- + +"22nd May, 1838.--Breakfasted at Milnes', and met rather a remarkable +party, consisting of Savage, Landor, and Carlyle (neither of whom +I had ever seen before), Robinson, Rogers, and Rice. A good deal of +conversation between Robinson and Carlyle about German authors, of +whom I knew nothing, nor (from what they paraded of them) felt that I +had lost much by my ignorance."[A] + +[Footnote A: Diary of Thomas Moore. (Lond. 1856.) Vol. vii., p. 224] + +In 1835, after the publication of "Sartor Resartus," Carlyle received +an invitation from some American admirers of his writings, to visit +their country, and he contemplated doing so, but his labours in +examining and collecting materials for his great work on "The French +Revolution," then hastening towards completion, prevented him. + +We may say that, for many reasons, it is to be regretted that this +design was never carried into execution. Had Carlyle witnessed with +his own eyes the admirable working of democratic institutions in the +United States, he might have done more justice to our Transatlantic +brethren, who were always his first and foremost admirers, and he +might also have acquired more faith in the future destinies of his own +countrymen. + +In December, 1837, Carlyle wrote a very remarkable letter to a +correspondent in India, which has never been printed in his works, +and which we are enabled to give here entire. It is addressed to Major +David Lester Richardson, in acknowledgment of his "Literary Leaves, +or Prose and Verse," published at Calcutta in 1836. These "Literary +Leaves" contain among other things an article on the Italian Opera +(taking much the same view of it as Carlyle does), and a sketch of +Edward Irving. These papers no doubt pleased Carlyle, and perhaps led +him to entertain a rather exaggeratedly high opinion of the rest of +the book. + + THOMAS CARLYLE TO DAVID LESTER RICHARDSON. + + "5, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London, + "_19th December_, 1837. + +"My DEAR SIR, + +"Your courteous gift, with the letter accompanying it, reached me only +about a week ago, though dated 20th of June, almost at the opposite +point of the year. Whether there has been undue delay or not is +unknown to me, but at any rate on my side there ought to be no delay. + +"I have read your volume--what little of it was known to me before, +and the much that was not known--I can say, with true pleasure. It +is written, as few volumes in these days are, with fidelity, with +successful care, with insight and conviction as to matter, with +clearness and graceful precision as to manner: in a word, it is the +impress of a mind stored with elegant accomplishments, gifted with +an eye to see, and a heart to understand; a welcome, altogether +recommendable book. More than once I have said to myself and others, +How many parlour firesides are there this winter in England, at which +this volume, could one give credible announcement of its quality, +would be right pleasant company? There are very many, _could_ one give +the announcement: but no such announcement _can_ be given; therefore +the parlour firesides must even put up with ---- or what other stuff +chance shovels in their way, and read, though with malediction all the +time. It is a great pity, but no man can help it. We are now arrived +seemingly pretty near the point when all criticism and proclamation +in matters literary has degenerated into an inane jargon, incredible, +unintelligible, inarticulate as the cawing of choughs and rooks; and +many things in that as in other provinces, are in a state of painful +and rapid transition. A good book has no way of recommending itself +except slowly and as it were accidentally from hand to hand. The man +that wrote it must abide his time. He needs, as indeed all men do, the +_faith_ that this world is built not on falsehood and jargon but on +truth and reason; that no good thing done by any creature of God was, +is, or ever can be _lost_, but will verily do the service appointed +for it, and be found among the general sum-total and all of things +after long times, nay after all time, and through eternity itself. Let +him 'cast his bread upon the waters,' therefore, cheerful of heart; +'he will find it after many days.' + +"I know not why I write all this to you; it comes very spontaneously +from me. Let it be your satisfaction, the highest a man can have in +this world, that the talent entrusted to you did not lie useless, +but was turned to account, and proved itself to be a talent; and the +'publishing world' can receive it altogether according to their own +pleasure, raise it high on the housetops, or trample it low into the +street-kennels; that is not the question at all, the _thing_ remains +precisely what it was after never such raising and never such +depressing and trampling, there is no change whatever in _it_. I bid +you go on, and prosper. + +"One thing grieves me: the tone of sadness, I might say of settled +melancholy that runs through all your utterances of yourself. It is +not right, it is wrong; and yet how shall I reprove you? If you knew +me, you would triumphantly[A] for any spiritual endowment bestowed +on a man, that it is accompanied, or one might say _preceded_ as the +first origin of it, always by a delicacy of organisation which in +a world like ours is sure to have itself manifoldly afflicted, +tormented, darkened down into sorrow and disease. You feel yourself an +exile, in the East; but in the West too it is exile; I know not where +under the sun it is not exile. Here in the Fog Babylon, amid mud +and smoke, in the infinite din of 'vociferous platitude,' and quack +outbellowing quack, with truth and pity on all hands ground under the +wheels, can one call it a home, or a world? It is a waste chaos, where +we have to swim painfully for our life. The utmost a man can do is +to swim there like a man, and hold his peace. For this seems to me +a great truth, in any exile or chaos whatsoever, that sorrow was not +given us for sorrow's sake, but always and infallibly as a lesson to +us from which we are to learn somewhat: and which, the somewhat +once _learned_, ceases to be sorrow. I do believe this; and study +in general to 'consume my own smoke,' not indeed without very ugly +out-puffs at times! Allan Cunningham is the best, he tells me that +always as one grows older, one grows happier: a thing also which I +really can believe. But as for you, my dear sir, you have other work +to do in the East than grieve. Are there not beautiful things there, +glorious things; wanting only an eye to note them, a hand to record +them? If I had the command over you, I would say, read _Paul et +Virginie_, then read the _Chaumiere Indienne_; gird yourself together +for a right effort, and go and do likewise or better! I mean what I +say. The East has its own phases, there are things there which the +West yet knows not of; and one heaven covers both. He that has an eye +let him look! + +[Footnote A: There seems to be some omission or slip of the pen here.] + +"I hope you forgive me this style I have got into. It seems to me on +reading your book as if we had been long acquainted in some measure; +as if one might speak to you right from the heart. I hope we shall +meet some day or other. I send you my constant respect and good +wishes; and am and remain, + + "Yours very truly always, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle first appeared as a lecturer in 1837. His first course was on +'German Literature,' at Willis's Rooms; a series of six lectures, of +which the first was thus noticed in the _Spectator_ of Saturday, May +6, 1837.[A] + +[Footnote A: Facsimiled in "The Autographic Mirror," July, 1865.] + +"_Mr. Thomas Carlyle's Lectures_. + +"Mr. Carlyle delivered the first of a course of lectures on German +Literature, at Willis's Rooms, on Tuesday, to a very crowded and yet +a select audience of both sexes. Mr. Carlyle may be deficient in the +mere mechanism of oratory; but this minor defect is far more than +counterbalanced by his perfect mastery of his subject, the originality +of his manner, the perspicuity of his language, his simple but genuine +eloquence, and his vigorous grasp of a large and difficult question. +No person of taste or judgment could hear him without feeling that the +lecturer is a man of genius, deeply imbued with his great argument." + +"This course of lectures," says a writer already quoted, "was well +attended by the fashionables of the West End; and though they saw +in his manner something exceedingly awkward, they could not fail to +discern in his matter the impress of a mind of great originality and +superior gifts."[A] + +[Footnote A: JAMES GRANT: "Portraits of Public Characters." (Lond. +1841.) Vol. ii., p. 152.] + +The following year he delivered a second course on the 'History of +Literature, or the Successive Periods of European Culture,' at +the Literary Institution in Edwards-street, Portman-square. 'The +Revolutions of Modern Europe' was the title given to the third course, +delivered twelve months later. The fourth and last series, of six +lectures, is the best remembered, 'Heroes and Hero-worship.' This +course alone was published, and it became more immediately popular +than any of the works which had preceded it. Concerning these +lectures, Leigh Hunt remarked that it seemed "as if some Puritan +had come to life again, liberalized by German philosophy and his own +intense reflections and experience." Another critic, a Scotch writer, +could see nothing but wild impracticability in them, and exclaimed, +"Can any living man point to a single practical passage in any of +these lectures? If not, what is the real value of Mr. Carlyle's +teachings? What is Mr. Carlyle himself but a phantasm!" + +The vein of Puritanism running through his writings, composed upon +the model of the German school, impressed many critics with the belief +that their author, although full of fire and energy, was perplexed and +embarrassed with his own speculations. Concerning this Puritan element +in his reflections, Mr. James Hannay remarks, "That earnestness, that +grim humour--that queer, half-sarcastic, half-sympathetic fun--is +quite Scotch. It appears in Knox and Buchanan, and it appears in +Burns. I was not surprised when a school-fellow of Carlyle's told me +that his favourite poem was, when a boy, 'Death and Doctor Hornbook.' +And if I were asked to explain this originality, I should say that he +was a covenanter coming in the wake of the eighteenth century and the +transcendental philosophy. He has gone into the hills against 'shams,' +as they did against Prelacy, Erastianism, and so forth. But he lives +in a quieter age, and in a literary position. So he can give play +to the humour which existed in them as well, and he overflows with +a range of reading and speculation to which they were necessarily +strangers." + +'Chartism,' published in 1839, and which, to use the words of a critic +of the time, was the publication in which "he first broke ground on +the Condition of England question," appeared a short time before the +lectures on 'Heroes and Hero-worship' were delivered. If we +remember rightly, Mr. Carlyle gave forth "those grand utterances" +extemporaneously and without an abstract, notes, or a reminder of any +kind--utterances not beautiful to the flunkey-mind, or valet-soul, +occupied mainly with the fold of the hero's necktie, and the cut +of his coat. Flunkey-dom, by one of its mouthpieces, thus speaks of +them:-- + +"Perhaps his course for the present year, which was on Hero-worship, +was better attended than any previous one. Some of those who were +present estimated the average attendance at three hundred. They +chiefly consisted of persons of rank and wealth, as the number of +carriages which each day waited the conclusion of the lecture to +receive Mr. Carlyle's auditors, and to carry them to their homes, +conclusively testified. The locality of Mr. Carlyle's lectures has, I +believe, varied every year. The Hanover Rooms, Willis's Rooms, and +a place in the north of London, the name of which I forget, have +severally been chosen as the place whence to give utterance to his +profound and original trains of thought. + +"A few words will be expected here as to Mr. Carlyle's manner as a +lecturer. In so far as his mere manner is concerned, I can scarcely +bestow on him a word of commendation. There is something in his manner +which, if I may use a rather quaint term, must seem very uncouth to +London audiences of the most respectable class, _accustomed as they +are to the polished deportment[A] which is usually exhibited in +Willis's or the Hanover Rooms_. When he enters the room, and proceeds +to the sort of rostrum whence he delivers his lectures, he is, +according to the usual practice in such cases, generally received +with applause; but he very rarely takes any more notice of the mark +of approbation thus bestowed upon him, than if he were altogether +unconscious of it. And the same seeming want of respect for his +audience, or, at any rate, the same disregard for what I believe +he considers the troublesome forms of politeness, is visible at the +commencement of his lecture. Having ascended his desk, he gives a +hearty rub to his hands, and plunges at once into his subject. He +reads very closely, which, indeed, must be expected, considering +the nature of the topics which he undertakes to discuss. He is not +prodigal of gesture with his arms or body; but there is something in +his eye and countenance which indicates great earnestness of purpose, +and the most intense interest in his subject. _You can almost fancy, +in some of his more enthusiastic and energetic moments, that you +see his inmost soul in his face_. At times, indeed very often, he so +unnaturally distorts his features, as to give to his countenance a +very unpleasant expression. On such occasions, you would imagine that +he was suddenly seized with some violent paroxysms of pain. _He is +one of the most ungraceful speakers I have ever heard address a public +assemblage of persons_. In addition to the awkwardness of his general +manner, he 'makes mouths,' which would of themselves be sufficient to +mar the agreeableness of his delivery. And his manner of speaking, and +the ungracefulness of his gesticulation, are greatly aggravated by +his strong Scotch accent. Even to the generality of Scotchmen his +pronunciation is harsh in no ordinary degree. Need I say, then, what +it must be to an English ear? + +[Footnote A: Shade of Mr. Turveydrop senior, hear this man!] + +"I was present some months ago, during the delivery of a speech by Mr. +Carlyle at a meeting held in the Freemasons' Tavern, for the purpose +of forming a metropolitan library; and though that speech did not +occupy in its delivery more than five minutes, he made use of some of +the most extraordinary phraseology I ever heard employed by a +human being. He made use of the expression 'this London,' which he +pronounced 'this Loondun,' four or five times--a phrase which grated +grievously on the ears even of those of Mr. Carlyle's own countrymen +who were present, and which must have sounded doubly harsh in the ears +of an Englishman, considering the singularly broad Scotch accent with +which he spoke. + +"A good deal of uncertainty exists as to Mr. Carlyle's religious +opinions. I have heard him represented as a firm and entire believer +in revelation, and I have heard it affirmed with equal confidence that +he is a decided Deist. My own impression is," &c.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Portraits of Public Characters," by the author of +"Random Recollections of the Lords and Commons." Vol. ii. pp. +152-158.] + +In 1841 Carlyle superintended the publication of the English +edition of his friend Emerson's Essays,[B] to which he prefixed a +characteristic Preface of some length. + +[Footnote B: Essays: by R.W. Emerson, of Concord, Massachusetts. With +Preface by Thomas Carlyle. London: James Fraser, 1841.] + +"The name of Ralph Waldo Emerson," he writes, "is not entirely new +in England: distinguished travellers bring us tidings of such a man; +fractions of his writings have found their way into the hands of +the curious here; fitful hints that there is, in New England, some +spiritual notability called Emerson, glide through Reviews and +Magazines. Whether these hints were true or not true, readers are now +to judge for themselves a little better. + +"Emerson's writings and speakings amount to something: and yet +hitherto, as seems to me, this Emerson is perhaps far less notable for +what he has spoken or done, than for the many things he has not spoken +and has forborne to do. With uncommon interest I have learned that +this, and in such a never-resting, locomotive country too, is one of +those rare men who have withal the invaluable talent of sitting still! +That an educated man, of good gifts and opportunities, after looking +at the public arena, and even trying, not with ill success, what its +tasks and its prizes might amount to, should retire for long years +into rustic obscurity; and, amid the all-pervading jingle of dollars +and loud chaffering of ambitions and promotions, should quietly, +with cheerful deliberateness, sit down to spend _his_ life not in +Mammon-worship, or the hunt for reputation, influence, place, or any +outward advantage whatsoever: this, when we get a notice of it, is a +thing really worth noting." + +In 1843, "Past and Present" appeared--a work without the wild power +which "Sartor Resartus" possessed over the feelings of the reader, +but containing passages which look the same way, and breathe the +same spirit. The book contrasts, in a historico-philosophical spirit, +English society in the Middle Ages, with English society in our own +day. In both this and the preceding work the great measures advised +for the amelioration of the people are education and emigration. + +Another very admirable letter, addressed by Mr. Carlyle in 1843 to a +young man who had written to him desiring his advice as to a proper +choice of reading, and, it would appear also, as to his conduct in +general, we shall here bring forth from its hiding-place in an old +Scottish newspaper of a quarter of a century ago:-- + +"DEAR SIR, + +"Some time ago your letter was delivered me; I take literally the +first free half-hour I have had since to write you a word of answer. + +"It would give me true satisfaction could any advice of +mine contribute to forward you in your honourable course of +self-improvement, but a long experience has taught me that advice can +profit but little; that there is a good reason why advice is so seldom +followed; this reason namely, that it is so seldom, and can almost +never be, rightly given. No man knows the state of another; it is +always to some more or less imaginary man that the wisest and most +honest adviser is speaking. + +"As to the books which you--whom I know so little of--should read, +there is hardly anything definite that can be said. For one thing, you +may be strenuously advised to keep reading. Any good book, any book +that is wiser than yourself, will teach you something--a great many +things, indirectly and directly, if your mind be open to learn. +This old counsel of Johnson's is also good, and universally +applicable:--'Read the book you do honestly feel a wish and curiosity +to read.' The very wish and curiosity indicates that you, then and +there, are the person likely to get good of it. 'Our wishes are +presentiments of our capabilities;' that is a noble saying, of deep +encouragement to all true men; applicable to our wishes and efforts in +regard to reading as to other things. Among all the objects that look +wonderful or beautiful to you, follow with fresh hope the one which +looks wonderfullest, beautifullest. You will gradually find, by +various trials (which trials see that you make honest, manful ones, +not silly, short, fitful ones), what _is_ for you the wonderfullest, +beautifullest--what is _your_ true element and province, and be able +to profit by that. True desire, the monition of nature, is much to be +attended to. But here, also, you are to discriminate carefully between +_true_ desire and false. The medical men tell us we should eat what +we _truly_ have an appetite for; but what we only _falsely_ have an +appetite for we should resolutely avoid. It is very true; and flimsy, +desultory readers, who fly from foolish book to foolish book, and get +good of none, and mischief of all--are not these as foolish, unhealthy +eaters, who mistake their superficial false desire after spiceries and +confectioneries for their real appetite, of which even they are +not destitute, though it lies far deeper, far quieter, after solid +nutritive food? With these illustrations, I will recommend Johnson's +advice to you. + +"Another thing, and only one other, I will say. All books are properly +the record of the history of past men--what thoughts past men had in +them--what actions past men did: the summary of all books whatsoever +lies there. It is on this ground that the class of books specifically +named History can be safely recommended as the basis of all study of +books--the preliminary to all right and full understanding of anything +we can expect to find in books. Past history, and especially the past +history of one's own native country, everybody may be advised to begin +with that. Let him study that faithfully; innumerable inquiries will +branch out from it; he has a broad-beaten highway, from which all +the country is more or less visible; there travelling, let him choose +where he will dwell. + +"Neither let mistakes and wrong directions--of which every man, in +his studies and elsewhere, falls into many--discourage you. There is +precious instruction to be got by finding that we are wrong. Let a +man try faithfully, manfully, to be right, he will grow daily more +and more right. It is, at bottom, the condition which all men have +to cultivate themselves. Our very walking is an incessant falling--a +falling and a catching of ourselves before we come actually to the +pavement!