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Home , Sartor Resartus, Thomas Carlyle

CARLYLE'S HANDLING OF THE "LAWS OF NATURE" CONCEPT

A Thesis

Submitted to the Faculty of G~duate Studies and Research of McGill University

by William R. Taggart

In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts

May - 1952 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Pa~e I. Introduction ------References ------10 II. Background; Early Influences ------11 References ------1? III. The Influence of German Philosophy and Literature 18 References ------28 IV. Development and Growth of the "Nature" Concept~ Early essays; Sartor Resartu'8; The ; --- 29 References ------51 v. The "Laws of Nature" in.the lectures 54 References ------?0

VI. ?2 References ------92 VII. ; Exodus from Houndsditch; The N1gger Question --- , ------95 References ------106 VIII.Latter-Day Pamphlets ------10? References ------134 IX. Spiritual Optics; ; Carlyle's Consistent Reference to the "Laws of Nature" 13? References ------148 x. Recapitu~ation and Conclusion ------149 References ------156 Bibliography ------15? I. INTRODUCTION

"his strange mystic, almost magic Diagram of the Universe, and how it was gradually drawn, is nothenceforth altogether dark to us. Those mysterious ideas on TIME, which merit consideration, and are not wholly unintelligible with such, may by and by prove significant. Still more may his somewhat peculiar view of Nature, the decis~ve oneness he ascribes to Nature. How all Nature and Life are but one Garment, a 'Living Garment', woven and ever aweaving in the 'Loom of Time'." - I. INTRODUCTION.:~

Most considerations of centre around one aspect of his thou~li~,or writing. Carlyle's comprehensive method of writing - selecting a portion of a philosophical or practical syst~ here which suits his purpose, rejecting a component of another system there - would seem to defy complete analysis and explanation under any single heading. To those seeking an under­ standing of Carlyle's personal religion and philosophy, Sartor Resartus forms the central document. To other men who could not fathom this transcendantal, mystical think­ ing Carlyle left his praotioal gospel of "" and "Duty" for their edification. The men who were to lead their fellows in society to the beat possible way of life were the "Heroes", the intuitive seers of Carlyle's ideal government. But behind and beyond all these conceptions the question remains - what was the fundamental core of Carlyle's philosophical system, which he applied in a most practical way to everyday social life? What sanctions - - 3 - divine, intuitive or logical - did he have for taking his most pronounced, absolutist view of life and govern­ ment? How did this beliet begin, and can its development and consistent application be traced in Carlyle's writings? The object of this study will be to establish that Carlyle's ultimate authority in all his pronouncements is what is usually referred to in his writings as the "Laws of Nature". This conception is not a simple one; consequently, part of its exposition must always depend upon an inspired interpretation of the Carlylean dialectic. However, it will be the attempt here to demonstrate and trace as far as possible the importance of this pivotal element in Carlyle's thinking. To trace or explain the use of the term "Nature" in philosophy and literature in general would be an imposs­ ibility in this place. Indeed, because of the various uses and meanings attached to it, it is difficult to establish with certainty even the basic sources of Carlyle's use of the concept. However, as the main purpose here is to indicate Carlyle's use of the expression "Laws of Nature" and how what he meant by it conditions significantly his philosophical writings and social , a detailed consideration of the varied concepts of "Nature" in European thought does not fall within the compass of this s:tudy. At the same time, the immense importance of the subject of "Nature" in itself is noted and appreciated. - 4 -

Basil Willey, in his book The Eighteenth Century Background, whose sub-title is Studies on the !dea of Nature in the Thought of the Period, quotes Sir 's apt summation of "Nature's" influence. "Nature is a word contrived in order to introduce as many equivocations as possible into all the theories, political, legal, artistic or literary, into which it enters." 1 In the same place Willey goes on to cite a source which 2 has isolated sixty distinct uses of the term "Nature". "Nature's" importance can be traced back to classical thought. From at least the time when the "Great Chain of Being" became the predominant cosmology in Western thought, the concept has been in active use under one or another. Joseph Warren Beach's book on the subject - The Concept of Nature in Nineteenth Century English Poetry - leaves a similar impression to that made by Willey. That is, the concept has been of tremendous importance and has been used by a bewildering number of authors with endless ramifications of meaning. To Lord Shaftesbury "Nature" was the "Wise Substitute of Providence! impower'd Creatress!" 3 Shaftesbury believed natural phen- omena in themselves could inspire a knowledge of God. Hume developed a metaphysical idea, defending "Nature" against "reason" in human affairs.4 "Nature" was the dominant concept, and at times the authority of the revol­ utionary and romantic literature of the late eighteenth - 5 - and early nineteenth centuries.5 William Godwin, Rousseau and Wordsworth were important in this group. Beach lists some of the main schools of "Nature" as those of "romantic nature, metaphysical nature, naturallsm, Platonism and ". (Carlyle is included in the last group nam.ed.) 6 Scarcely an important or is omitted from consideration in the work, which includes Ralph Cudworth, Henry More, Berkeley, Newton, Shaftesbury, Byron, Wordsworth, Shelley, Goethe, Coleridge, Emerson, Whitman, Tennyson, Swinburne and Meredith. A.O. Lovejoy, in an article entitled "Nature" as Aesthetic Norm, which appeared in Modern Language Notes for November, 192?, has tried to reduce some order out of all this chaos. From the outset he is aware of the extrema difficulty and comprehensiveness of the problem. He says the much abused term "Nature" has become the "verbal jack-of-all-trades; ••• To read eighteenth century books (in particular) without having in mind the meanings of "nature" is to move about in the midst of ambiguities unrealized; ••• for "nature" has, of course, been the chief and the most pregnant word in the terminology of all the normative provinces of thought in the West." ? Having stated his difficulty in advance, Lovejoy goes on to catalogue some of the aesthetic uses of the term. For example, "Nature" has been put forward as the object to be imitated in Art by D'Alembert, Goldsmith, Granville and Reynolds.a Human nature has been depicted as the "natural" expression of passions by Shakespeare, Dryden, - 6 -

Chaucer, Moliere,' Boileau, Fenelon,~ Diderot, dohnson and Horace Walpole.9 Another group has represented "'Nature' as the essence or Platonic !dea of a kind, imperfectly r~alized in empirical reality"; (for example, the "idealized type form., la belle nature"). In this group are included DuFresnoy, Molière, Dryden, Diderot and Hurd.10 To summarize briefly, still ether schools have pictured "Nature" as representing the "generic type" of man, ethers the "average type"; again, seme have de­ picted "nature as antithetic to man and his works". "Nature" has been used to convey a system of truth ooncerning the essential qualities and relations of "being". Finally, "Nature" has been used more generally as the exemplar of human art to represent the cosmic order as a whole.ll The foregoing comments are included, not so much as a background to Carlyle's concept of "Nature", but rather to indicate the difficulty of tracing fully the concept's usage before Carlyle adopted his partioular connotation for it. For this reason, it is intended to trace how a concept which Carlyle calls the "Laws of Nature" appears as a oonditioning factor throughout his works rather than to explain the concept basically in itself. As the kernel of Carlyle's thought is based on inspired intuitive conviction, no amount of logical analysis will divulge its ultimate value. Therefore, - 7 - although Carlyle's "Laws of Nature" will be explained as far as possible here, the main purpose will be to show their conditioning, indeed,determining position in his grand view of life and society. Beforejthis is done, by way of opening, some introductory matters will be considered as a prelude to the main study. First of all, some aspects of Carlyle's personal characteristics, family life and education must be considered. Secondly, the importance of the_ influences of maturity, inoluding the great spirituel crisis in Carlyle's mental life. It will be seen that Carlyle's devotion to the German transoendentalists of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries is an important factor. The contemporary situation, or "Condition-of­ question" is also a noteworthy issue. However, in the last consideration, it will be held that Carlyle bases his thinking primarily on external factors. It is with universal, cosmic penetration that he makes his final judgments. In this study it will be neoessary to show where the "Laws of Nature" concept first arises in

Carlyle~' s wri tings, how i_t rea&hed speedy orystallization and henceforth became the conditioning factor in all his higher thinking. It will be noticed that aspects of the schema of "Nature" appear in some of Carlyle's early essays, such as Signs of the Time@, Characteristics and - 8 -

Chartism. Previous to this, Carlyle had considered the "Nature" concept,as used by certain German philosophera, in his essays The State of (1827) and

Novalis (1829). The~ lectures of 1840 expound the practical, human link in the great system of "Nature"; that is, the "Great Man" is the medium through which "Nature's Laws" are carried out. Past and Present (1843) and the Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850) contain the fullest expositions of Carlyle's comprehensive "Laws of Nature". Exodus from Houndsditch (1848) and Spiritual Optics (1852) are important as fragmentary, abortive works in which Carlyle planned to develop and explain further his funda­ mental ideas on "Nature".

On the other hand~ Carlyle's epie histories - The French Revolution, Oliver Cromwell and Fr$1erick the Great - contain little direct reference to the "Laws of Nature". It is true that "Nature's Laws" are implied and presupposed in Carlyle's thinking in these works, but he was not intent on making his system of thought evident in the manner he employed in the works primarily under study here. In the same way, his practical, logical suggestions for reform are noteworthy, but as they add nothing to the programmes of social idealists of his own time and later, they cannot be said to form the core of his philosophy. Carlyle's lasting, perennial reputation will be found to rest ultimately not on his "Great Man" - g -

of::action, nor on his literary genius, nor on his appeal to moral heroics, nor on his practical suggestions for governmental reform, but on his grand, universal conception of life which lay behind all of these - the "Laws of Nature". Therefore, his higher pronouncements, whether concerning nineteenth-9entury or universal situations, must always be analyzed with reference to this concept. It is with this belief that the predominating importance of the "Laws of Nature" will be traced throughout Car­

lyle's works and explained as far as is possible~ In the works where "Nature's Laws" are not explicitly invoked at length by Carlyle, it is suggested that study would reveal that they are the silent criteria of Carlyle's judgment. From this treatment it is hoped that the fundamental teaching of Carlyle will appear in a new

perspective, with a las~ing stability and consistency.

His permanent value will appear i~ his exposition of .the perennial principles of life and government. These laws can be observed entirely apart from Thomas Carlyle and his nineteenth century, although he gives in his writing the most vivid, convincing demonstration of them. As the "Laws of Nature" condition all his serious writings, the concept must be taken into account in any consider­ ation of Carlyle's current value as a philosopher and social cri tic. - 10 -

REFERENCES - I

1 - Op. ci t., P• . 2. 2 - Loc. cit. 3 - Op. cit., quoted p. 63. 4 - Ibid.,- p. 110-lll. 5 - Ibid.,- P• 205. ô - ill.S.·' Introduction. 7 - Op. ci t., p. 444.