--it is emblematic of all things a man does. + +"In conclusion, I will remind you that it is not by books alone, or +by books chiefly, that a man becomes in all points a man. Study to do +faithfully whatsoever thing in your actual situation, there and now, +you find either expressly or tacitly laid to your charge; that is +your post; stand in it like a true soldier. Silently devour the many +chagrins of it, as all human situations have many; and see you aim not +to quit it without doing all that _it_, at least, required of you. +A man perfects himself by work much more than by reading. They are a +growing kind of men that can wisely combine the two things--wisely, +valiantly, can do what is laid to their hand in their present sphere, +and prepare themselves withal for doing other wider things, if such +lie before them. + +"With many good wishes and encouragements, I remain, yours sincerely, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE. + + "Chelsea, 13th March, 1843." + +The publication of "Past and Present" elicited a paper "On the Genius +and Tendency of the Writings of Thomas Carlyle," from Mazzini, which +appeared in the "British and Foreign Review," of October, 1843.[A] It +is a candid and thoughtful piece of criticism, in which the writer, +while striving to do justice to Carlyle's genius, protests strongly +and uncompromisingly against the tendency of his teaching. + +[Footnote A: Reprinted in the "Life and Writings of Joseph Mazzini." +(London, 1867). Vol. iv. pp. 56-144.] + +Some months afterwards, when the House of Commons was occupied with +the illegal opening of Mazzini's letters, Carlyle spontaneously +stepped forward and paid the following tribute to his character:-- + +"TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"In your observations in yesterday's _Times_ on the late disgraceful +affair of Mr. Mazzini's letters and the Secretary of State, you +mention that Mr. Mazzini is entirely unknown to you, entirely +indifferent to you; and add, very justly, that if he were the most +contemptible of mankind, it would not affect your argument on the +subject.[A] + +[Footnote A: "Mr. Mazzini's character and habits and society are +nothing to the point, unless connected with some certain or probable +evidence of evil intentions or treasonable plots. We know nothing, +and care nothing about him. He may be the most worthless and the most +vicious creature in the world; but this is no reason of itself why +his letters should be detained and opened."--leading article, June 17, +1844.] + +"It may tend to throw farther light on this matter if I now certify +you, which I in some sort feel called upon to do, that Mr. Mazzini is +not unknown to various competent persons in this country; and that he +is very far indeed from being contemptible--none farther, or very few +of living men. I have had the honour to know Mr. Mazzini for a series +of years; and, whatever I may think of his practical insight and skill +in worldly affairs, I can with great freedom testify to all men that +he, if I have ever seen one such, is a man of genius and virtue, a man +of sterling veracity, humanity, and nobleness of mind; one of those +rare men, numerable unfortunately but as units in this world, who are +worthy to be called martyr-souls; who, in silence, piously in their +daily life, understand and practise what is meant by that. + +"Of Italian democracies and young Italy's sorrows, of extraneous +Austrian Emperors in Milan, or poor old chimerical Popes in Bologna, +I know nothing, and desire to know nothing; but this other thing I do +know, and can here declare publicly to be a fact, which fact all of +us that have occasion to comment on Mr. Mazzini and his affairs may do +well to take along with us, as a thing leading towards new clearness, +and not towards new additional darkness, regarding him and them. + +"Whether the extraneous Austrian Emperor and miserable old chimera +of a Pope shall maintain themselves in Italy, or be obliged to decamp +from Italy, is not a question in the least vital to Englishmen. But +it is a question vital to us that sealed letters in an English +post-office be, as we all fancied they were, respected as things +sacred; that opening of men's letters, a practice near of kin to +picking men's pockets, and to other still viler and far fataler forms +of scoundrelism be not resorted to in England, except in cases of the +very last extremity. When some new gunpowder plot may be in the +wind, some double-dyed high treason, or imminent national wreck not +avoidable otherwise, then let us open letters--not till then. + +"To all Austrian Kaisers and such like, in their time of trouble, +let us answer, as our fathers from of old have answered:--Not by such +means is help here for you. Such means, allied to picking of pockets +and viler forms of scoundrelism, are not permitted in this country for +your behoof. The right hon. Secretary does himself detest such, and +even is afraid to employ them. He dare not: it would be dangerous +for him! All British men that might chance to come in view of such +a transaction, would incline to spurn it, and trample on it, and +indignantly ask him what he meant by it? + +"I am, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "THOMAS CARLYLE.[A] + + "Chelsea, June 18." + +[Footnote A: From _The Times_, Wednesday, June 19, 1844.] + +The autumn of this year was saddened for Carlyle by the loss of +the dear friend whose biography he afterwards wrote. On the 18th of +September, 1844--after a short career of melancholy promise, only half +fulfilled--John Sterling died, in his thirty-ninth year. + +The next work that appeared from Carlyle's pen--a special service +to history, and to the memory of one of England's greatest men--was +"Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, with Elucidations and a +Connecting Narrative," two volumes, published in 1845. If there were +any doubt remaining after the publication of the "French Revolution" +what position our author might occupy amongst the historians of the +age, it was fully removed on the appearance of "Cromwell's Letters." +The work obtained a great and an immediate popularity; and though +bulky and expensive, a very large impression was quickly sold. +These speeches and letters of Cromwell, the spelling and punctuation +corrected, and a few words added here and there for clearness' sake, +and to accommodate them to the language and style in use now, were +first made intelligible and effective by Mr. Carlyle. "The authentic +utterances of the man Oliver himself," he says, "I have gathered them +from far and near; fished them up from the foul Lethean quagmires +where they lay buried. I have washed, or endeavoured to wash them +clean from foreign stupidities--such a job of buckwashing as I do not +long to repeat--and the world shall now see them in their own shape." +The work was at once republished in America, and two editions were +called for here within the year. + +While engaged on this work, Carlyle went down to Rugby by express +invitation, on Friday, 13th May, 1842, and on the following day +explored the field of Naseby, in company with Dr. Arnold. The meeting +of two such remarkable men--only six weeks before the death of +the latter--has in it something solemn and touching, and unusually +interesting. Carlyle left the school-house, expressing the hope that +it might "long continue to be what was to him one of the rarest sights +in the world--a temple of industrious peace." + +Arnold, who, with the deep sympathy arising from kindred nobility of +soul, had long cherished a high reverence for Carlyle, was very proud +of having received such a guest under his roof, and during those few +last weeks of life was wont to be in high spirits, talking with his +several guests, and describing with much interest, his recent visit to +Naseby with Carlyle, "its position on some of the highest table-land +in England--the streams falling on the one side into the Atlantic, on +the other into the German Ocean--far away, too, from any town--Market +Harborough, the nearest, into which the cavaliers were chased late in +the long summer evening on the fourteenth of June." + +Perhaps the most graphic description of Carlyle's manner and +conversation ever published, is contained in the following passage +from a letter addressed to Emerson by an accomplished American, +Margaret Fuller, who visited England in the autumn of 1846, and whose +strange, beautiful history and tragical death on her homeward voyage, +are known to most readers. + +The letter is dated Paris, November 16, 1846. + +"Of the people I saw in London, you will wish me to speak first of the +Carlyles. Mr. C. came to see me at once, and appointed an evening to +be passed at their house. That first time, I was delighted with him. +He was in a very sweet humour,--full of wit and pathos, without being +overbearing or oppressive. I was quite carried away with the rich flow +of his discourse, and the hearty, noble earnestness of his personal +being brought back the charm which once was upon his writing, before I +wearied of it. I admired his Scotch, his way of singing his great full +sentences, so that each one was like the stanza of a narrative ballad. +He let me talk, now and then, enough to free my lungs and change my +position, so that I did not get tired. That evening, he talked of the +present state of things in England, giving light, witty sketches +of the men of the day, fanatics and others, and some sweet, homely +stories he told of things he had known of the Scotch peasantry. + +"Of you he spoke with hearty kindness; and he told, with beautiful +feeling, a story of some poor farmer, or artisan in the country, who +on Sunday lays aside the cark and care of that dirty English world, +and sits reading the Essays, and looking upon the sea. + +"I left him that night, intending to go out very often to their +house. I assure you there never was anything so witty as Carlyle's +description of ---- ----. It was enough to kill one with laughing. +I, on my side, contributed a story to his fund of anecdote on this +subject, and it was fully appreciated. Carlyle is worth a thousand of +you for that;--he is not ashamed to laugh when he is amused, but goes +on in a cordial, human fashion. + +"The second time Mr. C. had a dinner-party, at which was a witty, +French, flippant sort of man, author of a History of Philosophy,[A] +and now writing a Life of Goethe, a task for which he must be as unfit +as irreligion and sparkling shallowness can make him. But he told +stories admirably, and was allowed sometimes to interrupt Carlyle a +little, of which one was glad, for that night he was in his more acrid +mood, and though much more brilliant than on the former evening, grew +wearisome to me, who disclaimed and rejected almost everything he +said. + +[Footnote A: George Henry Lewes.] + +"For a couple of hours he was talking about poetry, and the whole +harangue was one eloquent proclamation of the defects in his own mind. +Tennyson wrote in verse because the schoolmasters had taught him that +it was great to do so, and had thus, unfortunately, been turned from +the true path for a man. Burns had, in like manner, been turned from +his vocation. Shakespeare had not had the good sense to see that +it would have been better to write straight on in prose;--and such +nonsense, which, though amusing enough at first, he ran to death after +a while. + +"The most amusing part is always when he comes back to some refrain, +as in the French Revolution of the _sea-green_. In this instance, it +was Petrarch and _Laura_, the last word pronounced with his ineffable +sarcasm of drawl. Although he said this over fifty times, I could not +help laughing when _Laura_ would come. Carlyle running his chin out +when he spoke it, and his eyes glancing till they looked like the eyes +and beak of a bird of prey. + +Poor Laura! Luckily for her that her poet had already got her safely +canonized beyond the reach of this Teufelsdroeckh vulture. + +"The worst of hearing Carlyle is, that you cannot interrupt him. I +understand the habit and power of haranguing have increased very much +upon him, so that you are a perfect prisoner when he has once got hold +of you. To interrupt him is a physical impossibility. If you get a +chance to remonstrate for a moment, he raises his voice and bears +you down. True, he does you no injustice, and, with his admirable +penetration, sees the disclaimer in your mind, so that you are not +morally delinquent; but it is not pleasant to be unable to utter it. +The latter part of the evening, however, he paid us for this, by a +series of sketches, in his finest style of railing and raillery, of +modern French literature, not one of them, perhaps, perfectly just, +but all drawn with the finest, boldest strokes, and, from his point of +view, masterly. All were depreciating, except that of Beranger. Of him +he spoke with perfect justice, because with hearty sympathy. + +"I had, afterward, some talk with Mrs. C., whom hitherto I had only +_seen_, for who can speak while her husband is there? I like her very +much;--she is full of grace, sweetness, and talent. Her eyes are sad +and charming. + + * * * * * + +"After this, they went to stay at Lord Ashburton's, and I only saw +them once more, when they came to pass an evening with us. Unluckily, +Mazzini was with us, whose society, when he was there alone, I enjoyed +more than any. He is a beauteous and pure music: also, he is a dear +friend of Mrs. C., but his being there gave the conversation a turn to +'progress' and ideal subjects, and C. was fluent in invectives on +all our 'rose-water imbecilities.' We all felt distant from him, and +Mazzini, after some vain efforts to remonstrate, became very sad. Mrs. +C. said to me,-- + +"'These are but opinions to Carlyle, but to Mazzini, who has given his +all, and helped bring his friends to the scaffold, in pursuit of such +subjects, it is a matter of life and death.' + +"All Carlyle's talk, that evening, was a defence of mere +force,--success the test of right;--if people would not behave well, +put collars round their necks;--find a hero, and let them be his +slaves, &c. It was very Titanic, and anti-celestial. I wish the last +evening had been more melodious. However, I bid Carlyle farewell with +feelings of the warmest friendship and admiration. We cannot feel +otherwise to a great and noble nature, whether it harmonise with our +own or not. I never appreciated the work he has done for his age +till I saw England. I could not. You must stand in the shadow of that +mountain of shams, to know how hard it is to cast light across it. + +"Honour to Carlyle! _Hoch_! Although, in the wine with which we drink +this health, I, for one, must mingle the despised 'rose-water.' + +"And now, having to your eye shown the defects of my own mind, in +the sketch of another, I will pass on more lowly,--more willing to be +imperfect, since Fate permits such noble creatures, after all, to +be only this or that. It is much if one is not only a crow or +magpie;--Carlyle is only a lion. Some time we may, all in full, be +intelligent and humanely fair." + + * * * * * + +"_December_, 1846.--Accustomed to the infinite wit and exuberant +richness of his writings, his talk is still an amazement and +a splendour scarcely to be faced with steady eyes. He does not +converse;--only harangues. It is the usual misfortune of such marked +men,--happily not one invariable or inevitable,--that they cannot +allow other minds room to breathe, and show themselves in their +atmosphere, and thus miss the refreshment and instruction which the +greatest never cease to need from the experience of the humblest. + +"Carlyle allows no one a chance, but bears down all opposition, not +only by his wit and onset of words, resistless in their sharpness as +so many bayonets, but by actual physical superiority,--raising his +voice, and rushing on his opponent with a torrent of sound. This is +not in the least from unwillingness to allow freedom to others. On the +contrary, no man would more enjoy a manly resistance to his thought. +But it is the impulse of a mind accustomed to follow out its own +impulse, as the hawk its prey, and which knows not how to stop in +the chase. Carlyle, indeed, is arrogant and overbearing; but in his +arrogance there is no littleness,--no self-love. It is the heroic +arrogance of some old Scandinavian conqueror;--it is his nature, and +the untameable impulse that has given him power to crush the dragons. +You do not love him, perhaps, nor revere; and perhaps, also, he would +only laugh at you if you did; but you like him heartily, and like to +see him the powerful smith, the Siegfried, melting all the old iron +in his furnace till it glows to a sunset red, and burns you, if you +senselessly go too near. + +"He seems, to me, quite isolated,--lonely as the desert,--yet never +was a man more fitted to prize a man, could he find one to match +his mood. He finds them, but only in the past. He sings, rather than +talks. He pours upon you a kind of satirical, heroical, critical poem, +with regular cadences, and generally catching up, near the beginning, +some singular epithet, which serves as a _refrain_ when his song is +full, or with which, as with a knitting needle, he catches up the +stitches, if he has chanced, now and then, to let fall a row. + +"For the higher kinds of poetry he has no sense, and his talk on that +subject is delightfully and gorgeously absurd. He sometimes stops a +minute to laugh at it himself, then begins anew with fresh vigour; for +all the spirits he is driving before him seem to him as Fata Morganas, +ugly masks, in fact, if he can but make them turn about; but he laughs +that they seem to others such dainty Ariels. His talk, like his books, +is full of pictures; his critical strokes masterly. Allow for his +point of view, and his survey is admirable. He is a large subject. I +cannot speak more or wiselier of him now, nor needs it;--his works are +true, to blame and praise him,--the Siegfried of England,--great and +powerful, if not quite invulnerable, and of a might rather to destroy +evil, than legislate for good."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli." (Boston, 1852.) Vol. +iii., pp. 96-104.] + +In 1848 Mr. Carlyle contributed a series of articles to the _Examiner_ +and _Spectator_, principally on Irish affairs, which, as he has never +yet seen fit to reprint them in his Miscellanies, are apparently quite +unknown to the general public. With the exception of the last, they +may be considered as a sort of alarum note, sounded to herald +the approach of the Latter-Day Pamphlets, which appeared shortly +afterwards. + +The following is a list of these newspaper articles:-- + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + March 4. "Louis Philippe." + April 29. "Repeal of the Union." + May 13. "Legislation for Ireland." + +In _The Spectator_, 1848. + + May 13. "Ireland and the British Chief Governor." + " "Irish Regiments (of the New Era)." + +In _The Examiner_, 1848. + + Dec. 2. "Death of Charles Buller." + +The last-named paper, a tribute to the memory of his old pupil, we +shall give entire. Another man of genius,[A] now also gone to his +rest, sang sorrowfully on the same occasion: + +[Footnote A: W.M. Thackeray.] + + "Who knows the inscrutable design? + Blest be He who took and gave! + Why should your mother, Charles, not mine, + Be weeping at her darling's grave? + + We bow to Heaven that will'd it so, + That darkly rules the fate of all, + That sends the respite or the blow, + That's free to give, or to recall." + +Carlyle's paper reads like a solemn and touching funeral oration to +the uncovered mourners as they stand round the grave before it is +closed:-- + +"A very beautiful soul has suddenly been summoned from among us; one +of the clearest intellects, and most aerial activities in England, +has unexpectedly been called away. Charles Buller died on Wednesday +morning last, without previous sickness, reckoned of importance, till +a day or two before. An event of unmixed sadness, which has created a +just sorrow, private and public. The light of many a social circle +is dimmer henceforth, and will miss long a presence which was always +gladdening and beneficent; in the coming storms of political trouble, +which heap themselves more and more in ominous clouds on our horizon, +one radiant element is to be wanting now. + +"Mr. Buller was in his forty-third year, and had sat in Parliament +some twenty of those. A man long kept under by the peculiarities of +his endowment and position, but rising rapidly into importance of late +years; beginning to reap the fruits of long patience, and to see an +ever wider field open round him. He was what in party language is +called a 'Reformer,' from his earliest youth; and never swerved from +that faith, nor could swerve. His luminous sincere intellect laid bare +to him in all its abject incoherency the thing that was untrue, which +thenceforth became for him a thing that was not tenable, that it was +perilous and scandalous to attempt maintaining. Twenty years in +the dreary, weltering lake of parliamentary confusion, with its +disappointments and bewilderments, had not quenched this tendency, in +which, as we say, he persevered as by a law of nature itself, for the +essence of his mind was clearness, healthy purity, incompatibility +with fraud in any of its forms. What he accomplished, therefore, +whether great or little, was all to be _added_ to the sum of good; +none of it to be deducted. There shone mildly in his whole conduct +a beautiful veracity, as if it were unconscious of itself; a perfect +spontaneous absence of all cant, hypocrisy, and hollow pretence, +not in word and act only, but in thought and instinct. To a singular +extent it can be said of him that he was a spontaneous clear man. Very +gentle, too, though full of fire; simple, brave, graceful. What he +did, and what he said, came from him as light from a luminous body, +and had thus always in it a high and rare merit, which any of the more +discerning could appreciate fully. + +"To many, for a long while, Mr. Buller passed merely for a man of wit, +and certainly his beautiful natural gaiety of character, which by no +means meant _levity_, was commonly thought to mean it, and did for +many years, hinder the recognition of his intrinsic higher qualities. +Slowly it began to be discovered that, under all this many-coloured +radiancy and coruscation, there burnt a most steady light; a sound, +penetrating intellect, full of adroit resources, and loyal by nature +itself to all that was methodic, manful, true;--in brief, a mildly +resolute, chivalrous, and gallant character, capable of doing much +serious service. + +"A man of wit he indisputably was, whatever more amongst the wittiest +of men. His speech, and manner of being, played everywhere like soft +brilliancy of lambent fire round the common objects of the hour, and +was, beyond all others that English society could show, entitled to +the name of excellent, for it was spontaneous, like all else in him, +genuine, humane,--the glittering play of the soul of a real man. To +hear him, the most serious of men might think within himself, 'How +beautiful is human gaiety too!' Alone of wits, Buller never made wit; +he could be silent, or grave enough, where better was going; often +rather liked to be silent if permissible, and always was so where +needful. His wit, moreover, was ever the ally of wisdom, not of folly, +or unkindness, or injustice; no soul was ever hurt by it; never, we +believe, never, did his wit offend justly any man, and often have we +seen his ready resource relieve one ready to be offended, and light up +a pausing circle all into harmony again. In truth, it was beautiful to +see such clear, almost childlike simplicity of heart coexisting with +the finished dexterities, and long experiences, of a man of the world. +Honour to human worth, in whatever form we find it! This man was true +to his friends, true to his convictions,--and true without effort, +as the magnet is to the north. He was ever found on the right +side; helpful to it, not obstructive of it, in all he attempted or +performed. + +"Weak health; a faculty indeed brilliant, clear, prompt, not deficient +in depth either, or in any kind of active valour, but wanting the +stern energy that could long endure to _continue_ in the deep, in the +chaotic, new, and painfully incondite--this marked out for him his +limits; which, perhaps with regrets enough, his natural veracity and +practicality would lead him quietly to admit and stand by. He was not +the man to grapple, in its dark and deadly dens, with the Lernaean coil +of social Hydras; perhaps not under any circumstances: but he did, +unassisted, what he could; faithfully himself did something--nay, +something truly considerable;--and in his _patience_ with the much +that by him and his strength could not be done let us grant there was +something of beautiful too! + +"Properly, indeed, his career as a public man was but beginning. +In the office he last held, much was silently expected of him; he +himself, too, recognised well what a fearful and immense question this +of Pauperism is; with what ominous rapidity the demand for solution +of it is pressing on; and how little the world generally is yet +aware what methods and principles, new, strange, and altogether +contradictory to the shallow maxims and idle philosophies current at +present, would be needed for dealing with it! This task he perhaps +contemplated with apprehension; but he is not now to be tried with +this, or with any task more. He has fallen, at this point of the +march, an honourable soldier; and has left us here to fight along +without him. Be his memory dear and honourable to us, as that of +one so worthy ought. What in him was true and valiant endures for +evermore--beyond all memory or record. His light, airy brilliancy has +suddenly become solemn, fixed in the earnest stillness of Eternity. +_There_ shall we also, and our little works, all shortly be." + +In 1850 appeared the "Latter-Day Pamphlets," essays suggested by the +convulsions of 1848, in which, more than in any previous publication, +the author spoke out in the character of a social and political censor +of his own age. "He seemed to be the worshipper of mere brute force, +the advocate of all harsh, coercive measures. Model prisons and +schools for the reform of criminals, poor-laws, churches as at present +constituted, the aristocracy, parliament, and other institutions, were +assailed and ridiculed in unmeasured terms, and generally, the +English public was set down as composed of sham heroes, and a valet +or 'flunkey' world." From their very nature as stern denunciations +of what the author considered contemporary fallacies, wrongs, and +hypocrisies, these pamphlets produced a storm of critical indignation +against him. + +The life of John Sterling was published in the following year; and +Carlyle then began that long spell of work--the "History of Frederick +the Great"--which extended over thirteen years, the last, and perhaps +the greatest, monument of his genius. + +In 1856, when we may suppose his mind to be full of the details of +battles, and overflowing with military tactics, he received from Sir +W. Napier his "History of the Administration of Scinde," and wrote the +following letter to the author:-- + + "THOMAS CARLYLE TO SIR WILLIAM NAPIER. + + "Chelsea, May 12, 1856. + +"DEAR SIR, + +"I have read with attention, and with many feelings and reflections, +your record of Sir C. Napier's Administration of Scinde. You must +permit me to thank you, in the name of Britain at large, for writing +such a book; and in my own poor name to acknowledge the great +compliment and kindness implied in sending me a copy for myself. + +"It is a book which every living Englishman would be the better +for reading--for studying diligently till he saw into it, till he +recognised and believed the high and tragic phenomenon set forth +there! A book which may be called 'profitable' in the old Scripture +sense; profitable for reproof, for correction and admonition, for +great sorrow, yet for 'building up in righteousness' too--in heroic, +manful endeavour to do well, and not ill, in one's time and place. +One feels it a kind of possession to know that one has had such a +fellow-citizen and contemporary in these evil days. + +"The fine and noble qualities of the man are very recognisable to me; +his subtle, piercing intellect turned all to the practical, giving +him just insight into men and into things; his inexhaustible adroit +contrivances; his fiery valour; sharp promptitude to seize the good +moment that will not return. A lynx-eyed, fiery man, with the spirit +of an old knight in him; more of a hero than any modern I have seen +for a long time. + +"A singular veracity one finds in him; not in his words alone--which, +however, I like much for their fine rough _naivete_--but in his +actions, judgments, aims; in all that he thinks, and does, and +says--which, indeed, I have observed is the root of all greatness or +real worth in human creatures, and properly the first (and also the +rarest) attribute of what we call _genius_ among men. + +"The path of such a man through the foul jungle of this world--the +struggle of Heaven's inspiration against the terrestrial fooleries, +cupidities, and cowardices--cannot be other than tragical: but the man +does tear out a bit of way for himself too; strives towards the good +goal, inflexibly persistent till his long rest come: the man does +leave his mark behind him, ineffaceable, beneficent to all good men, +maleficent to none: and we must not complain. The British nation of +this time, in India or elsewhere--God knows no nation ever had more +need of such men, in every region of its affairs! But also perhaps no +nation ever had a much worse chance to get hold of them, to recognise +and loyally second them, even when they are there. + +"Anarchic stupidity is wide as the night; victorious wisdom is but as +a lamp in it shining here and there. Contrast a Napier even in Scinde +with, for example, a Lally at Pondicherry or on the Place de Greve; +one has to admit that it is the common lot, that it might have been +far worse! + +"There is great talent in this book apart from its subject. The +narrative moves on with strong, weighty step, like a marching phalanx, +with the gleam of clear steel in it--sheers down the opponent objects +and tramples them out of sight in a very potent manner. The writer, +it is evident, had in him a lively, glowing image, complete in all its +parts, of the transaction to be told; and that is his grand secret +of giving the reader so lively a conception of it. I was surprised to +find how much I had carried away with me, even of the Hill campaign +and of Trukkee itself; though without a map the attempt to understand +such a thing seemed to me desperate at first. + +"With many thanks, and gratified to have made this reflex +acquaintance, which, if it should ever chance to become a direct one, +might gratify me still more, + + "I remain always yours sincerely, + + "T. CARLYLE."[A] + +[Footnote A: "Life of General Sir William Napier, K.C.B." Edited by +H.A. Bruce, M.P. London: Murray, 1864. Vol. ii. pp. 312-314.] + +In June, 1861, a few days after the great fire in which Inspector +Braidwood perished in the discharge of his duty, Carlyle broke a long +silence with the following letter:-- + + "TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'TIMES.' + +"SIR,-- + +"There is a great deal of public sympathy, and of deeper sort than +usual, awake at present on the subject of Inspector Braidwood. It is +a beautiful emotion, and apparently a perfectly just one, and well +bestowed. Judging by whatever light one gets, Braidwood seems to have +been a man of singular worth in his department, and otherwise; such a +servant as the public seldom has. Thoroughly skilled in his function, +nobly valiant in it, and faithful to it--faithful to the death. +In rude, modest form, actually a kind of hero, who has perished in +serving us! + +"Probably his sorrowing family is not left in wealthy circumstances. +Most certainly it is pity when a generous emotion, in many men, or in +any man, has to die out futile, and leave no _action_ behind it. The +question, therefore, suggests itself--Should not there be a 'Braidwood +Testimonial,' the proper parties undertaking it, in a modest, serious +manner, the public silently testifying (to such extent, at least) what +worth its emotion has? + +"I venture to throw out this hint, and, if it be acted on, will, with +great satisfaction, give my mite among other people; but must, for +good reasons, say further, that this [is] all I can do in the matter +(of which, indeed, I know nothing but what everybody knows, and a +great deal less than every reader of the newspapers knows); and that, +in particular, I cannot answer any letters on the subject, should such +happen to be sent me. + +"In haste, I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, + + "T. CARLYLE.[A] + + "5, Cheyne-row, Chelsea, June 30." + +[Footnote A: (Printed in _The Times_, Tuesday, July 2, 1861.)] + +The "History of Frederick the Great" was completed early in 1865. +Later in the same year the students of Edinburgh University elected +Carlyle as Lord Rector. We cannot do better than describe the +proceedings and the subsequent address in the words of the late +Alexander Smith:-- + +"Mr. Gladstone demitted office, and then it behoved the students of +the University to cast about for a worthy successor. Two candidates +were proposed, Mr. Carlyle and Mr. Disraeli; and on the election day +Mr. Carlyle was returned by a large and enthusiastic majority. This +was all very well, but a doubt lingered in the minds of many whether +Mr. Carlyle would accept the office, or if accepting it, whether he +would deliver an address--said address being the sole apple which the +Rectorial tree is capable of bearing. The hare was indeed caught, but +it was doubtful somewhat whether the hare would allow itself to be +_cooked_ after the approved academical fashion. It was tolerably well +known that Mr. Carlyle had emerged from his long spell of work on +"Frederick," in a condition of health the reverse of robust; that +he had once or twice before declined similar honours from Scottish +Universities--from Glasgow some twelve or fourteen years ago, and from +Aberdeen some seven or eight; and that he was constitutionally opposed +to all varieties of popular displays, more especially those of the +oratorical sort. + +"But all dispute was ended when it was officially announced that Mr. +Carlyle had accepted the office of Lord Rector, that he would conform +to all its requirements, and that the Rectorial address would be +delivered late in spring. And so when the days began to lengthen in +these northern latitudes, and crocuses to show their yellow and purple +heads, people began to talk about the visit of the great writer, and +to speculate on what manner and fashion of speech he would deliver. + +"Edinburgh has no University Hall, and accordingly when speech-day +approached, the largest public room in the city was chartered by the +University authorities. This public room--the Music Hall in George +Street--will contain, under severe pressure, from eighteen hundred to +nineteen hundred persons, and tickets to that extent were secured by +the students and members of the General Council. Curious stories are +told of the eagerness on every side manifested to hear Mr. Carlyle. +Country clergymen from beyond Aberdeen came into Edinburgh for the +sole purpose of hearing and seeing. Gentlemen came down from London +by train the night before, and returned to London by train the night +after. + +"In a very few minutes after the doors were opened the large hall was +filled in every part, and when up the central passage the Principal, +the Lord Rector, the Members of the Senate, and other gentlemen +advanced towards the platform, the cheering was vociferous and hearty. +The Principal occupied the chair of course, the Lord Rector on his +right, the Lord Provost on his left. Every eye was fixed on the +Rector. To all appearance, as he sat, time and labour had dealt +tenderly with him. His face had not yet lost the country bronze which +he brought up with him from Dumfriesshire as a student fifty-six years +ago. His long residence in London had not touched his Annandale look, +nor had it--as we soon learned--touched his Annandale accent. His +countenance was striking, homely, sincere, truthful--the countenance +of a man on whom 'the burden of the unintelligible world' had weighed +more heavily than on most. His hair was yet almost dark; his moustache +and short beard were iron grey. His eyes were wide, melancholy, +sorrowful; and seemed as if they had been at times a-weary of the +sun. Altogether in his aspect there was something aboriginal, as of +a piece, of unhewn granite, which had never been polished to any +approved pattern, whose natural and original vitality had never +been tampered with. In a word, there seemed no passivity about Mr. +Carlyle--he was the diamond, and the world was his pane of glass; he +was a graving tool rather than a thing graven upon--a man to set his +mark on the world--a man on whom the world could not set _its_ mark. +And just as, glancing towards Fife a few minutes before, one could not +help thinking of his early connection with Edward Irving, so seeing +him sit beside the venerable Principal of the University, one could +not help thinking of his earliest connection with literature. + +"Time brings men into the most unexpected relationships. When the +Principal was plain Mr. Brewster, editor of the Edinburgh Cyclopaedia, +little dreaming that he should ever be Knight of Hanover and head +of the Northern Metropolitan University, Mr. Carlyle--just as little +dreaming that he should be the foremost man of letters of his day and +Lord Rector of the same University--was his contributor, writing for +said Cyclopaedia biographies of Montesquieu and other notables. And so +it came about that after years of separation and of honourable labour, +the old editor and contributor were brought together again--in new +aspects. + +"The proceedings began by the conferring of the degree of LL.D. on Mr. +Erskine of Linlathen--an old friend of Mr. Carlyle's--on Professors +Huxley, Tyndall, and Ramsay, and on Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer. That +done, amid a tempest of cheering and hats enthusiastically waved, Mr. +Carlyle, slipping off his Rectorial robe--which must have been a very +shirt of Nessus to him--advanced to the table and began to speak in +low, wavering, melancholy tones, which were in accordance with +the melancholy eyes, and in the Annandale accent, with which his +playfellows must have been familiar long ago. So self-contained +was he, so impregnable to outward influences, that all his years +of Edinburgh and London life could not impair even in the slightest +degree, _that_. + +"The opening sentences were lost in the applause. What need of quoting +a speech which by this time has been read by everybody? Appraise it as +you please, it was a thing _per se_. Just as, if you wish a purple dye +you must fish up the Murex; if you wish ivory you must go to the east; +so if you desire an address such as Edinburgh listened to the other +day, you must go to Chelsea for it. It may not be quite to your taste, +but, in any case, there is no other intellectual warehouse in which +that kind of article is kept in stock. + +"The gratitude I owe to him is--or should be--equal to that of most. +He has been to me only a voice, sometimes sad, sometimes wrathful, +sometimes scornful; and when I saw him for the first time with the +eye of flesh stand up amongst us the other day, and heard him speak +kindly, brotherly, affectionate words--his first appearance of that +kind, I suppose, since he discoursed of Heroes and Hero Worship to the +London people--I am not ashamed to confess that I felt moved towards +him, as I do not think in any possible combination of circumstances I +could have felt moved towards any other living man."[A] + +[Footnote A: _The Argosy_, May, 1866.] + +The Edinburgh correspondent to a London paper thus describes what took +place:-- + +"A vast interest among the intelligent public has been excited by the +prospect of Mr. Thomas Carlyle's appearance to be installed as Lord +Rector of the University of Edinburgh. With the exception of the +delivery of his lectures on Heroes and Hero-worship, he has avoided +oratory; and to many of his admirers the present occasion seemed +likely to afford their only chance of ever seeing him in the flesh, +and hearing his living voice. The result has been, that the University +authorities have been beset by applications in number altogether +unprecedented--to nearly all of which they could only give the +reluctant answer, that admission for strangers was impossible. The +students who elect Mr. Carlyle received tickets, if they applied +within the specified time, and the members of the University +council, or graduates, obtained the residue according to priority of +application. Ladies' tickets to the number of one hundred and fifty +were issued, each professor obtaining four, and the remaining thirty +being placed at the disposal of Sir David Brewster, the Principal. And +the one hundred and fifty lucky ladies were conspicuous in the front +of the gallery to-day, having been admitted before the doors for +students and other males were open. + +"The hour appointed for letting them in was kept precisely--it was +half-past one P.M., but an hour before it, despite occasional +showers of rain, a crowd had begun to gather at the front door of +the music-hall, and at the opening of the door it had gathered to +proportions sufficient to half fill the building, its capacity under +severe crushing being about two thousand. + +"When the door was opened, they rushed in as crowds of young men +only can and dare rush, and up the double stairs they streamed like +a torrent; which torrent, however, policemen and check-gates soon +moderated. I chanced to fall into a lucky current of the crowd, and +got in amongst the first two or three hundred, and got forward to the +fourth seat from the platform, as good a place for seeing and hearing +as any. + +"The proceedings of the day were fixed to commence at two P.M., and +the half-hour of waiting was filled up by the students in throwing +occasional volleys of peas, whistling _en masse_ various lively tunes, +and in clambering, like small escalading parties, on to and over the +platform to take advantage of the seats in the organ gallery behind. +For Edinburgh students, however, let me say that these proceedings +were singularly decorous. They did indulge in a little fun when +nothing else was doing, but they did not come for that alone. Any +student who wanted fun could have sold his ticket at a handsome +profit, for which better fun could be had elsewhere. I heard among the +crowd that some students had got so high a price as a guinea each for +their tickets, and I heard of others who had been offered no less +but had refused it. And I must say further, that they listened to Mr. +Carlyle's address with as much attention and reverence as they could +have bestowed on a prophet--only I daresay most prophets would have +elicited less applause and laughter. + +"Shortly before two, the city magistrates and a few other personages +mounted the platform, and, with as much quietness as the fancy of the +students directed, took the seats which had been marked out for them +by large red pasteboard tickets. At two precisely the students in +the organ gallery started to the tops of the seats and began to cheer +vociferously, and almost instantly all the audience followed their +example. The procession was on its way through the hall, and in half +a minute Lord Provost Chambers, in his official robes, mounted the +platform stair; then Principal Sir David Brewster and Lord Rector +Carlyle, both in their gold-laced robes of office; then the Rev. Dr. +Lee, and the other professors, in their gowns; also the LL.D.'s to be, +in black gowns. Lord Neaves and Dr. Guthrie were there in an LL.D.'s +black gown and blue ribbons; Mr. Harvey, the President of the Royal +Academy, and Sir D. Baxter, Bart.