8 -Ibid., P• 445-446. 9 - Loc.cit. 10 - Loc. ci t. 11 - Ibid.,- P• 446-447. II. BACKGROUND: EARLY INFLUENCES

"the old great truth ••• : That man is what we call a miraculous creature, with mir­ aculous power over men; and, on the whole, with such a Life in him, and such a world round him, as victorious Analysis, with her Physiologies, Nervous-systems, Physic and Metaphysic, will never completely name, to say nothing of explaining." ---- - The French Revolution II. BACKGROUND: EARLY INFLUENCES

The influence of Carlyle's stern, paternal upbringing on his thought and character cannat be denied, but it should not be overemphasized. He early acknow­ ledged the absolute nature of his father's control of the family. "My Active Power (Thatkraft) was unfavorably hemmed in; ••• everywhere a strait bond of obedience held me dawn. Thus already Freewill often came in painful collision with Necessity." 1 This resembles a semi-humourous reminiscence on Carlyle's part, which is balanced by the positive contribution his family upbringing made to his mature religious beliefs. "'Wouldst thou rather be a peasant's son that knew, were it never so rudely, there was a God in Heaven and in Man; or a duke's son that only knew there were two-and-thirty quarters on the family-coach?' " To which last question we must answer: Beware, 0 Teufelsdrockh, of spiritual pride!" 2 However, these recollections of juvenile experiences are unimportant in Carlyle's life compared with the spiritual crisis which culminated in "The Everlasting Yea". - 13 -

For all his attachment to his dogmatic, Calvinistic mother, Carlyle would not embrace the family church completely, remaining "the unchristian rather than Christian 'Diogenes'" 3 in his final thinking.· Moreover, Carlyle seems to anticipate the critical dismissal that he is simply the child of an austere, peasant Scottish family whose philosophy he transposed into rhapsodie .. rhetoric. It is significant that the infant Teufelsdrockh is left by a dark "Stranger" at his parents' door in Sartor Resartus. The "Stranger" is that "unknown Father" whom Carlyle can never completely understand,4 but whose workings and precepts he can fathom to a sufficient degree to devise a workable system of li fe for himself. The essential, the ultimate in Diogenes Teufelsdrockh cannot be traced to heredity nor environment, but rests finally on a mystical, spiritual origin. "'·thy true Beginning and Father is in Heaven, whom with the bodily eye thou shalt never behold, but only wi th the spi ri tual. 'u 5 His childhood and youth were not unhappy, but gradually Carlyle's besetting sin, in his own eyes at least, came to be a tendency to vacillate whenever important decisions arose. However, once he had settled on a course and remained with it, most of his troubles seemed to vanish. In this way precipitate, forthright action on his part finally ended a reign of misery caused by the bullying of his classmaj"es~-at school. - 14 -

"'They were boys', he tTeufelsdrockhJ says, 'mostly rude Boys, and obeyed the impulse of rude Nature, which-bids the deerherd fall upon any stricken hart, the duck-flock put to death any broken-winged brother or sister, and on all hands the strong tyrannize over the weak.'" 6 This was far removed from the complex "Nature" which Carlyle later set out to interpret. Still, there is a conneotion1 : ,_ Carlyle' s method of viewing the natural and the supernatural as one necessarily included a consideration of the physical aspects of nature for purposes of understanding this lite. It is at this point that many interpretations of Carlyle reach an inaccurate and shortsighted conclusion, basing their findings on Carlyle's recognition of physical nature, and neglecting the comprehensive~$UQness with which he considered all sensuous and suprasensuous aspects of experience and existence. One of the solutions to "The Everlasting No" - the mental malady of Carlyle's early maturity - was to adopt an approach towards religion and philosophy where to doubt was not permissible. Freedom of thought and ac- tion were hemmed in by an absolute necessity, but it must be granted that there was freedom within these limitations, and that Carlyle was far from adopting a stand for fatalistic predestination. Rather, the "limita­ tions" would open up endless vistas of thought and insight into the wonder and significance of lite. In short, proper confor.mity to the necessities of lite made for a - 15 - fuller, richer existence. But along with these rewarding, ennobling experiences would come the certain knowledge that the earth was the "Sanctuary of Sorrow" and that life was a divine worship of sorrows.7 In this respect Carlyle is Christian in thought, as in his emphasis on self-renunciation. "the fraction of Life can be increased in value not so much by increasing your Numerator as by lessenlng your Denominator. Nay, unless my algebra deceive me, ynity itself divided by ~ will gi ve Infin ty. " 8 To obtain a pattern for a positive course of action Carlyle turned to Goethe, the teacher who more than any other rescued h1m from despair and set him on the sure road to blessedness, which infinitely transcended mere "happiness" in Goethe's philosophy. Goethe's "Doubt of any sort cannet be removed except by Action" and "Do the Duty which lies nearest thee" becomer> the strongly Scriptural "'Produce! Produoe! ••• in God's name! 'Tis the utmost thou hast in thee: out with it, then. Up, up! Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy whole might. Work while it is called Today; for the Night cometh, wherein no man can work. '" 9 It cannet be denied that there is a resemblance between this personal philosophy of "The Everlasting Yea" and the imm.utable, intraotable "Laws of Nature" which Carlyle later was to invoke constantly. But he would have argued \ that his personal formula stemmed from and conformed to everlasting, pre-established canons of conduct. This is - 16 - directly opposed to the view that his "Laws of Nature" were a product of his personal philosophy. It was the beginning of all wisdom to see into these "Laws of Nature" and obey them; moreover, Carlyle had to "work out his own salvation with fear and trembling" before he discovered a sure way of thinking. It could even be argued that his original nature and makeup were hostile to "Nature's Laws", and that it was only through diligent search that he settled upon the "Infinite nature of Duty". 10 However, this is only mentioned to refute the charge that Carlyle's philosophy of life and government is simply the reflection of a domineering, deter.ministic personal nature. His final personal philosophy solidified considerably after maturity (in the middle twenties) and was deter.mined by his discovery of the "Laws of Nature". The next task is to.show briefly what influence the German transcendantal school of philosophera of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries had upon Carlyle with respect to the central, predominating thought in his writings, - the concept which Carlyle ter.ms the "Laws of Nature" or a simia.ar variant of this expression. - 17 -

REFERENCES - II

1 - Sartor Resartus, P• ?9-80. 2 - -Ibid., P• 81. 3 - Ibid., P• ?O. 4 - Loc. oit. 5 - -Ibid., P• 69. 6 - -Ibid., P• 84. ? - -Ibid., P• 154. 8 - -Ibid., P• 156. 9 - -Ibid., P• 159,161. 10- Expression used- Ibid., p. 134, Fast and Present, p. 106 and passim throughout Carlyie's works. III. THE INFLUENCE OF GERMAN PHILOSOPHY ANDLITERATURE

"Perennial, as a possession for ever, Goethe's History and Writings abide •••• a thousand­ voiced "Melody of Wisdom" ••• the experience of the most complexly-situated, deep-searching, every way far-experienced man •••• So did he catch the Music of the Universe, and unfol~it into clearness, and in authentic celestial tones bring it home to the hearts of men •••• Come, let us build a tower which shall reach to heaven; and ••• vanquish not only Physical Nature, but the divine Spirit of Nature, and scale the empyrean itself." - Goethe's Works

"Fichte's opinions may be true or false; but his character, as a thinker, can be slightly val ued only by su ch as know i t ill·; and as a man, approved by action and suffering, in his life and in his death, he ranks with a class of men who were common only in better ages than ours." - The State of German Literature III. THE INFLUENCE OF GERMAN PHILOSOPHY

AND LITERATURE

To trace in detail the philosophical back­ ground and influences leading to Carlyle's "Laws of Nature" concept is not the purpose of this study. The present purpose is to explain as far as possible the concept of the "Laws of Nature" as Carlyle used it and to show how this concept conditions his thinking through­ out his major works. However, as Carlyle discovered the root of his thought among the German idealists, mystics and romantics, it will be well to point out the chief sources of this influence. Whether or not Carlyle turned to the Germans through the help of a friend who could supply hlm with German literature l remains open to question. However, it is a fact that he found in the transcendantal school the solid ground upon which he could base his own system of thought. For it is accepted that he took from the Germans, as from other sources, precisely what he desired - 20 - for his own purposes without necessarily endorsing a particular philosophical system as such. Paradoxically, the solid, practical working method of thought which his mind demanded was based on airy mysticism and trans­ cendentalism. One aspect of thought which the Ger.mans had in common was the basing of essentiel reality on a "Divine !dea" which lay behind observable phenomene. This Platonic thinking, especially in Fichte, went on to state that only the seer could see into the "Divine !dea" and interpret this ultimate truth to mankind. Here can be seen the germ of the idea of the "Laws of Nature" and the "Hero". In Sartor Resart!UJ, Carlyle openly ack­ nowledges this neo-Platonic element in his thinking when he refers to "the high Platonic Mysticism of our Author, which is perhaps the fundamental element of his nature." 2 Carlyle is as explicit in recording his debt to the German philosophera in several passages of his works. As early as 1827, in the writing of The State ... of German Literature, Carlyle is enthusiastic in expounding the position of Kant and Fichte with regard to "Nature" because "they have penetrated into the mystery of Nature". 3 ,. Fichte is quoted at leng~h from Uber das Wesen des Gelehrten (On the Nature of the Literary Man). It is the duty of the "Literary Man" to interpret to his readers the "Divine - 21 -

Idea" of the universe, which lies behind visible reality. In the same Carlyle praises Kant for bis separation of "Reason" and "Understanding" in the Kritik der Reinen Vernunft.4 The "Understanding" can discern only relations between given·objects, but the "Reason" sees beneath the outward manifestations to "Truth" itself. It will be seen that Carlyle himself n&V~r adopted this particular approach to a philosophical dialectic, but was later disposed to combine all human mental and spiritual faculties into one comprehensive "Force" or "Wisdom". In the essay (1829), Carlyle strongly endorses several tenets of the Ger.man philosophera; many of these were of lasting influence on his own thinking. One such is the following maxim by Novalis, translated by Carlyle. "What is Nature? An encyclopaedical, systematic Index or Plan of our Spirit." 5 The reference to the "encyclopaedical system" is what is most important here. It was a similar comprehensive, divine body of laws, although embracing more than "our Spirit", which Carlyle was shortly to develop and carry throughout his works with him as his final authority for his many pontifical statements. Another explicit reference in tbe text of Carlyle's works to tbe Ger.man transcendentalists appears in the Hero as Man of Letters le•oture. Here Carlyle again explains the essence of Fichte's thought in the - 22 -