--men conspicuous in their plain +clothes. + +"Dr. Lee offered up a prayer of a minute and a half, at the 'Amen' of +which I could see Mr. Carlyle bow very low. Then the business of the +occasion commenced. Mr. Gibson--a tall, thin, pale-faced, beardless, +acute, composed-looking young gentleman, in an M.A.'s gown--introduced +Mr. Carlyle, 'the most distinguished son of the University,' to the +Principal, Sir David Brewster, as the Lord Rector elected by the +students. Sir David saluted him as such, thinking, perhaps, of the +time when, an unknown young man, Thomas Carlyle wrote articles for +Brewster's 'Cyclopaedia,' and got Brewster's name to introduce to +public notice his translation of Legendre's 'Geometry.' Next Professor +Muirhead, for the time being the Dean of the Faculty of Laws in the +University, introduced various gentlemen to the Principal in order, +as persons whom the senate had thought worthy of the degree of LL.D., +giving a dignified, but not always very happy, account of the merits +of each. There was Mr. Erskine, of Linlathen, Mr. Carlyle's host for +the time being, and often previously, an old friend of Irving and +Chalmers, himself the writer of various elegant and sincere religious +books, and one of the best and most amiable of men. If intelligent +goodness ever entitled any one to the degree of LL.D., he certainly +deserves it; and when I say this, I do not insinuate that on grounds +of pure intellect he is not well entitled to the honour. He is now, I +should think, nearer eighty than seventy years of age--a mild-looking, +full-eyed old man, with a face somewhat of the type of Lord Derby's. +There was Professor Huxley, young in years, dark, heavy-browed, alert +and resolute, but not moulded after any high ideal; and there was +Professor Tyndall, also young, lithe of limb, and nonchalant in +manner. When his name was called he sat as if he had no concern +in what was going on, and then rose with an easy smile, partly of +modesty, but in great measure of indifference. + +"Dr. Rae, the Arctic explorer and first discoverer of the fate of Sir +John Franklin, who is an M.D. of Edinburgh, was now made LL.D. He is +of tall, wiry, energetic figure, slightly baldish, with greyish, curly +hair, keen, handsome face, high crown and sloping forehead, and his +bearing is that of a soldier--of a man who has both given and obeyed +commands, and been drilled to stand steady and upright. Carlyle +himself was offered the degree of LL.D., but he declined the honour, +laughing it off, in fact, in a letter, with such excuses as that he +had a brother a Dr. Carlyle (an M.D., also a man of genius, I insert +parenthetically, and known in literature as a translator of 'Dante'), +and that if two Dr. Carlyles should appear at Paradise, mistakes might +arise. + +"After all the LL.D's had heard their merits enumerated, and had had +a black hood or wallet of some kind, with a blue ribbon conspicuous in +it, flung over their heads, Principal Brewster announced that the Lord +Rector would now deliver his address. Thereupon Mr. Carlyle rose at +once, shook himself out of his gold-laced rectorial gown, left it on +his chair, and stepped quietly to the table, and drawing his tall, +bony frame into a position of straight perpendicularity not possible +to one man in five hundred at seventy years of age, he began to speak +quietly and distinctly, but nervously. There was a slight flush on +his face, but he bore himself with composure and dignity, and in the +course of half an hour he was obviously beginning to feel at his ease, +so far at least as to have adequate command over the current of his +thought. + +"He spoke on quite freely and easily, hardly ever repeated a word, +never looked at a note, and only once returned to finish up a topic +from which he had deviated. He apologised for not having come with +a written discourse. It was usual, and 'it would have been more +comfortable for me just at present,' but he had tried it, and could +not satisfy himself, and 'as the spoken word comes from the heart,' he +had resolved to try that method. What he said in words will be learned +otherwise than from me. I could not well describe it; but I do not +think I ever heard any address that I should be so unwilling to blot +from my memory. Not that there was much in it that cannot be found in +his writings, or inferred from them; but the manner of the man was a +key to the writings, and for naturalness and quiet power, I have never +seen anything to compare with it. He did not deal in rhetoric. He +talked--it was continuous, strong, quiet talk--like a patriarch about +to leave the world to the young lads who had chosen him and were just +entering the world. His voice is a soft, downy voice--not a tone in +it is of the shrill, fierce kind that one would expect it to be in +reading the Latter-day Pamphlets. + +"There was not a trace of effort or of affectation, or even of +extravagance. Shrewd common sense there was in abundance. There was +the involved disrupted style also, but it looked so natural that +reflection was needed to recognise in it that very style which purists +find to be un-English and unintelligible. Over the angles of this +disrupted style rolled out a few cascades of humour--quite as if +by accident. He let them go, talking on in his soft, downy accents, +without a smile; occasionally for an instant looking very serious, +with his dark eyes beating like pulses, but generally looking merely +composed and kindly, and so, to speak, father-like. He concluded by +reciting his own translation of a poem of Goethe-- + + "'The future hides in it gladness and sorrow.' + +And this he did in a style of melancholy grandeur not to be described, +but still less to be forgotten. It was then alone that the personality +of the philosopher and poet were revealed continuously in his manner +of utterance. The features of his face are familiar to all from his +portraits. But I do not think any portrait, unless, perhaps, Woolner's +medallion, gives full expression to the resolution that is visible +in his face. Besides, they all make him look sadder and older than he +appears. Although he be threescore and ten, his hair is still abundant +and tolerably black, and there is considerable colour in his cheek. +Not a man of his age on that platform to-day looked so young, and he +had done more work than any ten on it." + +The correspondent of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ gives some interesting +particulars:-- + +"Mr. Carlyle had not spoken in public before yesterday, since those +grand utterances on Heroes and Hero-worship in the institute in +Edwards Street, Marylebone, which one can scarcely believe, whilst +reading them, to have been, in the best sense, extemporaneously +delivered. In that case Mr. Carlyle began the series, as we have +heard, by bringing a manuscript which he evidently found much in his +way, and presently abandoned. On the second evening he brought some +notes or headings; but these also tripped him until he had left them. +The remaining lectures were given like his conversation, which no +one can hear without feeling that, with all its glow and inspiration, +every sentence would be, if taken down, found faultless. It was so +in his remarkable extemporaneous address yesterday. He had no notes +whatever. 'But,' says our correspondent, in transmitting the report, +'I have never heard a speech of whose more remarkable qualities so few +can be conveyed on paper. You will read of "applause" and "laughter," +but you will little realize the eloquent blood flaming up the +speaker's cheek, the kindling of his eye, or the inexpressible +voice and look when the drolleries were coming out. When he spoke +of clap-trap books exciting astonishment 'in the minds of foolish +persons,' the evident halting at the word '_fools_,' and the smoothing +of his hair, as if he must be decorous, which preceded the change +to 'foolish persons,' were exceedingly comical. As for the flaming +bursts, they took shape in grand tones, whose impression was made +deeper, not by raising, but by lowering the voice. Your correspondent +here declares that he should hold it worth his coming all the way +from London in the rain in the Sunday night train were it only to have +heard Carlyle say, "There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of all +California, or the getting of all the suffrages that are on the planet +just now!"' In the first few minutes of the address there was some +hesitation, and much of the shrinking that one might expect in a +secluded scholar; but these very soon cleared away, and during the +larger part, and to the close of the oration, it was evident that he +was receiving a sympathetic influence from his listeners, which he +did not fail to return tenfold. The applause became less frequent; +the silence became that of a woven spell; and the recitation of +the beautiful lines from Goethe, at the end, was so masterly--so +marvellous--that one felt in it that Carlyle's real anathemas against +rhetoric were but the expression of his knowledge that there is a +rhetoric beyond all other arts." + +In the _Times_ the following leader appeared upon Mr. Carlyle's +address:-- + +"There is something in the return of a man to the haunts of his youth, +after he has acquired fame and a recognised position in the world, +which is of itself sufficient to arrest attention. We are interested +in the retrospect and the contrast, the juxtaposition of the old and +the new, the hopes of early years, the memory of the struggles and +contests of manhood, the repose of victory. A man may differ as much +as he pleases from the doctrines of Mr. Carlyle, he may reject his +historical teachings, and may distrust his politics, but he must be +of a very unkindly disposition not to be touched by his reception +at Edinburgh. It is fifty-four years, he told the students of the +University, since he, a boy of fourteen, came as a student, 'full of +wonder and expectation,' to the old capital of his native country, and +now he returns, having accomplished the days of man spoken of by the +Psalmist, that he may be honoured by students of this generation, +and may give them a few words of advice on the life which lies before +them. + +"The discourse of the new Lord Rector squared very well with the +occasion. There was no novelty in it. New truths are not the gifts +which the old offer the young; the lesson we learn last is but the +fulness of the meaning of what was only partially apprehended at +first. Mr. Carlyle brought out things familiar enough to everyone who +has read his works; there were the old platitudes and the old truths, +and, it must be owned, mingled here and there with them the old +errors. Time has, however, its recompenses, and if the freshness of +youth seemed to be wanting in the address of the Rector, so also was +its crudity. There was a singular mellowness in Mr. Carlyle's speech, +which was reflected in the homely language in which it was couched. +The chief lessons he had to enforce were to avoid cram, and to be +painstaking, diligent, and patient in the acquisition of knowledge. +Students are not to try to make themselves acquainted with the +outsides of as many things as possible, and 'to go flourishing about' +upon the strength of their acquisitions, but to count a thing as known +only when it is stamped on their mind. The doctrine is only a new +reading of the old maxim, _non multa sed multum_, but it is as much +needed now as ever it was. Still more appropriate to the present day +was Mr. Carlyle's protest against the notion that a University is +the place where a man is to be fitted for the special work of a +profession. A University, as he puts it, teaches a man how to read, +or, as we may say more generally, how to learn. It is not the function +of such a place to offer particular and technical knowledge, but to +prepare a man for mastering any science by teaching him the method of +all. A child learns the use of his body, not the art of a carpenter or +smith, and the University student learns the use of his mind, not the +professional lore of a lawyer or a physician. It is pleasant to meet +with a strong reassertion of doctrines which the utilitarianism of a +commercial and manufacturing age is too apt to make us all forget. +Mr. Carlyle is essentially conservative in his notions on academic +functions. Accuracy, discrimination, judgment, are with him the be-all +and end-all of educational training. If a man has learnt to know a +thing in itself, and in its relation to surrounding phenomena, he +has got from a University what it is its proper duty to teach. +Accordingly, we find him bestowing a good word on poor old Arthur +Collins, who showed that he possessed these valuable qualities in the +humble work of compiling a Peerage. + +"The new Lord Rector is, however, as conservative in his choice of the +implements of study as he is in the determination of its objects. The +languages and the history of the great nations of antiquity he puts +foremost, like any other pedagogue. The Greeks and the Romans are, +he tells the Edinburgh students, 'a pair of nations shining in the +records left by themselves as a kind of pillar to light up life in the +darkness of the past ages;' and he adds that it would be well worth +their while to get an understanding of what these people were, and +what they did. It is here, however, that an old error of Mr. +Carlyle's crops up among his well-remembered truths. He quotes from +Machiavelli--evidently agreeing himself with the sentiment, though he +refrained from asking the assent of his audience to it--the statement +that the history of Rome showed that a democracy could not permanently +exist without the occasional intervention of a Dictator. It is +possible that if Machiavelli had had the experience of the centuries +which have elapsed since his day, he would have seen fit to alter his +conclusion, and it is to be regretted that the admiration which Mr. +Carlyle feels for the great men of history will not allow him to +believe in the possibility of a political society where each might +find his proper sphere and duty without disturbing the order and +natural succession of the commonwealth. His judgment on this point +is like that of a man who had only known the steam-engine before +the invention of governor balls, and was ready to declare that its +mechanism would be shattered if a boy were not always at hand to +regulate the pressure of the steam. + + * * * * * + +"We may turn, however, from this difference to another of Mr. +Carlyle's doctrines, which mark at once his independence of thought +and his respect for experience, where he declares the necessity for +recognising the hereditary principle in government, if there is to be +'any fixity in things.' In the same way we find him almost lamenting +the fact that Oxford, once apparently so fast-anchored as to be +immovable, has begun to twist and toss on the eddy of new ideas. + +"It is impossible to glance at Mr. Carlyle's Easter Monday discourse +without recalling the oration which his predecessor pronounced on +resigning office last autumn. * * * Mr. Carlyle is as simple and +practical as his predecessor was dazzling and rhetorical. An ounce of +mother wit, quotes the new Lord Rector, is worth a pound of clergy, +and while he admires Demosthenes, he prefers the eloquence of Phocion. +A little later he repeats his old doctrine on the virtue of silence, +laments the fact that 'the finest nations in the world--the English +and the American--are going all away into wind and tongue,' and +protests that a man is not to be esteemed wise because he has poured +out speech copiously. Mr. Carlyle has so often inculcated these +sentiments in his books that there can be no suspicion of an _arriere +pensee_ in their utterance now, but the contrast between him and his +predecessor is at the least instructive. Each does, however, in some +measure, supply what is deficient in the other. No one would claim +for the Chancellor of the Exchequer the intensity of power of his +successor, but in his abundant energy, his wide sympathy with popular +movement, and his real, if vague and indiscriminating, faith in the +activity and progress of modern life, he conveys lessons of trust +in the present, and hopefulness in the future, which would be +ill-exchanged for the patient and somewhat sad stoicism of Mr. +Carlyle." + +Carlyle was still in Scotland on April 21, and there the terrible and +solemn news had to be conveyed to him of the sudden death of her who +had been his true and faithful life-companion for forty years. + +Mrs. Carlyle died on Saturday, April 21, under very peculiar +circumstances. She was taking her usual drive in Hyde Park about four +o'clock, when her little favourite dog--which was running by the side +of the brougham--was run over by a carriage. She was greatly alarmed, +though the dog was not seriously hurt. She lifted the dog into the +carriage, and the man drove on. Not receiving any call or direction +from his mistress, as was usual, he stopped the carriage and +discovered her, as he thought, in a fit, or ill, and drove to +St. George's Hospital, which was near at hand. When there it was +discovered that she must have been dead some little time. Mrs. +Carlyle's health had been for several months feeble, but not in a +state to excite anxiety or alarm. + +On the following Wednesday her remains were conveyed from London to +Haddington for interment there, and the funeral took place on Thursday +afternoon. Mr. Carlyle was accompanied from London (whither he had +returned immediately on the receipt of that solemn message) by his +brother, Dr. Carlyle, Mr. John Forster, and the Hon. Mr. Twistleton. +The funeral cortege was followed on foot by a large number of +gentlemen who had known Mrs. Carlyle and her father, Dr. Welsh, +who was held in high estimation in the town, where he had practised +medicine till his death, in 1819. The grave, which is the same as +that occupied by Dr. Welsh's remains, lies in the centre of the ruined +choir of the old cathedral at Haddington. In accordance with the +Scottish practice, there was no service read, and Mr. Carlyle threw +a handful of earth on the coffin after it had been lowered into the +grave. + + * * * * * + +Carlyle wrote the following inscription to be placed on his wife's +tombstone:-- + + "Here likewise now rests Jane Welsh Carlyle, spouse of Thomas + Carlyle, Chelsea, London. She was born at Haddington 14th + July, 1801; only child of the above John Welsh and of Grace + Welsh, Caplegell, Dumfriesshire, his wife. In her bright + existence she had more sorrows than are common, but also a + soft invincibility, a clearness of discernment, and a noble + loyalty of heart which are rare. For forty years she was the + true and loving helpmate of her husband, and by act and word + unweariedly forwarded him as none else could in all of worthy + that he did or attempted. She died at London, 21st April, + 1866, suddenly snatched away from him, and the light of his + life as if gone out." + +Later in the same year, weighed down as he was by his great sorrow, +Carlyle nevertheless thought it a public duty to come forward +in defence of Governor Eyre, when the quelling of the Jamaica +insurrection excited so much controversy, and seemed to divide England +into two parties. He acted as Vice-President of the Defence Fund. The +following is a letter written to Mr. Hamilton Hume, giving his views +on the subject in full: + + "Ripple Court, Ringwould, Dover, + + "_August 23_, 1866. + +"SIR, + +"The clamour raised against Governor Eyre appears to me to be +disgraceful to the good sense of England; and if it rested on any +depth of conviction, and were not rather (as I always flatter myself +it is) a thing of rumour and hearsay, of repetition and reverberation, +mostly from the teeth outward, I should consider it of evil omen to +the country and to its highest interests in these times. For my own +share, all the light that has yet reached me on Mr. Eyre and his +history in the world goes steadily to establish the conclusion that he +is a just, humane, and valiant man, faithful to his trusts everywhere, +and with no ordinary faculty of executing them; that his late services +in Jamaica were of great, perhaps of incalculable value, as certainly +they were of perilous and appalling difficulty--something like the +case of 'fire,' suddenly reported, 'in the ship's powder room,' in +mid-ocean where the moments mean the ages, and life and death hang +on your use or misuse of the moments; and, in short, that penalty and +clamour are not the thing this Governor merits from any of us, but +honour and thanks, and wise imitation (I will farther say), should +similar emergencies arise, on the great scale or on the small, in +whatever we are governing! + +"The English nation never loved anarchy, nor was wont to spend its +sympathy on miserable mad seditions, especially of this inhuman and +half-brutish type; but always loved order, and the prompt suppression +of seditions, and reserved its tears for something worthier than +promoters of such delirious and fatal enterprises who had got their +wages for their sad industry. Has the English nation changed, then, +altogether? I flatter myself it is not, not yet quite; but only that +certain loose, superficial portions of it have become a great deal +louder, and not any wiser, than they formerly used to be. + +"At any rate, though much averse, at any time, and at this time in +particular, to figure on committees, or run into public noises without +call, I do at once, and feel that as a British citizen I should, and +must, make you welcome to my name for your committee, and to whatever +good it can do you. With the hope only that many other British men, of +far more significance in such a matter, will at once or gradually do +the like; and that, in fine, by wise effort and persistence, a blind +and disgraceful act of public injustice may be prevented; and an +egregrious folly as well--not to say, for none can say or compute, +what a vital detriment throughout the British Empire, in such an +example set to all the colonies and governors the British Empire has! + +"Farther service, I fear, I am not in a state to promise, but the +whole weight of my conviction and good wishes is with you; and if +other service possible to me do present itself, I shall not want for +willingness in case of need. Enclosed is my mite of contribution to + your fund."I have the honour to be yours truly, + + "T. CARLYLE." + + "To HAMILTON HUME, Esq., + "Hon. Sec. 'Eyre Defence Fund.'" + +In August, 1867, Carlyle broke silence again with an utterance in the +style of the _Latter-Day Pamphlets_, entitled "Shooting Niagara: and +After?" published anonymously (though everyone, of course, knew it to +be his) in _Macmillan's Magazine_. Shortly afterwards it was reprinted +as a separate pamphlet, with additions, and with the author's name on +the title-page. + +In February, 1868, Carlyle wrote some Recollections of Sir William +Hamilton, as a contribution to Professor Veitch's Memoir of that +accomplished metaphysician. + +In November, 1870, he addressed a long and very remarkable letter +to the _Times_, on the French-German war, which is reprinted in the +latest edition of his collected Miscellanies. + +Two years later (November, 1872) he added a very beautiful Supplement +to the People's Edition of his "Life of Schiller," founded on Saupe's +"Schiller and his Father's Household," and other more recent books on +Schiller that had appeared in Germany. + +His last literary productions were a series of papers on "The Early +Kings of Norway," and an Essay on "The Portraits of John Knox," which +appeared, in instalments, in _Fraser's Magazine_, in the first four +months of 1875. On the 4th December of that year, Carlyle attained +his eightieth year, and this anniversary was signalised by some of the +more distinguished of his friends and admirers by striking a medal, +the head being executed by Mr. Boehm, whose noble statue of Carlyle, +exhibited in the Royal Academy in the previous year, had won so much +merited praise from Mr. Ruskin and others. The medal was accompanied +by an address, signed by the subscribers. Carlyle seems to have been +much gratified with this honour, which took him quite by surprise, and +he expressed his acknowledgments as follows:-- + +"This of the medal and formal address of friends was an altogether +unexpected event, to be received as a conspicuous and peculiar honour, +without example hitherto anywhere in my life.... To you ... I address +my thankful acknowledgments, which surely are deep and sincere, and +will beg you to convey the same to all the kind friends so beautifully +concerned in it. Let no one of you be other than assured that the +beautiful transaction, in result, management, and intention, was +altogether gratifying, welcome, and honourable to me, and that I +cordially thank one and all of you for what you have been pleased +to do. Your fine and noble gift shall remain among my precious +possessions, and be the symbol to me of something still more _golden_ +than itself, on the part of my many dear and too generous friends, so +long as I continue in this world. + + "Yours and theirs, from the heart, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +Carlyle's last public utterances were a letter on the Eastern +Question, addressed to Mr. George Howard, and printed in the _Times_ +of November 28, 1876, and a letter to the Editor of the _Times_, on +"The Crisis," printed in that journal on May 5, 1877. + +He was now beginning to feel the effects of his great age. Yearly and +monthly he grew more feeble. His wonted walking exercise had to be +curtailed, and at last abandoned. He was affectionately and piously +tended during these last years by his niece, Mary Aitken, now Mrs. +Alexander Carlyle. In the autumn of 1879 he lost his brother, Dr. John +Aitken Carlyle, the translator of Dante's "Inferno." + +The end came at last, after a long and gradual decay of strength. The +great writer and noble-hearted man passed away peacefully at about +half-past eight o'clock on the morning of Saturday, February 5, 1881, +in the eighty-sixth year of his age. + +His remains were conveyed to Scotland, and were laid in the +burial-ground at Ecclefechan, where the ashes of his father and +mother, and of others of his kindred, repose. He had executed what is +known in Scotch law as a "deed of mortification," by virtue of +which he bequeathed to Edinburgh University the estate of +Craigenputtoch--which had come to him through his wife--for the +foundation of ten Bursaries in the Faculty of Arts, to be called the +"John Welsh Bursaries." In his Will he bequeathed the books which +he had used in writing on Cromwell and Friedrich to Harvard College, +Massachusetts. + +In less than a month after his death, with a haste on many accounts +to be deplored, and which has excited much animadversion, his literary +executor, Mr. James Anthony Froude, the historian, issued two volumes +of posthumous "Reminiscences," written by Carlyle, partly in 1832, +and partly in 1866-67. The first section consists of a memorial paper, +written immediately after his father's death; the second contains +Reminiscences of his early friend, Edward Irving, commenced at Cheyne +Row in the autumn of 1866, and finished at Mentone on the 2nd January, +1867. The Reminiscences of Lord Jeffrey were begun on the following +day, and finished on January 19. The paper on Southey and Wordsworth, +relegated to the Appendix, was also written at Mentone between the +28th January and the 8th March, 1867. The Memorials of his wife, which +fill the greater part of the second volume, were written at Cheyne +Row, during the month after her death. + +Of the earlier portraits of Carlyle three are specially interesting, +1. The full-length sketch by "Croquis" (Daniel Maclise) which formed +one of the _Fraser_ Gallery portraits, and was published in the +magazine in June, 1833. (The original sketch of this is now deposited +in the Forster Collection at South Kensington.) 2. Count D'Orsay's +sketch, published by Mitchell in 1839, is highly characteristic of +the artist. It was taken when no man of position was counted a dutiful +subject who did not wear a black satin stock and a Petersham coat. +The great author's own favourite among the early portraits was 3. +the sketch by Samuel Laurence, engraved in Horne's "New Spirit of the +Age," published in 1844. Since the art of photography came into vogue, +a series of photographs of various degrees of merit and success have +been executed by Messrs. Elliott and Fry, and by Watkins. The late +Mrs. Cameron also produced a photograph of him in her peculiar style, +but it was not so successful as her fine portrait of Tennyson. An +oil-painting by Mr. Watts, exhibited some fifteen years ago, and now +also forming part of the Forster Collection at South Kensington, is +remarkable for its weird wildness; but it gave great displeasure to +the old philosopher himself! More lately we have a remarkable portrait +by Mr. Whistler, who seized the _tout ensemble_ of his illustrious +sitter's character and costume in a very effective manner. The _terra +cotta_ statue by Mr. Boehm, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1875, +has received such merited meed of enthusiastic praise from Mr. +Ruskin that it needs no added praise of ours. It has been excellently +photographed from two points of view by Mr. Hedderly, of Riley Street, +Chelsea. + +One of the best and happiest of the many likenesses of Mr. Carlyle +that appeared during the last decade of his life was a sketch by Mrs. +Allingham--a picture as well as a portrait--representing the venerable +philosopher in a long and picturesque dressing-gown, seated on a chair +and poring over a folio, in the garden at the back of the quaint old +house at Chelsea, which will henceforth, as long as it stands, be +associated with his memory. Beside him on the grass lies a long clay +pipe (a churchwarden) which he has been smoking in the sweet +morning air. So that altogether, as far as pictorial, graphic, and +photographic art can go, the features, form, and bodily semblance of +Carlyle will be as well known to future generations as they are to our +own. + + * * * * * + +The impression of his brilliant and eloquent talk, though it will +perhaps remain, for at least half a century to come, more or less +vivid to some of those of the new generation who were privileged to +hear it, will, of course, gradually fade away. But it seems +hardly probable that the rich legacy of his long roll of +writings--historical, biographical, critical--can be regarded as other +than a permanent one, in which each succeeding generation will find +fresh delight and instruction. The series of vivid pictures he has +left behind in his "French Revolution," in his "Cromwell," in his +"Frederick," can hardly become obsolete or cease to be attractive; nor +is such power of word-painting likely soon to be equalled or ever +to be surpassed. The salt of humour that savours nearly all he wrote +(that lambent humour that lightens and plays over the grimmest and +sternest of his pages) will also serve to keep his writings fresh and +readable. Many of his _dicta_ and opinions will doubtless be more and +more called in question, especially in those of his works which are +more directly of a didactic than a narrative character, and in regard +to subjects which he was by habit, by mental constitution, and by that +prejudice from which the greatest can never wholly free themselves, +incapable of judging broadly or soundly,--such, for instance, as the +scope and functions of painting and the fine arts generally, the value +of modern poetry, or the working of Constitutional and Parliamentary +institutions. + + RICHARD HERNE SHEPHERD. + + _Chelsea, June, 1881_. + + + + +ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS. + +[Illustration] + + + + + ADDRESS + DELIVERED TO THE + STUDENTS OF EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY, + APRIL 2, 1866. + + +GENTLEMEN, + +I have accepted the office you have elected me to, and have now the +duty to return thanks for the great honour done me. Your enthusiasm +towards me, I admit, is very beautiful in itself, however undesirable +it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling honourable +to all men, and one well known to myself when I was in a position +analogous to your own. I can only hope that it may endure to the +end--that noble desire to honour those whom you think worthy of +honour, and come to be more and more select and discriminate in the +choice of the object of it; for I can well understand that you +will modify your opinions of me and many things else as you go +on. (Laughter and cheers.) There are now fifty-six years gone +last November since I first entered your city, a boy of not quite +fourteen--fifty-six years ago--to attend classes here and gain +knowledge of all kinds, I know not what, with feelings of wonder and +awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this +is what we have come to. (Cheers.) There is something touching +and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third +generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up and +saying, "Well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the +vineyard: you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and +have had many judges." As the old proverb says, "He that builds by the +wayside has many masters." We must expect a variety of judges; but the +voice of young Scotland, through you, is really of some value to +me, and I return you many thanks for it, though I cannot describe my +emotions to you, and perhaps they will be much more conceivable if +expressed in silence. (Cheers.) + +When this office was proposed to me, some of you know that I was not +very ambitious to accept it, at first. I was taught to believe that +there were more or less certain important duties which would lie in +my power. This, I confess, was my chief motive in going into it--at +least, in reconciling the objections felt to such things; for if I can +do anything to honour you and my dear old _Alma Mater_, why should I +not do so? (Loud cheers.) Well, but on practically looking into the +matter when the office actually came into my hands, I find it grows +more and more uncertain and abstruse to me whether there is much real +duty that I can do at all. I live four hundred miles away from you, +in an entirely different state of things; and my weak health--now for +many years accumulating upon me--and a total unacquaintance with +such subjects as concern your affairs here,--all this fills me +with apprehension that there is really nothing worth the least +consideration that I can do on that score. You may, however, depend +upon it that if any such duty does arise in any form, I will use my +most faithful endeavour to do whatever is right and proper, according +to the best of my judgment. (Cheers.) + +In the meanwhile, the duty I have at present--which might be very +pleasant, but which is quite the reverse, as you may fancy--is to +address some words to you on some subjects more or less cognate to the +pursuits you are engaged in. In fact, I had meant to throw out some +loose observations--loose in point of order, I mean--in such a way as +they may occur to me--the truths I have in me about the business you +are engaged in, the race you have started on, what kind of race it is +you young gentlemen have begun, and what sort of arena you are likely +to find in this world. I ought, I believe, according to custom, to +have written all that down on paper, and had it read out. That would +have been much handier for me at the present moment (a laugh), but +when I attempted to write, I found that I was not accustomed to write +speeches, and that I did not get on very well. So I flung that away, +and resolved to trust to the inspiration of the moment--just to what +came uppermost. You will therefore have to accept what is readiest, +what comes direct from the heart, and you must just take that in +compensation for any good order of arrangement there might have been +in it. + +I will endeavour to say nothing that is not true, as far as I can +manage, and that is pretty much all that I can engage for. (A laugh.) +Advices, I believe, to young men--and to all men--are very seldom much +valued. There is a great deal of advising, and very little faithful +performing. And talk that does not end in any kind of action, is +better suppressed altogether. I would not, therefore, go much into +advising; but there is one advice I must give you. It is, in fact, the +summary of all advices, and you have heard it a thousand times, I dare +say; but I must, nevertheless, let you hear it the thousand and first +time, for it is most intensely true, whether you will believe it at +present or not--namely, that above all things the interest of your own +life depends upon being diligent now, while it is called to-day, +in this place where you have come to get education. Diligent! That +includes all virtues in it that a student can have; I mean to include +in it all qualities that lead into the acquirement of real instruction +and improvement in such a place. If you will believe me, you who +are young, yours is the golden season of life. As you have heard it +called, so it verily is, the seed-time of life, in which, if you do +not sow, or if you sow tares instead of wheat, you cannot expect to +reap well afterwards, and you will arrive at indeed little; while in +the course of years, when you come to look back, and if you have +not done what you have heard from your advisers--and among many +counsellers there is wisdom--you will bitterly repent when it is too +late. The habits of study acquired at Universities are of the highest +importance in after-life. At the season when you are in young years +the whole mind is, as it were, fluid, and is capable of forming itself +into any shape that the owner of the mind pleases to order it to form +itself into. The mind is in a fluid state, but it hardens up gradually +to the consistency of rock or iron, and you cannot alter the habits of +an old man, but as he has begun he will proceed and go on to the last. +By diligence, I mean among other things--and very chiefly--honesty in +all your inquiries into what you are about. Pursue your studies in the +way your conscience calls honest. More and more endeavour to do that. +Keep, I mean to say, an accurate separation of what you have really +come to know in your own minds, and what is still unknown. Leave all +that on the hypothetical side of the barrier, as things afterwards to +be acquired, if acquired at all; and be careful not to stamp a thing +as known when you do not yet know it. Count a thing known only when it +is stamped on your mind, so that you may survey it on all sides with +intelligence. + +There is such a thing as a man endeavouring to persuade himself, and +endeavouring to persuade others, that he knows about things when +he does not know more than the outside skin of them; and he goes +flourishing about with them. ("Hear, hear," and a laugh.) There is +also a process called cramming in some Universities (a laugh)--that +is, getting up such points of things as the examiner is likely to put +questions about. Avoid all that as entirely unworthy of an honourable +habit. Be modest, and humble, and diligent in your attention to what +your teachers tell you, who are profoundly interested in trying to +bring you forward in the right way, so far as they have been able +to understand it. Try all things they set before you, in order, if +possible, to understand them, and to value them in proportion to your +fitness for them. Gradually see what kind of work you can do; for it +is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work +he is to do in this universe. In fact, morality as regards study is, +as in all other things, the primary consideration, and overrides +all others. A dishonest man cannot do anything real; and it would be +greatly better if he were tied up from doing any such thing. He does +nothing but darken counsel by the words he utters. That is a very old +doctrine, but a very true one; and you will find it confirmed by +all the thinking men that have ever lived in this long series of +generations of which we are the latest. + +I daresay you know, very many of you, that it is now seven hundred +years since Universities were first set up in this world of ours. +Abelard and other people had risen up with doctrines in them the +people wished to hear of, and students flocked towards them from all +parts of the world. There was no getting the thing recorded in books +as you may now. You had to hear him speaking to you vocally, or else +you could not learn at all what it was that he wanted to say. And so +they gathered together the various people who had anything to teach, +and formed themselves gradually, under the patronage of kings +and other potentates who were anxious about the culture of their +populations, nobly anxious for their benefit, and became a University. + +I daresay, perhaps, you have heard it said that all that is greatly +altered by the invention of printing, which took place about midway +between us and the origin of Universities. A man has not now to go +away to where a professor is actually speaking, because in most cases +he can get his doctrine out of him through a book, and can read it, +and read it again and again, and study it. I don't know that I know of +any way in which the whole facts of a subject may be more completely +taken in, if our studies are moulded in conformity with it. +Nevertheless, Universities have, and will continue to have, an +indispensable value in society--a very high value. I consider the very +highest interests of man vitally intrusted to them. + +In regard to theology, as you are aware, it has been the study of the +deepest heads that have come into the world--what is the nature of +this stupendous universe, and what its relations to all things, as +known to man, and as only known to the awful Author of it. In +fact, the members of the Church keep theology in a lively condition +(laughter), for the benefit of the whole population, which is the +great object of our Universities. I consider it is the same now +intrinsically, though very much forgotten, from many causes, and +not so successful as might be wished at all. (A laugh.) It remains, +however, a very curious truth, what has been said by observant people, +that the main use of the Universities in the present age is that, +after you have done with all your classes, the next thing is a +collection of books, a great library of good books, which you proceed +to study and to read. What the Universities have mainly done--what I +have found the University did for me, was that it taught me to read +in various languages and various sciences, so that I could go into the +books that treated of these things, and try anything I wanted to make +myself master of gradually, as I found it suit me. Whatever you may +think of all that, the clearest and most imperative duty lies on +every one of you to be assiduous in your reading; and learn to be good +readers, which is, perhaps, a more difficult thing than you imagine. +Learn to be discriminative in your reading--to read all kinds of +things that you have an interest in, and that you find to be really +fit for what you are engaged in. Of course, at the present time, in a +great deal of the reading incumbent on you you must be guided by the +books recommended to you by your professors for assistance towards the +prelections. And then, when you get out of the University, and go into +studies of