German author's lectures entitled On the Nature of the Literary Man. 5 There appears a distinct parallel between Fichte's "Scholar" and Carlyle's "Hero". In both cases, these ideal types see into "the essence ••• 'the Divine Idea of the World'; this is the Reality which 'lies at the bottom of all Appearance•. To the mass of men no such Divine Idea is recognisable in the world; they live merely, says Fichte, among the superficialities, practicalities and shows of the world, not dreaming that there is anything divine ûnder them." 7 Thus, although Carlyle drew freely, consciously and unconsciously, on the school of German idealists - chiefly Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Herder, Goethe, Novalis, Heine, Schiller and Schleiermacher - there emerges the impression that Fichte had the strongest influence on the kernel of his thought. Margaret Storrs, in The Relation of Carlyle to Kant and Fichte, a Ph. D. thesis presented to Bryn Mawr College (1929), has admirably summ.ed up these two chief influences on Carlyle's thinking. From Fichte Carlyle imbibed his "general beliet in the ideal character of reality", specifically the notion of the "Divine Idea". 8 Also, Carlyle's collectivistic, socialistic tendencies and his theories of self-renunciation and the "Hero" can be round in Fichte's works.9 However, Carlyle extended Fichte's "Divine Idea" until it took on a unified, ali­ inclusive significance, in which the naturel and the supernatural, the physical and the spiritual, became one entity. Thus, with Carlyle's cosmic approach, the "Laws - 23 - of Nature" have a practical bearing and application on man's affaira. Again, Carlyle deviated from Fichte in supposing that the "Laws of Nature" interpreted a t'ully developed, immutable world order, whereas Fichte's "Divine Idea" is "evolutionary, in a state of becomingn.10 To Kant, the same work attributes three other Carlylean "notions":- the doctrine o'f' the ideality of' space and time, the distinction between understanding and reason, and the "moral law within humanity" of Kant's "Categorical Imperative".11 But as with Fichte, Carlyle adda his personal interpretation to Kant's meaning and also supplies original material so as to develop his own thought structure centering around the "Laws of' Nature". Whereas Kant saw a split between "the phenomenal and noumenal realms"(that is, between objecta which can be observed by the senses and those which can be conceived only by the reason), Carlyle, "concerned only with the spiritual, whether in nature or in man, retained a strict unity and f'ound true f'reedom to be attained by the perception of', and obedience to, the cosmic law of' Right. As such, it is the gif't only of' the Man of' Wisdom.nl2 In demonstrating how Carlyle deviates from Kant, (Miss) Storrs gives an excellent summary of' Carlyle's theory of' the essential oneness of' being, and how this unity is based on, and determined by, a spiritual, moral reality, to which the physical world, including the lif'e of' man, must conf'orm. - 24 -

"Carlyle ••• ~interpretSJ nature as the outward expression of a moral spirit, and his problem was, consequently, to account for human freedom in the face of the eternal necessity of the law of Right."13 . "Carlyle ••• clung to a simple unity of nature. To hlm, there was but one reality, that spiritual one in wbich the physical world partakes as well as the moral."l4 Charles Frederick Harrold, in Carlyle and German Thought; 1819-34, bas provided another valuable presentation of Carlyle's precise debt to the Germans. The book is a detailed interpretation of Carlyle's early study of literature and philosophy and how this work contributed to his ultimate deterministic, absolutist stand on life and society. This book, although it might overstress in places the importance of the German , provides, along witb (Miss) Storrs's thesis, the existing critical material which strikes closest at the heart of Carlyle's thought. While these works explain with detailed philosophical method the German background to Carlyle's thought, they do not trace in detail the social implications nor the central position o:r the concept of "Nature" through- out Carlyle's writings. However, they are of permanent value as basic aida for any thorough study of Carlyle's thought and writings. Several other critias treat, more or less adequately, the relative influences of the various German thinkers on Carlye. The general impression left by author­ itative writers is that Carlyle was most influenced by - 25 -

Fichte and Kant among the thinkers, whioh inoludes several great philosophera from Plato through Coleridge; while it was primarily in the writings of Goethe and Novalis that Carlyle found these ideas expressed.15 Louis Cazamian supports Lehman and (Miss) Storrs.J in the contention that

Kant and Fichte were central in helping to sh~pe Carlyle's thought.l6 Moreover, Cazamian also maintains that the finished result of Carlyle's thought has his stamp of ( ~' oroginality on it. Critias are agreed that traces of Jean-Paui Richter in Carlyle oan be seen more in the latter's art and style than in his thought or subjeot matter.l7 From Goethe and Novalis, especially the former, Carlyle received muoh philosophical thought seoond-hand; also from these sources came several of the praotical moral maxima whioh for.m suoh a significant counterpart of Carlyle's unified system. From Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprentioeship Carlyle was oonvinoed that the preoepts "Doubt of any sort 18 oannot be removed exoept by action" and "Do the duty which lies nearest thee"19 were those most likely to result in a state of blessedness, far transoending the elusive "happiness". Also from Wilhelm Meister came the thought that the worst kind of unbelief was unbelief in oneself. Moreover, in Goethe's writings Carlyle saw the core of his own transcendantal clothes philosophy, the pure system which he had to establish before he could be at peace with himself - 26 - and become a social critic on a cosmic scale. The "Earth-Spirit" in Faust representa "the ideality of space and time, the essence of Carlyle's "Natural Super- naturalism". '"Tis thus at the roaring Loom of Time I ply, And weave for God the Garment thou see'st Hlm by.n20 In the foregoing pages there have been briefly presented the main points in the literary and philosophical background which influenced Carlyle's thought. As with the circumstances of his personal life, these factors should be considered. They can be useful in helping to obtain an appreciation of Carlyle's own unique contribution to thought and philosophy. It is necessary now to give an exposition of what Carlyle meant by the "Laws of Nature", how this conception is his ultimate authority in all his higher pronouncements; and consequently, the manner in which the idea conditions his thought and method through- out the major works. The method adopted will be to indicate where the conception of "Nature" first arises in Carlyle's writings, how it gradually becomes the conditioning axiom of his thought and reaches mature development. in Fast and Present. The period 1840-1852 is central in this study: besides Fast and Present, it produced Latter-Day Pamphlets, the ~ lectures, and the discarded works Exodus from Houndsditch and Spiritual Optics. These writings mark the - 27 - high point of Carlyle's system of thought and receive the fullest treatment here. In this study Carlyle's other important works are also mentioned with reference to the "Laws of Nature". Moreover, various criticisms of his writings are cited throughout, either to corroborate the thesis held or to indicate some of the common misinterpretations of Car­ lyle's involved meaning. From this study there should emerge material with which to study the lasting importance of Carlyle as a thinker and social critic. The contention that it would be valuable for the contemporary era to enquire into what Carlyle fully meant by the "Laws of Nature" - with especial regard to the laws' controlling influence over systems of human government - is put forward as the reason for a desired re-awakening of interest in Carlyle's works. - 28 -

REFERENCES - III

1 - AMr. Swan of Kirkca1dy; cited in Froude, First Forty, Vol. I, p. 90. 2 - Op. ci t., p. 52.

3 - Op. oit., P• 56. 4 -Ibid.,- P· 69-70. 5 - Op. ci t., p. 181 (Modern British Essayists, Vol' ·V).

ô - Op. oit., P• 105; 204-206. 7 -Ibid.,- p. 205. 8 -Op. oit., p. 58. 9 - Loc. oit. 10- -Ibid., p. 71. 11- -Ibid., p. 27. 12- Ibid., P• 30. 13 - Loc. oit. 14- -Ibid., p. 32. 15 - B.H. Lehman - Carlyle's Theory of the Hero, p. 104. 16 - L. Cazamian - Carlyle, p. 36, 40. 17- Op. oit., p. 48,89. 18- Op. oit., Book V, Chapter lô. 19- Ibid., Book VII, Chapter 1. 20 - Goethe - Faust - Carlyle's in Sartor Resartus, p. 43, 218. IV. DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH OF THE "NATURE" CONCEPT: EARLY ESSAYS; SARTOR RESARTUS; THE FRENCH REVOLUTION; CHARTISM

"Our Professor's method is not, in any case, that of common school Logic, where the truths all stand in a row, each holding by the skirts of the other; but at best that of practical Reason, proceeding by large Intuition over whole systematic groups and kingdoms; whereby, we might say, a noble complexity, almost like that of Nature, reigns in his Philosophy, or spiritual Picture of Nature; a mighty maze, yet, as faith whispers, not without a plan." - Sarmor Resartus IV. DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH OF THE "NATURE" CONCEPT:

EARLY ESSAYS; SARTOR.iRESARTUS;

THE FRENCH REVOLUTION; CgARTISM

Carlyle's earliest writings consisted mostly of , translation and critici&.m of German writers and literature. It was only when his critical essaya took on a broader outlook, with social implications, that his thought assumed importance in more than the ~it~~P1 rrte~~y cri ticism. It was not until 1829, when Carlyle was approaching the age of thirty-five, that there appeared in his writing definitive commenta, with social impli­ cations, concerning aspects of the complex entity which Carlyle later most commonly referred to himself as the "Laws of Nature". These early references included considerations of "Right and Might", the physice.l versus the spirituel, and the place of "Great Men" in the scheme of "Nature". It was seen in Section III that about this time- in 1827 {Thë State of German Literature), and 1829 - 31 -

(Novalis) - Carlyle considered "Nature" in an exposition of what Fichte, Novalis and Kant meant by the ter.m. Signs of the Times, an essay of broad significance which appeared in June, 1829, considered most of the important contemporary currents of thought, from a Christianity which was losing prestige to an increasingly popular . In Signa of the Times Carlyle also throws light on what was to become a component of his "Laws of Nature". This aspect appears in his criticism of literature and the "Spirit of Beauty". The idea of a complex "Strength", involving all the human faculties, later received consid­ erable treatment in Past and Present. "Poetry itself has no eye for the Invisible. Beauty is no longer the god it worships, but some brute image of Strength; which we may call an idol, for true Strength is one and the same with Beauty, and its worship also is a hymn. The meek, silent Light can mould, create and purify all Nature; but the laud whirlwind, the sign and product of Disunion, of Weakness, passes on, and is torgotten. How widely this veneration for the physically Strongest has spread itself through Literature •••• We praise a work, not as "true", but as "strong"." 1 Another asp.ect of "Nature" which is broached in Signs of the Times is the contention that "Great Men" are the product of "Nature"; or, stated in another way, the "Hero" is wise and great because he sees into the workings of "Nature". This idea received fuller treatment from Carlyle in the -Hero lectures, the "Aris- tocracy of Talent" section of Past and Present, and as "The New Downing Street" in Latter-Day Pamphlets. - 32 -

"Did not Science originate rather, and gain advancement, in the obscure closets of the Roger Bacons, Keplers, Newtons; in the work­ shops of the Fausts and the Watts; wherever, and in what guise soever Nature, from the fir$t times downwards, bad sent a gifted spirit upon the earth? Again, were Homer and Shakespeare members of any beneficed guild, or made Poets by means of it? ••• No; Science and Art have, from first to last, been the free gift of Nature." 2 Carlyle goes on to warn, as if anticipating the lethal weapons of the twentieth century, that sometimes the penetration of "Nature" by science results in a "fatal ·giftu.3