your own, you will find it very important that you have +selected a field, a province in which you can study and work. + +The most unhappy of all men is the man that cannot tell what he is +going to do, that has got no work cut out for him in the world, and +does not go into it. For work is the grand cure of all the maladies +and miseries that ever beset mankind--honest work, which you intend +getting done. If you are in a strait, a very good indication as to +choice--perhaps the best you could get--is a book you have a great +curiosity about. You are then in the readiest and best of all possible +conditions to improve by that book. It is analogous to what doctors +tell us about the physical health and appetites of the patient. You +must learn to distinguish between false appetite and real. There is +such a thing as a false appetite, which will lead a man into vagaries +with regard to diet, will tempt him to eat spicy things which he +should not eat at all, and would not but that it is toothsome, and for +the moment in baseness of mind. A man ought to inquire and find +out what he really and truly has an appetite for--what suits his +constitution; and that, doctors tell him, is the very thing he ought +to have in general. And so with books. As applicable to almost all +of you, I will say that it is highly expedient to go into history--to +inquire into what has passed before you in the families of men. The +history of the Romans and Greeks will first of all concern you; and +you will find that all the knowledge you have got will be extremely +applicable to elucidate that. There you have the most remarkable race +of men in the world set before you, to say nothing of the languages, +which your professors can better explain, and which, I believe, are +admitted to be the most perfect orders of speech we have yet found +to exist among men. And you will find, if you read well, a pair of +extremely remarkable nations shining in the records left by themselves +as a kind of pillar to light up life in the darkness of the past +ages; and it will be well worth your while if you can get into the +understanding of what these people were and what they did. You will +find a great deal of hearsay, as I have found, that does not touch on +the matter; but perhaps some of you will get to see a Roman face to +face; you will know in some measure how they contrived to exist, and +to perform these feats in the world; I believe, also, you will find +a thing not much noted, that there was a very great deal of deep +religion in its form in both nations. That is noted by the wisest of +historians, and particularly by Ferguson, who is particularly well +worth reading on Roman history; and I believe he was an alumnus in our +own University. His book is a very creditable book. He points out the +profoundly religious nature of the Roman people, notwithstanding the +wildness and ferociousness of their nature. They believed that Jupiter +Optimus--Jupiter Maximus--was lord of the universe, and that he +had appointed the Romans to become the chief of men, provided they +followed his commands--to brave all difficulty, and to stand up with +an invincible front--to be ready to do and die; and also to have the +same sacred regard to veracity, to promise, to integrity, and all the +virtues that surround that noblest quality of men--courage--to +which the Romans gave the name of virtue, manhood, as the one thing +ennobling for a man. + +In the literary ages of Rome, that had very much decayed away; but +still it had retained its place among the lower classes of the Roman +people. Of the deeply religious nature of the Greeks, along with their +beautiful and sunny effulgences of art, you have a striking proof, if +you look for it. + +In the tragedies of Sophocles, there is a most distinct recognition of +the eternal justice of Heaven, and the unfailing punishment of crime +against the laws of God. + +I believe you will find in all histories that that has been at the +head and foundation of them all, and that no nation that did +not contemplate this wonderful universe with an awe-stricken and +reverential feeling that there was a great unknown, omnipotent, and +all-wise, and all-virtuous Being, superintending all men in it, and +all interests in it--no nation ever came to very much, nor did any man +either, who forgot that. If a man did forget that, he forgot the most +important part of his mission in this world. + +In our own history of England, which you will take a great deal of +natural pains to make yourselves acquainted with, you will find it +beyond all others worthy of your study; because I believe that the +British nation--and I include in them the Scottish nation--produced +a finer set of men than any you will find it possible to get anywhere +else in the world. (Applause.) I don't know in any history of +Greece or Rome where you will get so fine a man as Oliver Cromwell. +(Applause.) And we have had men worthy of memory in our little corner +of the island here as well as others, and our history has been strong +at least in being connected with the world itself--for if you examine +well you will find that John Knox was the author, as it were, of +Oliver Cromwell; that the Puritan revolution would never have taken +place in England at all if it had not been for that Scotchman. +(Applause.) This is an arithmetical fact, and is not prompted by +national vanity on my part at all. (Laughter and applause.) And it +is very possible, if you look at the struggle that was going on in +England, as I have had to do in my time, you will see that people were +overawed with the immense impediments lying in the way. + +A small minority of God-fearing men in the country were flying away +with any ship they could get to New England, rather than take the lion +by the beard. They durstn't confront the powers with their most just +complaint to be delivered from idolatry. They wanted to make the +nation altogether conformable to the Hebrew Bible, which they +understood to be according to the will of God; and there could be no +aim more legitimate. However, they could not have got their desire +fulfilled at all if Knox had not succeeded by the firmness and +nobleness of his mind. For he is also of the select of the earth to +me--John Knox. (Applause.) What he has suffered from the ungrateful +generations that have followed him should really make us humble +ourselves to the dust, to think that the most excellent man our +country has produced, to whom we owe everything that distinguishes +us among modern nations, should have been sneered at and abused by +people. Knox was heard by Scotland--the people heard him with the +marrow of their bones--they took up his doctrine, and they defied +principalities and powers to move them from it. "We must have it," +they said. + +It was at that time the Puritan struggle arose in England, and you +know well that the Scottish Earls and nobility, with their tenantry, +marched away to Dunse-hill, and sat down there; and just in the course +of that struggle, when it was either to be suppressed or brought +into greater vitality, they encamped on the top of Dunse-hill thirty +thousand armed men, drilled for that occasion, each regiment around +its landlord, its earl, or whatever he might be called, and eager +for Christ's Crown and Covenant. That was the signal for all England +rising up into unappeasable determination to have the Gospel there +also, and you know it went on and came to be a contest whether +the Parliament or the King should rule--whether it should be old +formalities and use and wont, or something that had been of new +conceived in the souls of men--namely, a divine determination to walk +according to the laws of God here as the sum of all prosperity--which +of these should have the mastery; and after a long, long agony of +struggle, it was decided--the way we know. I should say also of that +Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell's--notwithstanding the abuse it has +encountered, and the denial of everybody that it was able to get on in +the world, and so on--it appears to me to have been the most salutary +thing in the modern history of England on the whole. If Oliver +Cromwell had continued it out, I don't know what it would have come +to. It would have got corrupted perhaps in other hands, and could +not have gone on, but it was pure and true to the last fibre in his +mind--there was truth in it when he ruled over it. + +Machiavelli has remarked, in speaking about the Romans, that +democracy cannot exist anywhere in the world; as a Government it is an +impossibility that it should be continued, and he goes on proving that +in his own way. I do not ask you all to follow him in his conviction +(hear); but it is to him a clear truth that it is a solecism and +impossibility that the universal mass of men should govern themselves. +He says of the Romans that they continued a long time, but it was +purely in virtue of this item in their constitution--namely, that they +had all the conviction in their minds that it was solemnly necessary +at times to appoint a Dictator--a man who had the power of life and +death over everything--who degraded men out of their places, ordered +them to execution, and did whatever seemed to him good in the name +of God above him. He was commanded to take care that the Republic +suffered no detriment, and Machiavelli calculates that that was the +thing that purified the social system from time to time, and enabled +it to hang on as it did--an extremely likely thing if it was composed +of nothing but bad and tumultuous men triumphing in general over the +better, and all going the bad road, in fact. Well, Oliver Cromwell's +Protectorate, or Dictatorate if you will, lasted for about ten years, +and you will find that nothing that was contrary to the laws of Heaven +was allowed to live by Oliver. (A laugh, and applause.) For example, +it was found by his Parliament, called "Barebones"--the most zealous +of all Parliaments probably--the Court of Chancery in England was in +a state that was really capable of no apology--no man could get up and +say that that was a right court. There were, I think, fifteen thousand +or fifteen hundred--(laughter)--I don't really remember which, but +we shall call it by the last (renewed laughter)--there were fifteen +hundred cases lying in it undecided; and one of them, I remember, for +a large amount of money, was eighty-three years old, and it was going +on still. Wigs were waving over it, and lawyers were taking their +fees, and there was no end of it, upon which the Barebones people, +after deliberation about it, thought it was expedient, and commanded +by the Author of Man and the Fountain of Justice, and for the true +and right, to abolish the court. Really, I don't know who could have +dissented from that opinion. At the same time, it was thought by those +who were wiser, and had more experience of the world, that it was a +very dangerous thing, and would never suit at all. The lawyers began +to make an immense noise about it. (Laughter.) All the public, the +great mass of solid and well-disposed people who had got no deep +insight into such matters, were very adverse to it, and the president +of it, old Sir Francis Rous, who translated the Psalms--those that +we sing every Sunday in the church yet--a very good man and a wise +man--the Provost of Eton--he got the minority, or I don't know whether +or no he did not persuade the majority--he, at any rate, got a great +number of the Parliament to go to Oliver the Dictator, and lay +down their functions altogether, and declare officially with their +signature on Monday morning that the Parliament was dissolved. + +The thing was passed on Saturday night, and on Monday morning Rous +came and said, "We cannot carry on the affair any longer, and we +remit it into the hands of your Highness." Oliver in that way became +Protector a second time. + +I give you this as an instance that Oliver felt that the Parliament +that had been dismissed had been perfectly right with regard to +Chancery, and that there was no doubt of the propriety of abolishing +Chancery, or reforming it in some kind of way. He considered it, and +this is what he did. He assembled sixty of the wisest lawyers to be +found in England. Happily, there were men great in the law--men who +valued the laws as much as anybody does now, I suppose. (A laugh.) +Oliver said to them, "Go and examine this thing, and in the name of +God inform me what is necessary to be done with regard to it. You will +see how we may clean out the foul things in it that render it poison +to everybody." Well, they sat down then, and in the course of six +weeks--there was no public speaking then, no reporting of speeches, +and no trouble of any kind; there was just the business in hand--they +got sixty propositions fixed in their minds of the things that +required to be done. And upon these sixty propositions Chancery was +reconstituted and remodelled, and so it has lasted to our time. It had +become a nuisance, and could not have continued much longer. + +That is an instance of the manner in which things were done when a +Dictatorship prevailed in the country, and that was what the Dictator +did. Upon the whole, I do not think that, in general, out of common +history books, you will ever get into the real history of this +country, or anything particular which it would beseem you to know. You +may read very ingenious and very clever books by men whom it would be +the height of insolence in me to do any other thing than express +my respect for. But their position is essentially sceptical. Man +is unhappily in that condition that he will make only a temporary +explanation of anything, and you will not be able, if you are like the +man, to understand how this island came to be what it is. You will not +find it recorded in books. You will find recorded in books a jumble +of tumults, disastrous ineptitudes, and all that kind of thing. But to +get what you want you will have to look into side sources, and inquire +in all directions. + +I remember getting Collins' _Peerage_ to read--a very poor peerage as +a work of genius, but an excellent book for diligence and fidelity--I +was writing on Oliver Cromwell at the time. (Applause.) I could get no +biographical dictionary, and I thought the peerage book would help +me, at least tell me whether people were old or young; and about all +persons concerned in the actions about which I wrote. I got a great +deal of help out of poor Collins. He was a diligent and dark London +bookseller of about a hundred years ago, who compiled out of all kinds +of treasury chests, archives, books that were authentic, and out +of all kinds of things out of which he could get the information he +wanted. He was a very meritorious man. I not only found the solution +of anything I wanted there, but I began gradually to perceive this +immense fact, which I really advise every one of you who read history +to look out for and read for--if he has not found it--it was that +the kings of England all the way from the Norman Conquest down to +the times of Charles I. had appointed, so far as they knew, those who +deserved to be appointed, peers. They were all Royal men, with minds +full of justice and valour and humanity, and all kinds of qualities +that are good for men to have who ought to rule over others. Then +their genealogy was remarkable--and there is a great deal more in +genealogies than is generally believed at present. + +I never heard tell of any clever man that came out of entirely stupid +people. If you look around the families of your acquaintance, you will +see such cases in all directions. I know that it has been the case in +mine. I can trace the father, and the son, and the grandson, and the +family stamp is quite distinctly legible upon each of them, so that +it goes for a great deal--the hereditary principle in Government as in +other things; and it must be recognised so soon as there is any fixity +in things. + +You will remark that if at any time the genealogy of a peerage +fails--if the man that actually holds the peerage is a fool in these +earnest striking times, the man gets into mischief and gets into +treason--he gets himself extinguished altogether, in fact. (Laughter.) + +From these documents of old Collins it seems that a peer conducts +himself in a solemn, good, pious, manly kind of way when he takes +leave of life, and when he has hospitable habits, and is valiant in +his procedure throughout; and that in general a King, with a noble +approximation to what was right, had nominated this man, saying "Come +you to me, sir; come out of the common level of the people, where +you are liable to be trampled upon; come here and take a district of +country and make it into your own image more or less; be a king under +me, and understand that that is your function." I say this is the most +divine thing that a human being can do to other human beings, and no +kind of being whatever has so much of the character of God Almighty's +Divine Government as that thing we see that went all over England, and +that is the grand soul of England's history. + +It is historically true that down to the time of Charles I., it was +not understood that any man was made a peer without having a merit in +him to constitute him a proper subject for a peerage. In Charles +I.'s time it grew to be known or said that if a man was by birth a +gentleman, and was worth L10,000 a-year, and bestowed his gifts up and +down among courtiers, he could be made a peer. Under Charles II. it +went on with still more rapidity, and has been going on with ever +increasing velocity until we see the perfect break-neck pace at which +they are now going. (A laugh.) And now a peerage is a paltry kind of +thing to what it was in these old times, I could go into a great many +more details about things of that sort, but I must turn to another +branch of the subject. + +One remark more about your reading. I do not know whether it has been +sufficiently brought home to you that there are two kinds of books. +When a man is reading on any kind of subject, in most departments of +books--in all books, if you take it in a wide sense--you will find +that there is a division of good books and bad books--there is a good +kind of a book and a bad kind of a book. I am not to assume that you +are all ill acquainted with this; but I may remind you that it is a +very important consideration at present. It casts aside altogether the +idea that people have that if they are reading any book--that if +an ignorant man is reading any book, he is doing rather better than +nothing at all. I entirely call that in question. I even venture to +deny it. (Laughter and cheers.) It would be much safer and better +would he have no concern with books at all than with some of them. You +know these are my views. There are a number, an increasing number, of +books that are decidedly to him not useful. (Hear.) But he will learn +also that a certain number of books were written by a supreme, noble +kind of people--not a very great number--but a great number adhere +more or less to that side of things. In short, as I have written +it down somewhere else, I conceive that books are like men's +souls--divided into sheep and goats. (Laughter and applause.) Some +of them are calculated to be of very great advantage in teaching--in +forwarding the teaching of all generations. Others are going down, +down, doing more and more, wilder and wilder mischief. + +And for the rest, in regard to all your studies here, and whatever +you may learn, you are to remember that the object is not particular +knowledge--that you are going to get higher in technical perfections, +and all that sort of thing. There is a higher aim lies at the rear of +all that, especially among those who are intended for literary, for +speaking pursuits--the sacred profession. You are ever to bear in +mind that there lies behind that the acquisition of what may be called +wisdom--namely, sound appreciation and just decision as to all the +objects that come round about you, and the habit of behaving with +justice and wisdom. In short, great is wisdom--great is the value +of wisdom. It cannot be exaggerated. The highest achievement of +man--"Blessed is he that getteth understanding." And that, I believe, +occasionally may be missed very easily; but never more easily than +now, I think. If that is a failure, all is a failure. However, I will +not touch further upon that matter. + +In this University I learn from many sides that there is a great and +considerable stir about endowments. Oh, I should have said in regard +to book reading, if it be so very important, how very useful would +an excellent library be in every University. I hope that will not be +neglected by those gentlemen who have charge of you--and, indeed, I am +happy to hear that your library is very much improved since the time I +knew it; and I hope it will go on improving more and more. You require +money to do that, and you require also judgment in the selectors of +the books--pious insight into what is really for the advantage of +human souls, and the exclusion of all kinds of clap-trap books which +merely excite the astonishment of foolish people. (Laughter.) Wise +books--as much as possible good books. + +As I was saying, there appears to be a great demand for endowments--an +assiduous and praiseworthy industry for getting new funds collected +for encouraging the ingenious youth of Universities, especially +in this the chief University of the country. (Hear, hear.) Well, I +entirely participate in everybody's approval of the movement. It +is very desirable. It should be responded to, and one expects most +assuredly will. At least, if it is not, it will be shameful to the +country of Scotland, which never was so rich in money as at the +present moment, and never stood so much in need of getting noble +Universities to counteract many influences that are springing up +alongside of money. It should not be backward in coming forward in +the way of endowments (a laugh)--at least, in rivalry to our rude +old barbarous ancestors, as we have been pleased to call them. Such +munificence as theirs is beyond all praise, to whom I am sorry to say +we are not yet by any manner of means equal or approaching equality. +(Laughter.) There is an overabundance of money, and sometimes I cannot +help thinking that, probably, never has there been at any other time +in Scotland the hundredth part of the money that now is, or even the +thousandth part, for wherever I go there is that gold-nuggeting (a +laugh)--that prosperity. + +Many men are counting their balances by millions. Money was never so +abundant, and nothing that is good to be done with it. ("Hear, hear," +and a laugh.) No man knows--or very few men know--what benefit to get +out of his money. In fact, it too often is secretly a curse to him. +Much better for him never to have had any. But I do not expect that +generally to be believed. (Laughter.) Nevertheless, I should think it +a beautiful relief to any man that has an honest purpose struggling +in him to bequeath a handsome house of refuge, so to speak, for some +meritorious man who may hereafter be born into the world, to enable +him a little to get on his way. To do, in fact, as those old Norman +kings whom I have described to you--to raise a man out of the dirt and +mud where he is getting trampled, unworthily on his part, into some +kind of position where he may acquire the power to do some good in his +generation. I hope that as much as possible will be done in that way; +that efforts will not be relaxed till the thing is in a satisfactory +state. At the same time, in regard to the classical department of +things, it is to be desired that it were properly supported--that +we could allow people to go and devote more leisure possibly to the +cultivation of particular departments. + +We might have more of this from Scotch Universities than we have. I +am bound, however, to say that it does not appear as if of late times +endowment was the real soul of the matter. The English, for example, +are the richest people for endowments on the face of the earth in +their Universities; and it is a remarkable fact that since the time +of Bentley you cannot name anybody that has gained a great name in +scholarship among them, or constituted a point of revolution in the +pursuits of men in that way. The man that did that is a man worthy +of being remembered among men, although he may be a poor man, and not +endowed with worldly wealth. One man that actually did constitute +a revolution was the son of a poor weaver in Saxony, who edited his +"Tibullus" in Dresden in the room of a poor comrade, and who, while he +was editing his "Tibullus," had to gather his pease-cod shells on the +streets and boil them for his dinner. That was his endowment. But he +was recognised soon to have done a great thing. His name was Heyne. + +I can remember it was quite a revolution in my mind when I got hold +of that man's book on Virgil. I found that for the first time I had +understood him--that he had introduced me for the first time into +an insight of Roman life, and pointed out the circumstances in which +these were written, and here was interpretation; and it has gone on in +all manner of development, and has spread out into other countries. + +Upon the whole, there is one reason why endowments are not given now +as they were in old days, when they founded abbeys, colleges, and all +kinds of things of that description, with such success as we know. All +that has changed now. Why that has decayed away may in part be that +people have become doubtful that colleges are now the real sources +of that which I call wisdom, whether they are anything more--anything +much more--than a cultivating of man in the specific arts. In fact, +there has been a suspicion of that kind in the world for a long time. +(A laugh.) That is an old saying, an old proverb, "An ounce of mother +wit is worth a pound of clergy." (Laughter.) There is a suspicion that +a man is perhaps not nearly so wise as he looks, or because he has +poured out speech so copiously. (Laughter.) + +When the seven free Arts on which the old Universities were based came +to be modified a little, in order to be convenient for or to promote +the wants of modern society--though, perhaps, some of them are +obsolete enough even yet for some of us--there arose a feeling that +mere vocality, mere culture of speech, if that is what comes out of a +man, though he may be a great speaker, an eloquent orator, yet there +is no real substance there--if that is what was required and aimed at +by the man himself, and by the community that set him upon becoming +a learned man. Maid-servants, I hear people complaining, are getting +instructed in the "ologies," and so on, and are apparently totally +ignorant of brewing, boiling, and baking (laughter); above all things, +not taught what is necessary to be known, from the highest to the +lowest--strict obedience, humility, and correct moral conduct. Oh, it +is a dismal chapter, all that, if one went into it! + +What has been done by rushing after fine speech? I have written down +some very fierce things about that, perhaps considerably more emphatic +than I would wish them to be now; but they are deeply my conviction. +(Hear, hear.) There is very great necessity indeed of getting a little +more silent than we are. It seems to me the finest nations of the +world--the English and the American--are going all away into wind +and tongue. (Applause and laughter.) But it will appear sufficiently +tragical by-and-bye, long after I am away out of it. Silence is the +eternal duty of a man. He wont get to any real understanding of +what is complex, and, what is more than any other, pertinent to his +interests, without maintaining silence. "Watch the tongue," is a very +old precept, and a most true one. I do not want to discourage any +of you from your Demosthenes, and your studies of the niceties of +language, and all that. Believe me, I value that as much as any of +you. I consider it a very graceful thing, and a proper thing, for +every human creature to know what the implement which he uses in +communicating his thoughts is, and how to make the very utmost of it. +I want you to study Demosthenes, and know all his excellencies. At the +same time, I must say that speech does not seem to me, on the whole, +to have turned to any good account. + +Why tell me that a man is a fine speaker if it is not the truth that +he is speaking? Phocion, who did not speak at all, was a great deal +nearer hitting the mark than Demosthenes. (Laughter.) He used to tell +the Athenians--"You can't fight Philip. You have not the slightest +chance with him. He is a man who holds his tongue; he has great +disciplined armies; he can brag anybody you like in your cities here; +and he is going on steadily with an unvarying aim towards his object: +and he will infallibly beat any kind of men such as you, going +on raging from shore to shore with all that rampant nonsense." +Demosthenes said to him one day--"The Athenians will get mad some day +and kill you." "Yes," Phocion says, "when they are mad; and you as +soon as they get sane again." (Laughter.) + +It is also told about him going to Messina on some deputation that +the Athenians wanted on some kind of matter of an intricate and +contentious nature, that Phocion went with some story in his mouth to +speak about. He was a man of few words--no unveracity; and after he +had gone on telling the story a certain time there was one burst of +interruption. One man interrupted with something he tried to answer, +and then another; and, finally, the people began bragging and bawling, +and no end of debate, till it ended in the want of power in the people +to say any more. Phocion drew back altogether, struck dumb, and would +not speak another word to any man; and he left it to them to decide in +any way they liked. + +It appears to me there is a kind of eloquence in that which is equal +to anything Demosthenes ever said--"Take your own way, and let me out +altogether." (Applause.) + +All these considerations, and manifold more connected with +them--innumerable considerations, resulting from observation of the +world at this moment--have led many people to doubt of the salutary +effect of vocal education altogether. I do not mean to say it should +be entirely excluded; but I look to something that will take hold +of the matter much more closely, and not allow it slip out of our +fingers, and remain worse than it was. For if a good speaker--an +eloquent speaker--is not speaking the truth, is there a more horrid +kind of object in creation? (Loud cheers.) Of such speech I hear all +manner and kind of people say it is excellent; but I care very little +about how he said it, provided I understand it, and it be true. +Excellent speaker! but what if he is telling me things that are +untrue, that are not the fact about it--if he has formed a wrong +judgment about it--if he has no judgment in his mind to form a right +conclusion in regard to the matter? An excellent speaker of that kind +is, as it were, saying--"Ho, every one that wants to be persuaded +of the thing that is not true, come hither." (Great laughter and +applause.) I would recommend you to be very chary of that kind of +excellent speech. (Renewed laughter.) + +Well, all that being the too well-known product of our method of vocal +education--the mouth merely operating on the tongue of the pupil, and +teaching him to wag it in a particular way (laughter)--it had made a +great many thinking men entertain a very great distrust of this not +very salutary way of procedure, and they have longed for some kind of +practical way of working out the business. There would be room for +a great deal of description about it if I went into it; but I must +content myself with saying that the most remarkable piece of reading +that you may be recommended to take and try if you can study is a book +by Goethe--one of his last books, which he wrote when he was an old +man, about seventy years of age--I think one of the most beautiful +he ever wrote, full of mild wisdom, and which is found to be very +touching by those who have eyes to discern and hearts to feel it. It +is one of the pieces in "Wilhelm Meister's Travels." I read it through +many years ago; and, of course, I had to read into it very hard when +I was translating it (applause), and it has always dwelt in my mind +as about the most remarkable bit of writing that I have known to be +executed in these late centuries. I have often said, there are ten +pages of that which, if ambition had been my only rule, I would rather +have written than have written all the books that have appeared since +I came into the world. (Cheers.) Deep, deep is the meaning of what +is said there. They turn on the Christian religion and the religious +phenomena of Christian life--altogether sketched out in the most airy, +graceful, delicately-wise kind of way, so as to keep himself out +of the common controversies of the street and of the forum, yet to +indicate what was the result of things he had been long meditating +upon. Among others, he introduces, in an aerial, flighty kind of way, +here and there a touch which grows into a beautiful picture--a scheme +of entirely mute education, at least with no more speech than is +absolutely necessary for what they have to do. + +Three of the wisest men that can be got are met to consider what is +the function which transcends all others in importance to build up +the young generation, which shall be free from all that perilous stuff +that has been weighing us down and clogging every step, and which is +the only thing we can hope to go on with if we would leave the world +a little better, and not the worse of our having been in it for those +who are to follow. The man who is the eldest of the three says to +Goethe, "You give by nature to the well-formed children you bring into +the world a great many precious gifts, and very frequently these are +best of all developed by nature herself, with a very slight assistance +where assistance is seen to be wise and profitable, and forbearance +very often on the part of the overlooker of the process of education; +but there is one thing that no child brings into the world with it, +and without which all other things are of no use." Wilhelm, who is +there beside him, says, "What is that?" "All who enter the world want +it," says the eldest; "perhaps you yourself." Wilhelm says, +"Well, tell me what it is." "It is," says the eldest, +"reverence--_Ehrfurcht_--Reverence! Honour done to those who are +grander and better than you, without fear; distinct from fear." +_Ehrfurcht_--"the soul of all religion that ever has been among +men, or ever will be." And he goes into practicality. He practically +distinguishes the kinds of religion that are in the world, and he +makes out three reverences. The boys are all trained to go through +certain gesticulations, to lay their hands on their breast and look +up to heaven, and they give their three reverences. The first and +simplest is that of reverence for what is above us. It is the soul +of all the Pagan religions; there is nothing better in man than that. +Then there is reverence for what is around us or about us--reverence +for our equals, and to which he attributes an immense power in the +culture of man. The third is reverence for what is beneath us--to +learn to recognise in pain, sorrow, and contradiction, even in those +things, odious as they are to flesh and blood--to learn that there +lies in these a priceless blessing. And he defines that as being +the soul of the Christian religion--the highest of all religions; a +height, as Goethe says--and that is very true, even to the letter, as +I consider--a height to which the human species was fated and enabled +to attain, and from which, having once attained it, it can never +retrograde. It cannot descend down below that permanently, Goethe's +idea is. + +Often one thinks it was good to have a faith of that kind--that +always, even in the most degraded, sunken, and unbelieving times, he +calculates there will be found some few souls who will recognise what +that meant; and that the world, having once received it, there is no +fear of its retrograding. He goes on then to tell us the way in which +they seek to teach boys, in the sciences particularly, whatever the +boy is fit for. Wilhelm left his own boy there, expecting they would +make him a Master of Arts, or something of that kind; and when he came +back for him he saw a thundering cloud of dust coming over the plain, +of which he could make nothing. It turned out to be a tempest of wild +horses, managed by young lads who had a turn for hunting with their +grooms. His own son was among them, and he found that the breaking of +colts was the thing he was most suited for. (Laughter.) This is +what Goethe calls Art, which I should not make clear to you by any +definition unless it is clear already. (A laugh.) I would not attempt +to define it as music, painting, and poetry, and so on; it is in quite +a higher sense than the common one, and in which, I am afraid, most of +our painters, poets, and music men would not pass muster. (A laugh.) +He considers that the highest pitch to which human culture can go; and +he watches with great industry how it is to be brought about with men +who have a turn for it. + +Very wise and beautiful it is. It gives one an idea that something +greatly better is possible for man in the world. I confess it seems to +me it is a shadow of what will come, unless the world is to come to +a conclusion that is perfectly frightful; some kind of scheme of +education like that, presided over by the wisest and most sacred men +that can be got in the world, and watching from a distance--a training +in practicality at every turn; no speech in it except that speech that +is to be followed by action, for that ought to be the rule as nearly +as possible among them. For rarely should men speak at all unless it +is to say that thing that is to be done; and let him go and do his +part in it, and to say no more about it. I should say there is nothing +in the world you can conceive so difficult, _prima facie_, as that +of getting a set of men gathered together--rough, rude, and ignorant +people--gather them together, promise them a shilling a day, rank +them up, give them very severe and sharp drill, and by bullying and +drill--for the word "drill" seems as if it meant the treatment that +would force them to learn--they learn what it is necessary to learn; +and there is the man, a piece of an animated machine, a wonder of +wonders to look at. He will go and obey one man, and walk into the +cannon's mouth for him, and do anything whatever that is commanded of +him by his general officer. And I believe all manner of things in +this way could be done if there were anything like the same attention +bestowed. Very many things could be regimented and organized into the +mute system of education that Goethe evidently adumbrates there. But I +believe, when people look into it, it will be found that they will not +be very long in trying to make some efforts in that direction; for the +saving of human labour, and the avoidance of human misery, would be +uncountable if it were set about and begun even in part. + +Alas! it is painful to think how very far away it is--any fulfilment +of such things; for I need not hide from you, young gentlemen--and +that is one of the last things I am going to tell you--that you have +got into a very troublous epoch of the world; and I don't think +you will find it improve the footing you have, though you have many +advantages which we had not. You have careers open to you, by public +examinations and so on, which is a thing much to be approved, and +which we hope to see perfected more and more. All that was entirely +unknown in my time, and you have many things to recognise as +advantages. But you will find the ways of the world more anarchical +than ever, I think. As far as I have noticed, revolution has come upon +us. We have got into the age of revolutions. All kinds of things are +coming to be subjected to fire, as it were; hotter and hotter the wind +rises around everything. + +Curious to say, now in Oxford and other places that used to seem to +live at anchor in the stream of time, regardless of all changes, they +are getting into the highest humour of mutation, and all sorts of new +ideas are getting afloat. It is evident that whatever is not made of +asbestos will have to be burnt in this world. It will not stand the +heat it is getting exposed to. And in saying that, it is but saying +in other words that we are in an epoch of anarchy--anarchy _plus_ the +constable. (Laughter.) There is nobody that picks one's pocket without +some policeman being ready to take him up. (Renewed laughter.) But in +every other thing he is the son, not of Kosmos, but of Chaos. He is +a disobedient, and reckless, and altogether a waste kind of +object--commonplace man in these epochs; and the wiser kind of +man--the select, of whom I hope you will be part--has more and more a +set time to it to look forward, and will require to move with double +wisdom; and will find, in short, that the crooked things that he has +to pull straight in his own life, or round about, wherever he may be, +are manifold, and will task all his strength wherever he may go. + +But why should I complain of that either?