Thus it c~ be seen that Carlyle is early wrestling with his complex conception of the harmonious whole - the union of the healthy and holy- and rejecting all spurious pseudo-philosophies which isolate and vener­ ate any aspect of physical prowess in and for itself. The concluding paragraph of Signs of the Times emphasizes this idea in an apt figure. At the same time it is a remarkable epitome of Carlyle's entire system and method, anticipating important elements in his thought which he was to expound repeatedly, under many forms and figures, for the next thirty years. "as this wondrous planet, Earth, is journeying ••• through infinite Space, so are the wondrous destinies embarked on it journeying through infinite Time, under a higher guidance than ours. For the present, as our astronomy informs us, its path lies towards Hercules, the constellation of Physical Power: but that ls not our most pressing concern. Go where i t will, the deep EEAVEN will be around it. Therain let us have hope and sure faith. To refor.m a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men - 33-

know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself." 4 Over a year later, in November, 1830, in the essay On History, Carlyle is again minimizing the physical, and stressing its subordination to a well rounded order which is inherent in the nature of the world and which must answer ultimately to the highest spiritual authority. Carlyle has still not fully developed the sure vernacular, or dialectic, of Fast and Present and Latter-Day Pamphlets, the works in which the "Laws of Nature" are most.fully and convincingly expounded. But his passing comments in the early essays are definitely a part of his developed phil­ osophical core. Often Carlyle is more explicit in stating what his "Laws of Nature" are not, but in so doing he makes it possible, through a process of elimination and arrange­ ment, to discern his system from a positive standpoint. "For the physically happiest is simply the safest, the strongest; and, in all conditions of Govern­ ment, Power (whether of wealth as in these days, or of arms and adhereats as in old days) is the only outward emblem and purchase-money of Good. True Good, however, is ••• never offered for sale in the market where that coin passes current." 5 The essay On History also contains what is probably Carlyle's first reference to democracy as a governmental system. It is set in juxtaposition to the mute "Eternal Laws" with the implication that the pro­ found significance of "Nature" might be lost sight of in the democratie process. Carlyle was later to express - 34 - this thought with objective vehemence. "Suppose however, that the majority of votes cviews, opinions3 was all wrong; that the real cardinal points lay far deeperl and had been unnoticed, because no Seer, but only mere on­ lookers, chanced to be there!" ô Carlyle's next important writing was Sartor Resartus, written between September, 1830 and July, 1831. In this work the emphasis is on the tracing of his personal criais to final resolution - a veiled autobio­ graphy and a detailed exposition of the "Clothes Phil­ osophy". That is, the idea that superficial gar.ments clothe a hidden reality is extended through all realms of being to the ultimate conclusion that "Nature" itself, the physical universe, is "the living visible garment of God". 7 "'Or what is Nature? Ha! why do I not name thee God? Art not thou the "Living Gar.ment of God"? 0 Heavens, is it, in very deed, HE, then, that ever speaks through thee; that lives and loves in thee, that lives and loves in me?'" 8 This is not a pantheistic beliet that "Nature" is God, but an e:x:planation o"f the manner in which Goq, is presented to the human senses. In this way throughout Sartor Car- lyle emphasizes the idea that we must "look through the 9 Shows of things into Things themselves". It is in Sartor Resartus that Carlyle definitely establishes the comprehensive unity of "Nature"; how it governs all of man's life, not only on the physical level, but more significantly, in spirituel and moral matters too. - 35 -

This "decisive Oneness" is basic to the concept's importance. Carlyle establishes the idea of "Nature's" all-inclusiveness in Sartor; and his pronouncements in later works emphatically repeat this pervading authority of "Nature". "never till this hour had he known Nature, that she -:-nas One, that she was his Mother, and divine." 10 "••• his somewhat pecu1iar view of Nature, the decisive Oneness he ascribes to Nature. How a11 Nature and Life are but one Gar.ment." 11 "'Yes, truly; if Nature is one, and a living in­ divisible whole, much more is Mankind, the Image that reflects and creates Nature, without which Nature were not.'" 12 Carlyle re-emphasizes the unique aspeuts of his consideration of "Nature", demonstrating how the scheme crystallized in his mind after his development as a mature thinker. At the same time he insists that the ultimate sanction for his "Nature" goes far beyond natural, physical phenomena. In the chapter on "Natural Supernaturalism" in Sartor Resartus he juxtaposes his nascent system of "Nature" with the conventional beliefs concerning the laws of nature on the purely natural, physical level. "What are the Laws of Nature? To me·perhaps the rising of one from the dead were no violation of these Laws, but a confirmation; were some far deeper Law, now first penetrated into, and by Spiritual Force, even as the rest ethe purely physical laws1 have all been, brought to bear on us with its Material Force." 13 Carlyle's other statements on "Nature" in Sartor Resartus are, in effect, among those he continued to - 36 - develop, with eloquence and conviction, throughout all his writings. The insistance that a just universe is ruled by an ever-present, spiritual God is observed along with the conclusion that "Nature" is ultimately ineffable. "'System of Nature! To the wisest man, wide as is his vision, Nature remains of quite infinite depth, of quite infinite expansion.'" 14 At !east one other idea in Sartor is related to Carlyle's scheme of "Nature". It concerns the "Hero" and his place in the order of "Nature". The hierarchy extending from great to small in the outward world has an analogy in mankind. Therefore the "Wise Man" must first be able to revere and obey not only "Nature", but also.his superior fellows, before he can assume authority. This was always a strong characteristic of Carlyle's completed system, appearing as the "Aristocracy of Talent" in Past and Present and ~atter-Day Pamphlets. "in these days, man can do almost. all things, only not obey. True likewise that whoso cannot obey cannet be free, still less bear rule; he that is the inferior of nothing, can be the superior of nothing, the equal of nothing." 15

These twin ideas, the ~ecessity of obedience and reverence, were being devel~ped contemporaneously with Sartor Resartus in the essay Characteristics, which appeared in December, 1831. It is from a passage similar to the following that the mistaken notion that Carlyle advocated a return to mediaeval government is derived. Rather he insisted on a return to obedience to the eternal laws, in whatever for.m was best suited to the inevitable - 37 - industrio-democratic society. "Loyalty still hallowed obedience, and made rule noble cin pristine timesJ; there was still some­ thing to be loyal to: the Godlike stood embodied under many a symbol in men's interests and business; the Finite shadowed forth the Infinite; Eternity looked through Time. The Life of man was encom­ passed by a glory of Heaven, even as his dwelling­ place by the azure vault." 16 As previously mentioned, the necessity for reverence, obedience and loyalty became the fully devel­ oped "Aristocracy of Talent" as presented in Past and Present and Latter-Day Pamphlets. In this connection Carlyle's meaning should be carefully considered. By "weak" he means one who is ignorant of "Nature's Laws", while the "strong" are the wise who "see into the life of things" and understand what must be done to secure the maximum felicity for man in society. "Polities are formed; the weak submitting to the strong; with a willing loyalty, giving obedience that he may receive guidance: or say rather, in honour of our nature, the ignorant submitting to the wise; for so it is in all even the rudest communities, man never yields himself wholly to brute Force, but always to moral Greatness." 17 Characteristics is primarily a statement of Carlyle's philosophical method of intuitive dynamics versus the logi~al, cogitative mechanics which domin­ ated the thought of his day. Carlyle insisted that religion, to be effectual, could not be doubted, and yet could not be logically explained. With his compre­ hensive, unified method he applies this idea to the social problems- man in society and forms of government.18 - 38 -

Thus Carlyle does not avold, but explains and justifies, the lack of methodical planning with which his final sys­ tem is always associated. "In our inward, as in our outward world, what is mechanical lies open to us; not what is dynamical and has vitality. Of our thinking ••• it is but the mere upper surface that we shape into articulate Thoughts; ••• Manufacture is intelligible, but tri vial; Creation is gr·eat, and cannet be understood." 19 In this way "Nature, the perfect, the Great,strives, like a kind mother, to hide from us even this, that she is a mystery".20 And so Carlyle early establishes the inscrut­ ability of "Nature", although he is to continue using the concept as his final authori ty .-:IDlràlighou"tl ~JE~~s wri tings. Carlyle's individualistic, highly original attitude and method in approaching current problems can be ascribed to his beliet in the all-pervading "Laws of Nature" - a beliet whose formulation in his mind coincided with his development as a mature writer and thinker. His method cannot be connected with personal eccentricity and spleen of any kind, but rather is associated with his unshakable beliet in the external, ordered system of "Nature" which lay behind and go·verned all men' s actions. A note in his Journal of this period (August 11, 1832) confirms this. "Politics confuse me - what my duties are therein? As yetI have stood apart •••• The battle is not between Tory and Radical (that is but like other battles}; but between believer and unbeliever." 21 Of course the thing to be "believed" in this connection - 39 - was the "Laws of Nature", which Carlyle was struggling to articulate effectively at this time. Part of Carlyle' s philosophy of his tory, showing a relationship to the "Laws of Nature", was mentioned at an early date in the essay On History Again (1833). Here there is vague allusion made to the long-run adjustment btought about by "Nature" when deviations are made from the true course. This is the crude corrective agent which Carlyle believed was in operation in the French Revolution, when the existing regime had wandered so far from genuine conformity to "Nature" that an explosion was necessary to restore the balance in some measure. "Thus does Accident correct Accident; and in the wondrous boundless jostle of things (an aimful POWER presiding over it, say rather, dwetling in it), a result comes out that may be put-up witli." 22 This helps to explain the elements of emergency and necessity which dwell in most of Carlyle's later critioal writing. His belief that the "Laws of Nature" could only be contravened to a limited extent occasioned his dire warnings for a return to conformity to the eternal tendencies. Thus, by the time of the writing of The French Revolution (1835-37), Carlyle's system of the "Laws of Nature" was a well advanced formula in his thinking. It is probable that the concept is a determining factor in Carlyle's interpretation of the historical facts. However, . as his main purpose was to present a vivid tableau23 and make the Revolutiqn a flesh-and-blood drama, the "Laws of - 40 -

Nature" are scarcely mentioned explicitly throughout the work. Oply a careful study and analysis can trace the implicit operation of the "Laws" as they underlie the writing. This is true to almost the same extent in the later larger histories - Oliver Cromwell and Frederick the Great. Therefore it is to the shorter works and essays, especially Past and Present, Latter-Day Pamphlets, and to a somewhat lesser extent, the ~ lectures, that we must turn for a considered treatment of "Nature's Laws" as such. However, while Carlyle was "splashing.down in large masses of colours ••• the smoke-and-flame con­ flagration"24 of the Revolution, he did not entirely omit objective ref'erence to the "Laws of Nature". Clearly tha oldil'ranee had to be "abolished" and a new one "regener­ ated" by the dictates of these highest canons.25 The Sphinx comparison presented in Fast and Present, which pictured "Nature" as having the head of a goddess and the body of a brute beast was used by Carlyle in another for.m to describe the outburst in France. "French Revolution, - which we define to be a Truth once more, though a Truth clad in hellfire!" 26 The dialeotic is developed when it is stated that "not to die of starvation" is not only a "Right of Man" but also a "Might of Mann.27 This equation of "Mights" and "Rights" on several leve~s, far removed from sheer strength and force, is a recurrent theme throughout the history.28 At times - 41 -

Carlyle is satirizing the popular conception of "Might makes Right" in his usage of the catch phrase embodying his profound connotations and abstruse meanings.29 At other times he is striving to explain tully his deeper meaning of "Right and Might" - how his conception involves far more than the interrelations of man with mari, but also is bound to include an examination of events with reference to the intrinsic nature of the universe, and whether these happenings will be considered valid and permanent by the inexorable laws. "A Constitution, as we often say, will march when it images, if not the old Habits and Beliers of the Constituted; then accurately their Rights, or better indeed their Mights;- for these two, well­ understood, are they not one and the same? The old Habits of France are gone: her new Rights and Mights are not yet ascertained, ••• till she have measured herselt ••• with Principalities and Powers, with the upper and the under, internal and external; with the Earth and Tophet and the very Heaven! Then will she know." 30 The idea that human beings can only deviate to a limited extent from "Nature's" ways is also present in The French Revolution. "Sansculottism will burn much; but what is incom­ bustible it will not burn. Fear not Sansculottism; recognize it for what it is." 31 "Not forever; no. All , all Evil, Injustice, is, by the nature of it, dragon's-teeth; suicida!, and cannet endure." 32 These are early statements of Carlyle's beliet that in­ justice cou:td not flourish because of the intrinsic nature of the world. This explains his seeming disregard for physical force and apparent unawareness of the potential - 42 -

,. danger of military might. This may be a naive misconcep- tion on Carlyle's part, but nevertheless the thought forms part of his complex schem.e of "Nature". Moreover, he in­ sisted that eventually tyrants and their injustices are bound to be overthrown. This idea, along with the repeated emphasis on the desired "Republic of the Virtues", as opposed to a mere "Republic of the Strengths",33 appears at scattered intervals throughout the history. In this treatment of "Strengths" and "Virtues", Carlyle seem.s to be hinting at the explan­ ation of "Mights" and "Rights" which he was to expoub;d at length in his next work - Chartism. Although the com­ plexity of his conception is conveyed in The French Revolution, he does little to fully explain it, as the excerpts included indicate. What Carlyle did see most convincingly was that the revolutionary forces were creating much more than liberty, equality, fraternity and a constitution. "0 Girondin Friends, it is not a Republic of the Virtues we are getting; but oàly a Republic of the Strengths." 34 ·"They wanted a Republic of the Virtues, ••• and they tthe GirondinsJ could only get a Republic of the Strengths." 35 In The French Revolution Carlyle also briefly states a tenet of his system of "Nature" which is to reappear in more detail in later works. This is the idea that the ultimate sanction for his higher pronouncements - 43 - is an intuitively recognized and inexplicable divine authority. "For it is most true that all available authority is mystic in its conditions, and comes 'by the grace of God '·" 36 In Latter-Day Pamphlets especially, Carlyle vehemenjly opposes this "mystic authority" to human laws, "paper parchments", codified systems and man-made institutions of all kinds. Because of this brief, passing consideration of Carlyle's scheme of "Nature", The French Revolution's chief value is that it is a great scenic reproduction, a three-dimensional reincarnation with living charaoters 37 who "bleed when they are pricked" before the reader's eyes. The Chartist agitation in England was a move­ ment which to Carlyle had the potential explosive power of a French Revolution. His studies in the Revolution made the contemporary situation in England especially significant to him. Hence his next important work after completing The French Revolution was Chartism, issued in December, 1839. Here there is frequent reference to man's "Mights and Rights", always in the larger context of the "Laws of Nature". Carlyle believed that it was the intrin­ sic nature of the world and man's position in it, rather than philosophism and encyclopaedism, which precipitated the French Revolution. He believed that regardless of agitation and outside influence, the old regime in France - 44 - would have inevitably caused an outbreak. For this reason he is intensely preoccupied with the concept of "Might and Right" at the time of the writing of Chartism. The physical rising of the masses was a profound fact to Carlyle and one he could reconcile with his over-all philosophy. With sufficient justice of cause, a mass rising could not be put down and ought not to be put down. Whether this theory will stand the extreme tests of analysis and experience is not the present question. The point is that this idea forma a major part of Carlyle's philosophy, but a segment which it is dangerous to isolate from the complex whole. For example, in Chapter V of Chartism, entitled Mights and Rights, Carlyle, in equating "Right and Might", intimates that this idea must be considered in the larger context of the "Laws of Nature". "How can-do ci.e.,'might'J, if we will well interpret it, unites Itself with shall-do [i.e., 'right') among mortals; how strength acta ever as-tEe right-ar.m of justice; how might and right, so frightfully dis­ crepant at first, are ever in the long-run one and the same." 38 The qualification of "Might" is further underlined by this addition:- "Of conquest we may say it never yet went by brute force and compulsion; con'qllest of that kind does not endure." 39 Thus Carlyle establishes that ultimately the elements of "Might and Right" form an equation only when considered on the cosmic level. In this broader, comprehensive frame of reference, "Might" and "Right" are round to be - 45 - complementary; that is, the thing which should be done is the thing which is actually dGne with the greatest felicity while at the same time retaining an enduring effect. Shortly before this Carlyle was stating the same idea in a letter to Emerson. "1 suppose, as usual, Might anQ. Right will have to make thems el v es sytlonymous in some way. CANST and SHALT, if they are ~ well understood, mean the same thing under-this Sun of ours." 40 The idea of brute force and sheer strength is far re­ moved from this conception of "Might" as Carlyle adds his ultimate reference to the universel laws. "and again, "Might and Right", the identity of these two, if a man will understand this God's­ Universe, and that only he who confor.ms to the law of 11 canin the long-run have any "might"." 41 However, in spite of all Carlyle's studied attempts to indicate that his conception of "Might and Right" was part of a cosmic system, related to, but not dependent on, man, he is still criticized in a purely human frame of reference in this connection. That is, critics fall into the initial fallacy of considering that man can use strength and force arbitrarily, a function which is precluded from Carlyle's "Laws of Nature". With this erroneous viewpoint, Cazamian sums up the essence of Carlyle's teaching a "a fatalism conjoined with an assimilation of right to might".42 There are two gross errors here: one is the supposed "fatalism" of Carlyle - considered elsewhere in this study - the other is Cazamian's - 46 - misinterpreting of Carlyle to the extent that entirely humm connotations for "Might" and "Right" are substituted for Carlyle's complex, comprehensive mean~ng. Carlyle early realized that his choice of the aphorism "Might is Right" was one which was most suscep­ tible to adverse criticism bent on placing the wrong interpretation on his meaning. Nevertheless, he contin- ued to use the expressions as s~bolic of his deeper meaning conoerning man's place in the universe. It is interesting to note that there are not laoking critios who have defended Carlyle in this conception and have attampted to explain his use of the catch phrase. F.W. Roe, in The Social Philosophy of Carlyle and Ruskin, aohieves what amounts to an aphorism himself in this process. "Carlyle believed in the divine strength of right and not the divine right of strength." 43 B.H. Lehman, in Carlyle's Theory of the Hero, also aids in penetrating beneath the surface meaning of the maxim and tries to explain it in the deeper Carlylean context. "Wi th Carlyle, ••• Might makes Right, because only the Right which is based on a kindling insight into the Divine Reality can possess Might. The phrase was ••• ~fortunately choseni ••• none the less his own idea is a •safe' one." 44 To continue with a study of "Might and Right" and other aspects pf nNature" as expounded by Carlyle in Chartism, it is notioed that Carlyle, with his practical . eye for the fact and the possibility, advocates the desir­ ability of obtaining the pragmatic possible until the - 47 - final ideal becomes practicable. This is also a strong feature of his thought in the essay The Nigger Question. To do this it is necessary to understand one's strengths and mights, which is not the same as recommending the unbridled use of force. "But indeed the rights of man ••• are little worth ascertaining in comparison to the mights of man, - to what portion of his rights he has any chance of being able to make goodl The accurate final rights of man lie in the far deeps of the Ideal, where 'the Ideal weds itself to the Possible'.H 45 Carlyle anticipates the fierce controversy that would arise concerning his meaning in this regard. Therefore a double warning is issued to avoid superficial conclusions. H'Rights I will permit thee to call everywhere 'correctly.articulated mights'. A dreadful business to articulate correctly •••• Mights, I say, are a dreadful business to articulate correctly!'" 46 The rigourous sternness of Carlyle's "Laws", governing all of life, is nowhere better seen than in these lines from Chatttism. "Do we not all submi t to Dea th? The highest sentence of the law, sentence of death, is passed on all of us by the fact of birth; ••• clear undeniable right, clear undeniable might." 47 Carlyle, for the first time, stated definitively in Càartism that a perception and knowledge of the "Laws of Nature" by the governing and working classes of Europe would be necessary in order that the social struggle might be resolved satisfactorily. "What are the rights, what are the mights of' the discontented ••• ? The struggle that divides the upper and lower in society over Europe ••• is a - 48 -

struggle which will end and adjust itself as all other struggles do and have done, by making the right clear and the might clear; not otherwise than by that." 48 Having insisted on the necessity for "strong" in Chartism, Carlyle goes on to expand what he means by this statement. The result is the complex, well rounded leader who appears most often in On Heroes and Past and Present. Two things are significant in this early descrip- tion of the "strong man": one is the subservience and un- importance of physical prowess; the other is Carlyle's insistance on the intuitive, the "dynamic" element, whi!ch, because of its greatness and incomprehensibility, is to be preferred to logical method. "The strong man, what is he ••• ? The wise man; ••• who has insight into what is what, into what will follow out of what, the eye to see and the hand to do; who is fit to administer, to direct, and guidingly command: he is the strong man. His muscles and bones are no stronger than ours; but his soul is stronger, his soul is wiser, clearer, is better and novler •••• But it is the heart always that sees, before the head~ see; let us know that." 49 While Carlyle is insisting that the wise man is the one who conforms to "Nature", he is as explicit in insisting that falsehood and "quackery" are the result of humanity's disobeying "Nature". "The quack is a Falsehood Incarnate; and speaks, and makes and does mere falsehoods, which Nature with her veracity has to disown." 50 Some of the lower orders of Carlyle's hierarchy of wisdom are directly exposed in Chartis.m. Here is included the type of man whom Carlyle contrasted wi th hia ''Great Men" - 49 - in the ~ lectures and the "Aristocracy of Talent" in Past and Present. "He who believes no thing, who believes only the shows of things, is not in relation with Nature and Fact at all. Nature denies him; orders him at his earliest convenience to disappear. Let him disappear from her domains, - into those of Chaos, Hypothesis and Simulacrum, or wherever else his parish may be." 51

As Carlyle suggests in the pass~ge cited, the tolly of unbelie:f in "Nature's Laws" leads inevitably to a dangerous allegiance to "Hypothesis", "Simulacrum" and "Unlaws" of all kinds. Tbst is, a given society must :follow some code or system; if the true course is not adhered to, that society is bound to become allied to a :false system. "A people that knows not to speak the truth, and to act the ~ruth, such people has departed from even the possibility of well-being. Such people works no longer on Nature and Reality; works now on Phantasm, Simulation, Nonentity." 52 This method of illustrating "Nature" is developed most strongly in Latter-Dal Pamphlets. . In that work Carlyle challenges all human customs, laws and institutions with the eternal, inflexible "Laws of Nature". Eleven years earlier, in Chartism, he had begun this method of putting the highest :forms of human authority to the test of "Nature". "Parliantftnt with its privileges is strong; but Necessity and the Laws of Nature are stronger than it." 53 Another component of Carlyle's schema of "Nature" explicitly mentioned in Chartism is that of the dignity and nobleness of "Work". Once again, Carlyle develops - 50 - this thought into more than a moral maxim, emphasizing that the honest worker has solved the riddle of the universe to a certain extent, attaining thereby some degree of blessedness. The importance of work in the system of "Nature" is most fully developed in Past and Present, but the idea is definitely broached in Chartism. "He that can work is a born king of something; is in communion with Nature, is master of a thing or things, is a priest and king of Nature so far •••• Let a man honour his craftsmanship, his can-do." 54 Thus intelligent effort is more than a worldly asset and a saintly virtue. It represente a possession of the h~gher wisdom which comprehends God's master plan for man and directs humanity to its best possible course in life.