--for that is a thing a +man is born to in all epochs. He is born to expend every particle of +strength that God Almighty has given him, in doing the work he finds +he is fit for--to stand it out to the last breath of life, and do his +best. We are called upon to do that; and the reward we all get--which +we are perfectly sure of if we have merited it--is that we have got +the work done, or, at least, that we have tried to do the work; for +that is a great blessing in itself; and I should say there is not very +much more reward than that going in this world. If the man gets meat +and clothes, what matters it whether he have L10,000, or L10,000,000, +or L70 a-year. He can get meat and clothes for that; and he will find +very little difference intrinsically, if he is a wise man. + +I warmly second the advice of the wisest of men--"Don't be ambitious; +don't be at all too desirous to success; be loyal and modest." Cut +down the proud towering thoughts that you get into you, or see they be +pure as well as high. There is a nobler ambition than the gaining of +all California would be, or the getting of all the suffrages that are +on the planet just now. (Loud and prolonged cheers.) + +Finally, gentlemen, I have one advice to give you, which is +practically of very great importance, though a very humble one. + +I have no doubt you will have among you people ardently bent to +consider life cheap, for the purpose of getting forward in what they +are aiming at of high; and you are to consider throughout, much more +than is done at present, that health is a thing to be attended to +continually--that you are to regard that as the very highest of all +temporal things for you. (Applause.) There is no kind of achievement +you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. What are +nuggets and millions? The French financier said, "Alas! why is there +no sleep to be sold?" Sleep was not in the market at any quotation. +(Laughter and applause.) + +It is a curious thing that I remarked long ago, and have often +turned in my head, that the old word for "holy" in the German +language--_heilig_--also means "healthy." And so _Heil-bronn_ means +"holy-well," or "healthy-well." We have in the Scotch "hale;" and, +I suppose our English word "whole"--with a "w"--all of one piece, +without any hole in it--is the same word. I find that you could +not get any better definition of what "holy" really is than +"healthy--completely healthy." _Mens sana in corpore sano_. +(Applause.) + +A man with his intellect a clear, plain, geometric mirror, brilliantly +sensitive of all objects and impressions around it, and imagining all +things in their correct proportions--not twisted up into convex or +concave, and distorting everything, so that he cannot see the truth of +the matter without endless groping and manipulation--healthy, clear, +and free, and all round about him. We never can attain that at all. +In fact, the operations we have got into are destructive of it. You +cannot, if you are going to do any decisive intellectual operation--if +you are going to write a book--at least, I never could--without +getting decidedly made ill by it, and really you must if it is your +business--and you must follow out what you are at--and it sometimes +is at the expense of health. Only remember at all times to get back +as fast as possible out of it into health, and regard the real +equilibrium as the centre of things. You should always look at the +_heilig_, which means holy, and holy means healthy. + +Well, that old etymology--what a lesson it is against certain gloomy, +austere, ascetic people, that have gone about as if this world were +all a dismal-prison house! It has, indeed, got all the ugly things in +it that I have been alluding to; but there is an eternal sky over it, +and the blessed sunshine, verdure of spring, and rich autumn, and all +that in it, too. Piety does not mean that a man should make a sour +face about things, and refuse to enjoy in moderation what his Maker +has given. Neither do you find it to have been so with old Knox. If +you look into him you will find a beautiful Scotch humour in him, as +well as the grimmest and sternest truth when necessary, and a great +deal of laughter. We find really some of the sunniest glimpses of +things come out of Knox that I have seen in any man; for instance, in +his "History of the Reformation," which is a book I hope every one of +you will read--a glorious book. + +On the whole, I would bid you stand up to your work, whatever it may +be, and not be afraid of it--not in sorrows or contradiction to yield, +but pushing on towards the goal. And don't suppose that people are +hostile to you in the world. You will rarely find anybody designedly +doing you ill. You may feel often as if the whole world is obstructing +you, more or less; but you will find that to be because the world +is travelling in a different way from you, and rushing on in its own +path. Each man has only an extremely good-will to himself--which he +has a right to have--and is moving on towards his object. Keep out of +literature as a general rule, I should say also. (Laughter.) If you +find many people who are hard and indifferent to you in a world that +you consider to be unhospitable and cruel--as often, indeed, happens +to a tender-hearted, stirring young creature--you will also find there +are noble hearts who will look kindly on you, and their help will be +precious to you beyond price. You will get good and evil as you go on, +and have the success that has been appointed to you. + +I will wind up with a small bit of verse that is from Goethe also, +and has often gone through my mind. To me it has the tone of a modern +psalm in it in some measure. It is sweet and clear. The clearest +of sceptical men had not anything like so clear a mind as that man +had--freer from cant and misdirected notion of any kind than any man +in these ages has been This is what the poet says:-- + + The Future hides in it + Gladness and sorrow: + We press still thorow; + Nought that abides in it + Daunting us--Onward! + + And solemn before us, + Veiled, the dark Portal, + Goal of all mortal. + Stars silent rest o'er us-- + Graves under us, silent. + + While earnest thou gazest + Comes boding of terror, + Come phantasm and error; + Perplexes the bravest + With doubt and misgiving. + + But heard are the voices, + Heard are the Sages, + The Worlds and the Ages: + "Choose well: your choice is + Brief, and yet endless." + + Here eyes do regard you + In Eternity's stillness; + Here is all fulness, + Ye brave, to reward you. + Work, and despair not.[A] + +[Footnote A: Originally published in Carlyle's "Past and Present," +(Lond. 1843,) p. 318, and introduced there by the following words:-- + +"My candid readers, we will march out of this Third Book with a +rhythmic word of Goethe's on our tongue; a word which perhaps has +already sung itself, in dark hours and in bright, through many a +heart. To me, finding it devout yet wholly credible and veritable, +full of piety yet free of cant; to me joyfully finding much in it, and +joyfully missing so much in it, this little snatch of music, by the +greatest German man, sounds like a stanza in the grand _Road Song_ +and _Marching Song_ of our great Teutonic kindred,--wending, wending, +valiant and victorious, through the undiscovered Deeps of Time!"] + +One last word. _Wir heissen euch hoffen_--we bid you be of hope. Adieu +for this time. + + + + +THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR IN EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY. + + +The following is a letter addressed by Mr. Carlyle to Dr. Hutchison +Stirling, late one of the candidates for the Chair of Moral Philosophy +in the University of Edinburgh:-- + + "Chelsea, 16th June, 1868. + + "DEAR STIRLING,-- + +"You well know how reluctant I have been to interfere at all in the +election now close on us, and that in stating, as bound, what my own +clear knowledge of your qualities was, I have strictly held by that, +and abstained from more. But the news I now have from Edinburgh is of +such a complexion, so dubious, and so surprising to me; and I now find +I shall privately have so much regret in a certain event--which +seems to be reckoned possible, and to depend on one gentleman of the +seven--that, to secure my own conscience in the matter, a few plainer +words seem needful. To whatever I have said of you already, therefore, +I now volunteer to add, that I think you not only the one man in +Britain capable of bringing Metaphysical Philosophy, in the ultimate, +German or European, and highest actual form of it, distinctly home to +the understanding of British men who wish to understand it, but that +I notice in you farther, on the moral side, a sound strength of +intellectual discernment, a noble valour and reverence of mind, which +seems to me to mark you out as the man capable of doing us the highest +service in Ethical science too: that of restoring, or decisively +beginning to restore, the doctrine of morals to what I must ever +reckon its one true and everlasting basis (namely, the divine or +supra-sensual one), and thus of victoriously reconciling and rendering +identical the latest dictates of modern science with the earliest +dawnings of wisdom among the race of men. + +"This is truly my opinion, and how important to me, not for the sake +of Edinburgh University alone, but of the whole world for ages to +come, I need not say to you! I have not the honour of any personal +acquaintance with Mr. Adam Black, late member for Edinburgh, but for +fifty years back have known him, in the distance, and by current and +credible report, as a man of solid sense, independence, probity, and +public spirit; and if, in your better knowledge of the circumstances, +you judge it suitable to read this note to him--to him, or indeed to +any other person--you are perfectly at liberty to do so. + + "Yours sincerely always, + + "T. CARLYLE." +[Illustration] + + + + +FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS. + + +Mr. Carlyle, ex-Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, being +asked before the expiration of his term of office, to deliver a +valedictory address to the students, he sent the following letter to +Mr. Robertson, Vice-President of the Committee for his election:-- + + "Chelsea, December 6, 1868. + +"DEAR SIR,-- + +"I much regret that a valedictory speech from me, in present +circumstances, is a thing I must not think of. Be pleased to advise +the young gentlemen who were so friendly towards me that I have +already sent them, in silence, but with emotions deep enough, perhaps +too deep, my loving farewell, and that ingratitude or want of regard +is by no means among the causes that keep me absent. With a fine +youthful enthusiasm, beautiful to look upon, they bestowed on me that +bit of honour, loyally all they had; and it has now, for reasons one +and another, become touchingly memorable to me--touchingly, and even +grandly and tragically--never to be forgotten for the remainder of +my life. Bid them, in my name, if they still love me, fight the good +fight, and quit themselves like men in the warfare to which they are +as if conscript and consecrated, and which lies ahead. Tell them to +consult the eternal oracles (not yet inaudible, nor ever to become so, +when worthily inquired of); and to disregard, nearly altogether, in +comparison, the temporary noises, menacings, and deliriums. May they +love wisdom, as wisdom, if she is to yield her treasures, must be +loved, piously, valiantly, humbly, beyond life itself, or the prizes +of life, with all one's heart and all one's soul. In that case (I will +say again), and not in any other case, it shall be well with them. + +"Adieu, my young friends, a long adieu, yours with great sincerity, + + "T. CARLYLE" + + + + +BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE. + + +At a meeting of the Senatus Academicus of Edinburgh University, a few +weeks after his decease, a deed of mortification by Thomas Carlyle +in favour of that body, for the foundation of ten Bursaries in the +Faculty of Arts, was read. The document opens as follows:-- + +"I, Thomas Carlyle, residing at Chelsea, presently Rector in the +University of Edinburgh, from the love, favour and affection which I +bear to that University, and from my interest in the advancement of +education in my native Scotland, as elsewhere, for these and for other +more peculiar reasons, which also I wish to record, do intend, and +am now in the act of making to the said University, a bequest, +as underwritten, of the estate of Craigenputtoch, which is now my +property. Craigenputtoch lies at the head of the parish of Dunscore, +in Nithsdale, Dumfriesshire. The extent is of about 1,800 acres; +rental at present, on lease of nineteen years, is L250; the annual +worth, with the improvements now in progress, is probably L300. +Craigenputtoch was for many generations the patrimony of a family +named Welsh, the eldest son usually a 'John Welsh,' in series going +back, think some, to the famous John Welsh, son-in-law of the reformer +Knox. The last male heir of the family was John Welsh, Esq., surgeon, +Haddington. His one child and heiress was my late dear, magnanimous, +much-loving, and, to me, inestimable wife, in memory of whom, and +of her constant nobleness and piety towards him and towards me, I am +now--she having been the last of her kindred--about to bequeath to +Edinburgh University with whatever piety is in me this Craigenputtoch, +which was theirs and hers, on the terms, and for the purposes, and +under the conditions underwritten. Therefore I do mortify and +dispose to and in favour of the said University of Edinburgh, for +the foundation and endowment of ten equal Bursaries, to be called +the 'John Welsh Bursaries,' in the said University, heritably and +irredeemably, all and whole the lands of Upper Craigenputtoch. The +said estate is not to be sold, but to be kept and administered as +land, the net annual revenue of it to be divided into ten equal +Bursaries, to be called, as aforesaid, the 'John Welsh Bursaries.' The +Senatus Academicus shall bestow them on the ten applicants entering +the University who, on strict and thorough examination and open +competitive trial by examiners whom the Senatus will appoint for that +end, are judged to show the best attainment of actual proficiency and +the best likelihood of more in the department or faculty called of +arts, as taught there. Examiners to be actual professors in said +faculty, the fittest whom the Senatus can select, with fit assessors +or coadjutors and witnesses, if the Senatus see good, and always the +report of the said examiners to be minuted and signed, and to govern +the appointments made, and to be recorded therewith. More specially I +appoint that five of the 'John Welsh Bursaries' shall be given for the +best proficiency in mathematics--I would rather say 'in mathesis,' if +that were a thing to be judged of from competition--but practically +above all in pure geometry, such being perennial, the symptom not +only of steady application, but of a clear, methodic intellect, +and offering in all epochs good promise for all manner of arts and +pursuits. The other five Bursaries I appoint to depend (for the +present and indefinitely onwards) on proficiency in classical +learning, that is to say, in knowledge of Latin, Greek, and English, +all of these, or any two of them. This also gives good promise of a +young mind, but as I do not feel certain that it gives perennially or +will perennially be thought in universities to give the best promise, +I am willing that the Senatus of the University, in case of a change +of its opinion on this point hereafter in the course of generations, +shall bestow these latter five Bursaries on what it does then consider +the most excellent proficiency in matters classical, or the best proof +of a classical mind, which directs its own highest effort towards +teaching and diffusing in the new generations that will come. The +Bursaries to be open to free competition of all who come to study in +Edinburgh University, and who have never been of any other University, +the competition to be held on or directly before or after their first +matriculation there. Bursaries to be always given on solemnly strict +and faithful trial to the worthiest, or if (what in justice can never +happen, though it illustrates my intention) the claims of two +were absolutely equal, and could not be settled by further trial, +preference is to fall in favour of the more unrecommended and +unfriended under penalties graver than I, or any highest mortal, can +pretend to impose, but which I can never doubt--as the law of eternal +justice, inexorably valid, whether noticed or unnoticed, pervades all +corners of space and of time--are very sure to be punctually exacted +if incurred. This is to be the perpetual rule for the Senatus in +deciding." + +After stating some other conditions, the document thus concludes: + +"And so may a little trace of help to the young heroic soul struggling +for what is highest spring from this poor arrangement and bequest. +May it run for ever, if it can, as a thread of pure water from the +Scottish rocks, trickling into its little basin by the thirsty wayside +for those to whom it veritably belongs. Amen. Such is my bequest to +Edinburgh University. In witness whereof these presents, written upon +this and the two preceding pages by James Steven Burns, clerk to John +Cook, writer to the signet, are subscribed by me at Chelsea, the +20th day of June, 1867, before these witnesses: John Forster, +barrister-at-law, man of letters, etc., residing at Palace-gate House, +Kensington, London; and James Anthony Froude, man of letters, residing +at No. 5, Onslow Gardens, Brompton, London. + + "_(Signed)_ T. CARLYLE. + + "JOHN FORSTER,} + "J.A. FROUDE, } _Witnesses_. + +[Illustration] + + + + +INDEX. + + + Abelard, 134. + Aitken, Mary, 117. + Allingham, Mrs., her sketch of Carlyle, 121. + Annan, Academy, 9. + Anspach's _History_ of Newfoundland, 13. + Arnold, Thomas, visits the field of Naseby with Carlyle, 63, 64. + + Baillie, Joanna, her Metrical Legends, 13. + Bentley, Richard, the last of English scholars, 162. + Black, Adam, 191. + Boehm, Mr., his medallion and statue of Carlyle, 116, 120, 121. + Braidwood Testimonial, 85, 86. + Brewster, Sir David, his Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, 10, 11; + writes a Preface to Carlyle's Translation of Legendre, 13; + presides at Carlyle's installation as Rector of Edinburgh + University, 90, 93, 96. + Buchanan, George, 47. + Buller, Charles, Carlyle becomes tutor to, 15; + his death, 74; + Carlyle's tribute to, 75-80. + Burns, Robert, 67. + + Cameron, Mrs., her photograph of Carlyle, 120. + Carlyle, Jane Welsh, Goethe's verses to, 20; + described by Margaret Fuller, 68, 69; + death of, 109; + funeral, 110; + inscription on her tombstone, 111. + Carlyle, Thomas, birth and parentage, 8; + early studies, 9; + school-mastering, 9-10; + first attempts in literature, 10-14; + Buller tutorship, 15; + German translations, 15-17; + his marriage, 17; + life at Craigenputtoch, 17-18; + removes to London, 25; + his affection for Leigh Hunt, 26; + letter to Major Richardson, 40; + his Lectures, 45; + advice to a young man, 54; + defence of Mazzini, 59; + visit to Rugby, 63; + his letter to Sir William Napier, 81; + the Edinburgh Rectorship and Address, 87-109; + death of his wife, 109; + on the Jamaica insurrection, 112; + latest writings, 115; + medal and address, 116; + closing years of life, 117; + his _Reminiscences_, 118; + portraits of, 119. + Carlyle, John A., his Translation of Dante, 98; + death of, 117. + Chelsea, old memories of, 25; + Carlyle fixes his residence there, 25, 26. + Collins's Peerage, 152. + Craigenputtoch, 17; + description of by Carlyle, in a letter to Goethe, 18. + Cromwell, Oliver, Letters and Speeches, 68; + his Protectorate, 145 + Cunningham, Allan, on old age, 44: + + Demosthenes, 166. + De Quincey, Thomas, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16 + D'Orsay, Count, his Portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Dumfries, 18. + + Emerson, Ralph Waldo, his visit to Carlyle at Craigenputtoch, 21; + his Essays introduced to the English public by Carlyle, 52; + Margaret Fuller's letter to him, 64. + Eyre, Edward John, Carlyle's defence of, 112. + + Ferguson's Roman History, 140. + Fichte, 37. + Forster, John, 200. + Fraser's Magazine, 20, 22, 115, 119. + Frederick the Great, History of, 81, 87. + French Revolution, History of the, 38. + Froude, James Anthony, 118, 200. + Fuller, Margaret, her Letter to Emerson describing Carlyle's + conversation, 65-73. + + German Romance, 16. + Gibbon, 23. + Goethe, his _Faust_, 13; + his _Wilhelm Meister_ translated by Carlyle, 15; + Carlyle's letters to him, 18; + writes an Introduction to the German translation of Carlyle's Life + of Schiller, 20; + his verses to Mrs. Carlyle, _ib_.; + Wilhelm Meister's Travels, 170-171; + Verses by him, quoted, 186, 187. + Grant, James, quoted, 46, 48-52. + + Hannay, James, on Carlyle, 47. + Heyne, his Tibullus and Virgil, 162-163. + Hoffmann, Carlyle's translation from, 16. + Horne, R.H., quoted, 27, 28. + Houghton, Lord, breakfast party at his house, 38. + Hunt, Leigh, invited by Carlyle to visit him in Dumfriesshire. 26; + settles at Chelsea, _ib_.; + characteristic anecdote, 27; + leaves Chelsea, 28; + Carlyle's eulogium on, 29; + Carlyle's opinion + of his Autobiography, 33; + quoted, 35, 46. + + Ireland, Carlyle's papers on, 74. + Irving, Edward, 10, 40. + + Jeffrey, Lord, his critique on Wilhelm Meister, 16; + Carlyle's Reminiscences of, 119. + Johnson, Samuel, advice as to reading, 55. + + Kirkcaldy, 10. + Knox, John, an ancestor of Carlyle's wife, 17, 196; + grim humour of, 47; + the portraits of, 115; + belongs to the select of the earth, 142-143; + his History of the Reformation, 184-185. + + Lally, at Pondicherry, 84. + La Motte Fouque, Carlyle's Translations from, 16. + Landor, Walter Savage, 23, 38. + Latter-Day Pamphlets, 80. + Laurence, Samuel, his portrait of Carlyle, 119. + Legendre's Geometry, translated by Carlyle, 13, 14. + Leslie, Sir John, 9. + Lewes, George Henry, 66. + London Magazine, The, 15, 16. + Louis Philippe, 74. + + Machiavelli on Democracy, 107, 146. + Maclise, Daniel, 119. + Mazzini, his articles on Carlyle, 58; + Carlyle's defence of his character, 59; + remonstrates vainly with Carlyle, 69. + Milnes, R. M., see _Houghton_, Lord. + Mirabeau, 23. + Moore, Thomas, meets Carlyle at a breakfast party, 38. + Musaeus, Carlyle's translations from, 17. + + Napier, Sir William, his History of the Administration of Scinde 81; + Carlyle's letter to him, 81-85. + Necker, Carlyle's biography of him, quoted, 11. + Nero, death of, 22. + Newfoundland, Carlyle's account of, quoted, 12. + + Ossoli, see _Fuller_. + + _Past and Present_, 53; + quoted, 187-188. + _Paul et Virginie_, 44. + Petrarch and _Laura_, 67. + Phocion, 167. + + Quincey, see _De Quincey_. + + Richardson, David Lester, his _Literary Leaves_, 40; + Carlyle's letter to him, 40-44. + Richter, Jean Paul, 17. + Robinson, Henry Crabb, 38, 39. + Rous, Sir Francis, 148. + Rousseau, at St. Pierre, 19; + his Confessions, 23. + Ruskin, John, his praise of Boehm's statue of Carlyle, 116, 121. + Rugby School, 63, 64. + + _Sartor Resartus_, 36, 37. + Schiller, Friedrich, Carlyle's life of him, 15; + Supplement to, 115. + Shakespeare, 67. + Smith, Alexander, his account of the delivery of Carlyle's Address at + Edinburgh, 87-92. + Socrates, disparaged by Carlyle, 23. + Sophocles, the tragedies of, 141. + Sterling, John, 37, 38; + death of, 62; + Carlyle's life of him, 81. + Stirling, Dr., Carlyle's letter to, 189-191. + + Tennyson, why he wrote in verse, 67. + Teufelsdroeckh, 36, 68. + Thackeray, W.M., his verses on the death of Charles Buller, 15, 74-75. + Tieck, 17. + Turveydrop senior, on Polished Deportment, 49. + + University of Edinburgh, 125. + + Watts, G.F., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + Welsh family, 17. + Whistler, J.A., his portrait of Carlyle, 120. + + Youth, the golden season of life, 130. + + Zoilus, 19. + +THE END. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's On the Choice of Books, by Thomas Carlyle + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE CHOICE OF BOOKS *** + +***** This file should be named 13435.txt or 13435.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/3/4/3/13435/ + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer, S.R.Ellison and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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