At the same time, the stern, o~pulsory aspect of man's duty concerning "Nature" is reiterated by Carlyle. "Intellect, insight, is the discernment of order in disorder; it is the discovery of the will of Naturet of God's will; the beginning of the capa­ bility to walk according to that." 55 "He that will not work, and save according to his means, let him go elsewhither; let him know that for him the law has made no soft provision, but a hard and stern one; that by the Law of Nature, which the Law of England would vainly contend against in the long-run, he is doomed either to quit these habits, or miserabry be extruded from this Earth, which is made on principles different from these. He that will not work according to his faculty, let him perish according to his necessity: there is no law juster than that." 56 - 51 -

REFERENCES - IV

1 - Op. ci t., P• 241-242. 2 - Ibid., P• 234-235.

3 - ~., P• 235. 4 - Ibid., p. 245. 5 - Op. ci t., P• 88. ô - !ill·, P• 84. 7 - Op. ci t., P• 43. 8 - Ibid., P• 153. 9 -Ibid., P• 167.

10 - Ibid., P• 125. 11 -Ibid.,- p. 167. 12 - -Ibid., P• 200. 13 - ~·· P• 208. 14 - Ibid., P• 209. 15 Ibid., p. 204. 16 - Op. oit., P• 211.

17 - ~., P• 195. 18- Ibid., P• 202 and passim. 19 - Ibid., P• 189. 20 - -Ibid., P• 188. 21 - Froude, First Forty, Vol. II, P• 308. 22 - Op. oit., P• 97. - 52 -

23- "Like a madman's dream"- Op. cit., p. 678. 24 - In a latter to Mrs. Carlyle of July 24, 1836. 25 - The French Revolution, p. 172. 26 - On Heroes and Hero-Worship, p. 232. 27 - The French Revolution, p. 179. 28 - Ibid., P• 474 and passim. 29 -Ibid., see pp. 352, 544 for possible exemples of this. 30 - -Ibid., P• 395. 31 -Ibid., P• 169. 32 - lill·' P• 688. 33 - Ibid., P• 586, 600-601. 34 - --Ibid., P• 586. 35 -Ibid., P• 600-601. 36 -·Ibid., P• 231. 37 - Ibid., passim. 38 - OJ2. ci t., p. 190. 39 - Loo cit. 40 - Correspondance of Carlyle and Emerson - Vol. I, p. 108 (latter of Nov«œber 5, 1836). 41 - Life of , p. 185. 42- L. Cazamian, Op. cit., p. 229. 43- Qp. cit., p. 99. 44- Op. cit., p. 119. 45- Op. oit., p. 194. 46- Ibid., p. 214-215.

47 - ~., P• 169 - 53 -

48 - !lli· t P• 169-170. 49 - -Ibid., P• 190. 50 - lill·' P• 192. 51 - -Ibid., P• 217. 52 - Ibid., P• 181. 53 - Ibid., p. 208. 54 - -Ibid., P• 179. 55 - ~., P• 230. 56 - Ibid., P• 177. V. THE "LAWS OF NATURE" IN THE HERO LECTURES --"":.~··

"The man whom Natur~ has appointed to do great things, is first of all, furnished with that openness to Nature which renders him incapable of being ~sincere! To his large, open, deep-feeling heart Nature is a Fact •••• He must have truth; truth which he feels to be true. How shall he stand Otherwise? ••• He is under the noble nec­ essity of being true." - On Heroes and Hero-Worship V. THE "LAWS OF NATURE" IN THE HERO LECTURES

It has been seen how several of the central, conditioning elements in Carlyle's thought and social method were present in Chartiam. Carlyle went on to emphasize his ideas more eloquently in his later works, seizing on every opportunity in history and contemporary affaira, and employing every deviee of symbolism and imagery, to make the concept that was a certainty in his mind credible to the reader. In Chartism he used the formula of "Might and Right" in "Nature" as the predominant method of exposition. The Hero lectures added a human element throughout by the introduction of "Great Men" as the interpretera and enforcers of "Nature" in the human realm. Carlyle's grandest, most ambitious attempt to render the existence of the concept convincing appears in Past and Present. In that work he repeatedly says it is not primarily his task to explain or define the laws, this being an impossibility because of their intrinsic nature. However, he makes enough - 56 -

statements in passing for a tentative system to be codified. The ~er-Day Pamphlets are essentially an emphatic repetition of the fully developed thought and dialectic of Fast and Present, attempting to sear the importance of the "Laws of Nature" into the minds of the English people. But it was some time before the appearance of ~t and Pres~ that the lectures On Heroes were delivered (May, 1840). Here Carlyle makes abstruse theory more practical by a consideration of the types of men who are ideal leaders. In the first place, the predominating spiritual and cultural qualities of these types are remarkable; moreover, there is a corresponding neglect of any physical or military prowess they might possess. On the one hand, Carlyle admires the military leader mainly for his ability to get work done; at the same time he neglects any potential danger in the exis­ tence of regimented forces. Carlyle maintains that if the nascent "Hero" is not in.trinsically just, he will not have long-run endurance in any case. As observed in Sections IV and VI, this may appear as a naive lack of awareness of the dangers of the military; nevertheless it is a fixed component of Carlyle's "Laws of Nature".

~'I care little for the sword: ••• very sure that ft will, in the long-run, conquer nothing which does not deserve to be conquered. What is better than itself, it cannat put away, but only what is worse. In this great Duel, Nature herself is umpire, and can do no wrong: the thing which is - 57 -

deepest-rooted in Nature, what we call truest, that thing and not the other will be found growing at last." 1 Thus it is not the "Hero" or "Great Man" as such who directs matters on earth, but rather the underlying laws which ultimately govern all men's actions. Man as a moral being is inextricably bound up with "Nature", and the highest sanction for his deeds must be traced through him to "Nature" itself. Carlyle reviews some of the aspects of the

"Hero's" place in the order of "Nature" in the ~ lectures. The necessity for obedience, reverence, and a "divine relation" binding all men together is stressed.2 Constitutional freedoms and democratie rights pale before the categorical insistance on man's fulfilling his station in the great order of "Nature". "There is no act more moral between men than that of rule and obedience. Woe to him that claims obedience when it is not due; woe to him that refuses it when it is! God's law is in that, I say, however the Parchmenttlaws may run:-there is a Divine Right or else a Diabolic Wrong at the heart of every claim that one man makes upon another." 3 The matter of the strong thing being inevit­ ably the right thing is brought out again in the lectures, with the accompanying qualification to the meaning of "strong". "The weak thing, weaker than a child, becomes strong one day, if it be a true thing." 4 In this regard the appearance of Cromwell and - 58 - is held to be the result of a deviation from the "Laws of Nature" in their respective societies. The attainment of power by Napoleon in Revolutionary France and Cromwell in Puritan England was corroborated, as it were, by the cosmic "Laws of Nature"; hence their initial positions of authority could not be directly attributed to personal ambition. "While man is man sorne Cromwell or Napoleon is the necessary finish of Sansculottism •••• Divine right, take it on the great scale, is found to mean di vine might wi thal!" 5 In order to throw more light on Carlyle's meaning here, it is interesting to trace his treatment of Napoleon and how the latter came to usurp the author- ity he received from "Nature". The final denial to Napoleon of a position in the ranks of "Heroes" is borne out during a positive statement of the merits of a true "Hero", in this case, Goethe. "cGoetheJ is king of himself and of his world; nor does he rule it like a vulgar great man, like a Napoleon or Charles Twelfth, by the mere brute exertion of his own will, grounded on no will, or on a false one; faculties and feelings are not fettered and prostrated under the iron sway of Passion, but led ••• under· ••• Reason." 6 Carlyle repeats more than once the point that Napoleon's final position was that of a militaristic tyrant; hence he was inevitably banished because of his ultimate usurpation of "Nature's" sanction. "Unhappily it was in the military province only that Napoleon could realize this idea of his t'la carrière ouverte aux talens'J being forced to fight for himself the while • • • - 59 -

and he lost head ••• and became a selfish ambitionist and quac., and was hurled out." ? "The Duke of Weimar told his friends always, To be of courage; this Napoleonism was unjust, a falsehood, and could not last. It is true doctrine." 8 On the positive side, Carlyle adds to his system of thought by defining in some measure in the

~lectures the specifie qualities of the "Great Man". The following points emerge: one is that the true son of "Nature" bases his authority on intuitive divination; another, that although ~1 men are potentiel "Heroes", most cast their talent away, even to the point where thay cannat recognize greatness in others. "But the eye that flashes direct into the heart of things, and sees the truth of them; that is to me a highly-fnteresting abject. Great Nature's own gift; which she bestows on all; but which only one in the thousand does not cast sorrowfully away." 9 "The Hero is he who lives in the inward sphere of things, in the True, Divine and Eternal, which exists always, unseen to most, under the Temporary, Trivial •••• His life ••• is a piece of the everlasting heart of Nature herselt: all men's life is, - but the weak many know not the fact; the strong few are strong, heroic, perennial, because it cannot be hidden from them." 10 Carlyle emphasizes the positive aspect of this thought; that is, that the "Heroic Man" intuitively recognizes the "Laws of Nature" in their workings and bases his condu~t and thinking upon them. "the faculty which enables him to discern the inner heart of things, and the har.mony that dwells there ••• is ••• the gift of Nature - 60 -

herselt: the primary outfit for a Heroic Man in what sort soever." 11 Carlyle's comprehensive, unified system of philosophy, covering all life, matter and experience, and concentrated in the term "Nature", is in evidence in his description of the governing elements of the human mind and spirit. Carl~le implies there is a false division made between the so-oalled powers of insight, understanding, reason and so forth; consequently, in his method he joins them all in one glorious unit or "Force" which governs the whole man. "man's spiritual nature, the vital Force which dwells in hlm, is essentially one and indiv­ isible; that what we call imagination, fancy, understanding, and so forth, are but different figures of the same Power of Insight, all · indissolubly connected with each other, phys­ iognomically related •••• Morality itself, what we call the moral quality of a man, what is this but another side of the one vital Force whereby he is and works?" 12 This passage is another indication of the difficulty in fully analyzing and interpreting Carlyle's comprehensive system. In Characteristics, he said that intuttion was superior to a rational process of thought, (although reason was not an "instrument of disintegration", as Lippincott maintains}. Now, in the above passage from On Heroes, Carlyle unites all these faculties of perception and analysis into one "vital Force". Moreover, man must carry on his moral life, besides "be" and "work" by the aid of this "Force". From this explanation can be seen the inaccuracy of B.E. Lippincott•s statement:- - 61 -

"Carlyle and the fascists attack reason: Car­ lyle insists that reason is an instrument of disintegration and that man's function is to act, not to think •••• Mussolini and Hitler • • • he would have unquestionably admired." 13 This is an example of the short-sighted criticis.m which seizes upon one isolated aspect of Carlyle's complicated thought. Moreover, this treatment of a segregated element of Carlyle's thinking is of a superficiel type, not troubling to probe Carlyle's deeper meanings. To approach an understanding of Carlyle's intricate meaning with regard to "might", "Force" and "strength", it is useful to study his several definitions of the "Hero". It will be noticed that the optimistic picture of the possibility of all men's becoming "Heroes" is balanced by the observed fact that most forfeit their place. in "Nature's" order to follow the superficial shows and semblances. "The Valet does not know a Hero when he sees him1 Alas, no: it requires a kind of Hero to do that;- And one of the world's wants, in this as in other senses, is for most part want of such." 14 Carlyle dismissed summarily all relativistic, utilitarian, pragmatic philosophies of living. To him the world was not a mechanis.m wouid up and set in motion; rather, the physical manifestations of the universe clothed a moral reality in which every human action was of deep significance, being judged by immutable laws. Thus a vital, living force was added to Carlyle's growing concept of the "Laws of Nature" in On Heroes, - 62 - a charge which was to lend conviction to, and be further emphasized in Past and Present, where his body of doctrine is presented most completely. "Goqliband Evil careJ the two polar elements or this Creation, on which it all turns; that these two dirfer not by preferability of one to the ether, but by incompatibllity, absolute and infinite; that the one is excellent and high as light and Heaven, the ether hideous, black as Gehenna and the Pit of Hell! Ever­ lasting Justice, yet with Penitence, with everlasting Pity, - all Christianism, ••• is emblemed here." 15 The preceding passage illustrates Carlyle's method of selecting ideas which have the stamp of truth from all philosophies and religions, admitting thèm to his scheme of "Nature". His religion was utterly deVoid of dogma and creed, being one in which the universe itself was the temple or worship. His criteria for ad­ mitting beliefs to his personal religion or for adding components to the "Laws of Nature" are well put forth in the ~ lectures. "If it be a true word, we shall have to believe it; believing it, we a.hall have to do it. What name OD weloome we give him or it, is a point tnât concerns ourselves màinly. It, the new Truth, new deeper revealing of th~SeOret of this Universe, is verily of the nature of a message from on high; and must and will have itself obeyed." lô As an example pf the practical working of this method, it is seen that Mohammedanism can be placed in an inferior position to Christianity in one respect. "The sublime forgiveness of Christianity, turning of the ether cheek when the one has - 63 -

been smitten, is not here; you ~ to revenge yourself caccording to IslamJ•" 17 In the case of the Nordic religion, Carlyle traces the development of men's insight into the "Laws of Nature" through the ages in a study of their method of worship. "Man first puts himself in relation with Nature and her Powers, wonders and worships over those." 18 This is the crude Norse Odinism which worshipe only the physical manifestations of nature. Later the Narse­ men saw more fully into the unified entity of "Nature", and what its absolute power was ultimately based on. "not till a later epoch does he discern that all Power is Moral, that the grand point is the distinction for him of Good and Evil, of Thou sbalt and Thou shalt not." 19

The ~lectures illustrate Carlyle's lack of logically developed system, dogma and formal phil­ osophical vernacular, with the resulting unique, unorthodox process by which he invoked the "Laws of Nature", insisting on their eternal validity. This method may finally be regarded as Carlyle's sppreme strength rather than a philosophical weakness. In a sweeping passage he indicates his approval of Dante's religion, passes on to Shakespeare's contribution to humanity, concluding witb an admonition to all men to worship the universal religion of "Nature". It is this highly developed view of "Nature" whicp for.ms the dominant theme of his next work - Past and Present. - 64 -

"We called Dante the melodious Priest or Middle-Age Catholiciam. May .we not call Shakespeare the still more melodious Priest or a true Catbolicism, the 'Universal Church' or th~ture and of all times? ••• Nature seemed to this man also divine; unspeakable, deep as Tophet, high as Heaven: 77. No narrow superstition, harsh asceticis.m, intolerance, fanatical fierceness or perversion: a Revelation, so far as it goes, that such a thousand-fold beauty and divineness dwells in all Nature: which let all men worship as they canl" 20

Carlyle: antf,~i.p-a'tes: in the ~ lectures several pf the elements of the "Laws of Nature" which appear in their most complete for.m in Past and Present and Latter­ Day Pamphlets. As is to be expected, the "Hero" himself - the "Great Man" of the "Aristocracy of Talent" - receives the fullest treatment in the lectures. Each individual's standing is oonsidered directly with regard to "Nature". "For at bottom the Great Man, as he cames from .the hand or Nature, is ever the same kind of thing: , Luther, Johnson, Burns; I hoRe ta make it appear that these are all originally of one stuff." 21 In this respect Mahomet was "a silent great soul; he was one of those who cannet but be in earnest; whom Nature herself has appolnted ta be sincere •••• The word of such a man is a Voice direct from Nature's own Heart." 22 Shakespeare's ultimate value is also considered with regard to "Nature". It is not simply that he has con- for.med to "Nature"; rather, he is the product of divine laws working mysteriously in him. "Nature at her own time ••• sent him forth; taking small thought of Acts of Parliament. • • • Priceless Shakespeare was the free gift of Nature; given altogether silently." 23 - 65 -

When this process of indoctrination was complete, Shakespeare was linked indissolubly to "Nature", thus being bound to speak and write according to the eternal laws. "It is Nature's highest reward to a true simple great soul, that he get thus to be a part of herselt. Such a man's works ••• grow up withal unconsciously, from the unknown deeps in him; ••• Wfth a symmetry grounded on Nature's own laws, conformable to all Truth whatsoever. How much in Shakespeare lies·hid." 24 In the same way, Carlyle reserves his highest praise of all his heroes for a statement which will prove their kinship with "Nature". Luther is "a right Spiritual Hero and Prophet; once more, a true Son of Nature and Fact." 25 Also Dr. Johnson, Burns and Rqusseau, (although the latter especially is not a "Great Man" at all points), are presented as "Genuine Men" by Carlyle because "by Nature herselt a noble necessity was laid on them to be so •••• To a certain extent, they were Sons of Nature once more in an age of Artifice; once more, Original Men." 27 Dr. Johnson emerges as Carlyle's favou.Dite in this "Man of Letters" group. ''lt was in virtue of his sinceri ty, of his speaking still in some sort from the heart of Nature, ••• that Johnson was a Prophet." 28 Johnson appeals to Carlyle because the for.mer's persona! nature tended to make hlm taciturn and reticent. However, the compelling drive of "Nature" in the grand sense overca.me Dr. Johnson's innate personality, obliging hlm to speak the truth which existed in his mind. In this respect Johnson's - 66 - perso~ality resembles Carlyle's as revealed in Sartor Resartus. "Nature has provided that the great silent Samuel shall not be silent too long •••• there is an irrepressible tendency in every man to develop himself according to the magnitude which Nature has made him of; to speak-out, to act-out, what Nature has laid in him •••• Nature, I say, has provided amply that the silent gteat man shall strive to speak withal." 29 The comparison of "Nature" to the Sphinx, which is set forth in detail in the second chapter of Fast and Present, is also mentioned in passing in the

.~ lectures. In establishing a system of laws which was to comprehend everything conceivable to the human mind, spirit and senses under one heading, Carlyle co~ld not omit the inclusion of "the dark brute Powers of Nature". 30 This idea goes far beyond a consideration of tooth and fang nature, natural eruptions of all kinds on the earth which bring diaaster to humanity, and the weakness of the human body. Carlyle presupposes these self-evident aspects of life, going on to consider the long-run moral and social implications of man's conduct from the standpoint of "Nature's" severely strict laws. "A man must conform himself to Nature's laws, be verily in communion with Nature and the truth-of things, or Nature will answer him, No, not at all!" 31 This idea becomes lüearer when Carlyle exemplifies i t from a broad social and economie background. The collective false conduct which preceded the French Revolution directly precipitated the social outburst. The severe - 67 -

side of "Nature" appears when its laws are contravened to the breaking point. "Nature bursts-up in fire-flames, French Revol­ utions and such-like, proclaiming with terrible veracity that·forged notes are forged." 32 "The 'law of gravitation' acts; Nature's laws do none of them forget to act. The miserable millions burst-forth into Sansculottism, or some other sort of madness." 33 But as with nations, so with individuels: it is only the transgresser of "Nature" who is punished. A man realizes blessedness only insofar as he complies with the preordained pattern; and conversely, as Carlyle was later to re-emphasize in Past and Presen1, it is inevitable that the "Laws of.Nature" to the non-conformist in this sense will appear restrictive. "Infinite pity, yet also infinite rigour of law: it is so Nature is made." 34 "Nature, with her truth, remains to the bad, to the selfish and pusillanimous forever a sealed book: what such can know of Nature is mean, super­ ficiel, small; for the uses of the day merely." 35 In On Heroes and Hero-Worship, Carlyle intro­ duces another aspect of his thought on... t;he "Laws of Nature". This is the contention that man must accept as established facts the existence of "God's Law" with the corollaries that the heavenly judgment is just and is passed on all human actions - if not immediately - then in the fulness of time. Man must . "cease his frantic pretension of scanning this great God's-World ••• tandJ know that it had verily, though deep beyond his soundings,-a-Just Law, that the soul of it was Good;- that his part - 68 -

in it was to confor.m to the Law of the Whole ••• obeying it as unquestionable. "I say, this is yet the only true morality known. A man is right and invincible ••• precisely while he joins himself to the great deep Law o~ the World ••• he is victorious while he cooperates with that great central Law ••• and surely his first chance of cooperating with it, or getting into the course of it, is to know with his whole soul that it ~; that it is good, and alone good!" 36 Carlyle throws some light on the criteria for deter.mining the elements of "Nature", but ultimately it can be seen that the faculty of intuitive divination is required to penetrate the core of his meaning. "It is the way with Nature. The genuine essence of Truth never dies. That it be genuine, a voice from the great Deep of Nature, there is the point at Nature's judgment-seat." 37 Thus, from the strictly logical point of view, it is apparent that no conclusively satisfactory definition of "Nature" can be f'ound in Carlyle's works. However, Carlyle is aware of this and repeats that "Nature" must be intuitively felt,with no regard to the inadequacies of language and that medium's second-hand reproductions of what were originally imperfect thoughts in the speaker's mind. In this regard, Carlyle becomes outspokenly Platonic concerning "Nature" in the opening lecture of On Heroes. Here he states that to the

"child-man of Plato's ••• Nature had as yet no ~e ••• he had not yet united under a name the infinite variety of sights, sounds, shapes and motions, which we now collectively nam.e Univer.se, Nature, or the like,- and so with a name dismiss it from us. To the wild deep-hearted man all was yet new, not veiled under names or formulas; it stood naked,flashing-in - 69 -

on him there, beautiful, awful, unspeakable. Nature was to this man, what to the Thinker and Prophet it forever is, preternatural." 38 It is seen that "Nature" must "flash-in" on the mind; "Nature" is the intuitive norm which to Carlyle representa the compulsive force at the heart of the universe. Moreover, as we are assured that "it is the spiritual always that determines the material",39 all mechanical laws of the physical world are subservient to the divine, mystical law of necessity which fundamentally governs the uni verse. eJI>lanation of Carlyle's "Laws of Nature". Carlyle him- self, in referring to the "music" in "Nature", attempted to go further in On Heroes in an endeavour to reveal the core of his meaning. We must in the last resort accept his authority for the contention that the clairvoyant seer can probe beyond the incidentals and superficialities of life to an understanding of its divine meaning. However, what is certain - and what is important for this study - is that a most complex authoritative entity, epitomized as "Nature", is the governing standard of the Carlylean "Hero" and of Carlyle's high pronouncements in his subsequent writings. "The seeing eye! It is this that discloses the inner harmony of things; what Natur~ meant, what musical idea Nature has wrapped-up in these often rough embodiments." 40 "See deep enough, and you see musically; the heart of Nature being everywhere music, if you can only reach it." 41 - ?0 -

REFERENCES - V

1 - Op. ci t., P• 80-81. 2 - ~-, P• 2, 236. 3 - ill,g,., P• 260-261. 4 - ill.9:·, p. 189. 5 - ~-, P• 267. 6 - Quoted in Lehman, Op. ci t., P• 66 (from Car1y1e's essay on Goethe). 7 - Car1y1e's essay Sir Wa1t&r Scott, p. 67; (see a1so Car1y1e's Death of Goethe, p. 10).

8 - On Heroes, p. 31?~318.

9 - Ibid., p. 89.

10- ~-, p. 204.

11 - ~., p. 138. 12- -Ibid., p. 139. 13 - B.E. Lippincott, Victorian Critics of Democracy, p. 47' 51. 14 - On Heroes, p. 241.

15 - ~-, p. 127.

16 - ~., P• 254. 17 - Ibid., P• 97.

18 - Ibid., P• 40. 19 - Loc cit.

20- ~., p. 145-146. - 71 -

21 - ~., p. 56. 22 - !12.ll·' P• 71. 23 - -Ibid., P• 134. 24 - Ibid., p. 141-142. 25 -mg., P• 187. 26 - See Ibid., p. 242 et seg. for a detai1ed consideration of Rousseau. 27 - lill·' P• 233-234. 28 - -Ibid. , P• 236. 29 - -Ibid., p. 295-296. 30 - !.12,g.' P• 43. 31 - Ibid., P• 58. 32 - Loc. ci t. 33 -Ibid., P• 259-260. 34 - -Ibid., P• 123. 35 -Ibid., P• 140. 36 - -Ibid., P• 74. 37 -Ibid.,- p. 82. 38 - Ibid., P• 9-10.

39 - ~-, ·P· 203. 40 - -Ibid., P• 137. 41 - Ibid., p. 109. VI. PAST AND PRESENT

"Superstition, my friend, is far from me; Fanaticism, for any Fanum likely to arise soon on this Earth, is far •••• Fancy a man, moreover, recommending his fellow­ men to believe in God, that so Chartism might abate •••• The idea is more dis­ tracted than any placard-pole •••• "My friend c 'Advanced-Li beral ':J , if thou ever do come to believe in God, thou wilt find all Chartism, Manchester riot, Parl­ iamentary incompetence, Ministries of Windbag, and the wildest Social Dissol­ utions, and the burning-up of this entire Planet, a most small matter in comparison." - Fast and Present •

VI. P AST AND PRESENT

In this consideration of Carlyle's "Laws of

Nature", Fast and Pre~, written at white beat in the first seven weeks of 1843, forms the central document. Like most of Carlyle's writing, it considers everything human and divine, thus in a sense seeming to lack basic unity. "It is moral, political, historical, and a most questionable -hot indignant thing." 1 Carlyle's own consensus sums up the book's contant and spirit. Its.chief value for the purpose of this study lies in its grand, detailed consideration of. the system of thought which Carlyle finally came to epitomize as the "Laws of Nature". Actually, most or all of the component ideas in this conception bad been stated in his previous works, but they are brought together and emphasized with repeated force and completeness in this book. Although Carlyle's completed scheme of "Nature" defies systematized arrangement, all of the components - 74 - appear throughout Past and Present. It is noteworthy that all these aspects had been at least hinted at, if not emphasized by Carlyle before Past and Presen~; and in effect, he repeats them all once agaib, with some change of stress and imagery, in Latter-Day Pamphlets. The salient features of the scheme will be mentioned here, although it is not possible to trace them indiv­ idually with complete accuracy noD analyze them in isolation from one another. The main components of the "Laws of Nature" may be summarized as:- the sternness and severity of the laws with a resulting state of blessedness if the laws are adhered to; Carlyle's def­ initions of "Freedom" and "Despotism" within the frame­ work of "Nature"; the claim that a living, omnipresent God passes a moral judgm.ent on each human action, collective or individuel, with the corollary that divine justice will eventually and inevitably be meted out for each action; the beliet that social upheavals, large and small, are caused by infraction of the "Laws of Nature"; the inter­ connection and definition of "Might" and "Right" and the inevitability of the right cause being the "strong" cause and hence victorious;: the complex definition of "strength": involving a har.monious whole, a balanced oneness in the human faculties; the "Aristocracy of Talent" and its analogy to the "Hierarchy. of Nature" as opposed to the "Q.uack" and the "Sham"; the juxtaposition of parchment laws, human - 75 - movements and institutions with the silent, immutable "Laws of Nature"; the "Infinite nature of Duty and Work"; the emphatic insistance on the existence of the laws without a detailed explanation of them, this being ultim- ately impossible to express in language; and, the moral maxim presented in the for.m of a categorical imperative that reform must begin on each individual by himself. The stern, rigourous qualities of "Nature" are detailed in an opening chapter of Fast and Present, entitled The Sphinx.2 In one respect this aspect of "Nature" has a parallel in Christianity. Carlyle emphasizes this simil­ arity in a way which adds sanction and prestige to his "Laws of Nature". "Tluf,, li fe of all gods figures i tself to us as a Sublime Sadness,- earnestness of Infinite Battle against Infinite Labour. Our highest religion is named the 'Worship of Sorrow'. For the son of man there is no noble crown, ••• but is a orown of thorns!" 3 The sphinx riddle holds the secret of the conditions under which human life is possible. The outstanding point concerning the "Laws of Nature" is that they exist and demand confor.mity from humanity. However, the ultbm­ ate salutary effeot of the laws on mankind is presupposed, if not explicitly stated, in all Carlyle's commenta on the subjeot. That is, it is only to the outlaws of the universe, in the Carlylean hierarchy, that the "Laws" seem harsh. "Nature, Universe, Destiny, Existence, howsoever - ?6 -

we name this grand unnameable Fact in the midst of which we live and struggle, is as a heavenly bride and conquest to the wise and brave, to them who can discern her behests and do them; a destroying fiend to them who can­ nat." 4 To the men who discipline themselves to work and service in the world, "Nature's" rewards are boundless. "Had they known Nature's right truth, Nature's right truth would have made them free." 5 "Nature" has power to bless and also to punish. Al­ though "Nature's" authority can be usurped to-a certain degree, its power will finally destroy the most confirmed falsehoods and injustices. "From all seuls of men, from all ends of Nature, from the Throne of God above, there are voice·s bidding it: Away, away! ••• dissolution, explosion, and the everlasting Laws of Nature incessantly advance towards it; and the deeper its rooting, more obstinate its continuing, the deeper also and huger will its ruin and overturn be." 6 It is not only deviation from the "Laws of

Nature" whic~ causes pain and hardship to humanity. The finding of the true way again, for individuels or society as a whole, is a chastening experience. "This Universe hasits Laws. If we walk according to the Law, the Law-Maker will befriend us; if not, not •••• Nations cease to be befriended of the Law-Maker, when they walk not according to the Law." ? - · There is no simple remedy to this impasse. Carlyle offers no pleasant nor quick solution, but stresses the painful difficulty of a complete return to "Nature". "there will a most agonizing divorce between you and your chimeras, luxuries and falsities, take - ?? -

place; a most toilsome, all-but 'impossible' return to Nature, and her veracities, and her integrities, talee place." 8 Carlyle explicitly states that the same inexorable set of laws governs the conduct of the individuel and society. Where a person or group is prospering, it is directly because of loyalty to "Nature"; conversely, every kind of disaster - single or collective - can be fundamentally attributed to a wandering from the "Laws of God" into an allegiance to the "Laws of Sham and Semblance". 9 "Had he ("an indi vi dual "J followed Nature and her Laws, Nature, ever true to her Laws, would have yielded fruit and increase and felicity to him: but he has followed other than Nature's Laws; and now Nature, her patience with him being ended, leaves him desolate •••• "Nature's long-suffering with you is exhausted; and ye are here! ••• it is with the wretched Twenty-seven Millions, fallen wretched, as with the Unit fallen wretched: they, as he, have quitted the course prescribed by Nature •••• we have de­ parted far away from the Laws of this Universe •••• 'Nature in late centuries~ays Sauerteig, 'was universally supposed to be dead ···'· Behold, ye shall grow wiser, or ye shall die! Truer to Nature's Fact, or inane Chimera will swallow you." 10 In this way, in arder to establish the rigourously

severe quali ti es of his system of ",Ilfat'l.l);-é~l, Carlyle, in the opening chapters of Fast and Present, dwells at length on~ the dire urgency of a true adherence to "Nature's Fact". Other components of his body of laws assume the centre of reference as the book proceeds, but at the same time Car- lyle frequently reiterates the uncompromising, sphinx-like aspects of "Nature". For example, in Book III, Chapter 11, - 78 - a consideration of Sir Christopher Wren's difficulties in building St. Paul's Cathedral is reduced to a problem of the extent of his insight into "Nature's Laws". "Equitable Nature herself, who carries her math- ematics and architectonies not on the face of ber, but deep in the hidden heart of her,- Nature herself is but partially for him; will be wholly against him, if he constrain her not." 11 The co-existence of freedom and despotis.m is reconciled in the consideration of their relation to "Nature's Laws" in Fast and Present. Man's true freedom comes in obeying the "Laws of Nature", whose despotism is accepted because of their inherent justice. Carlyle extends the parallel with telling effect to collective human affaira. "Despotism is essentiel in most enterprises. • •• And yet observe there too: Freedom, not nomad's or ape's Freedoa, but man's Freedom; this is indispensable. We must have it, and will have it! To reconcile Despotis.m with Freedom:- well, is that such a mystery? ••• It is to make your Despotism just. Rigourous as destiny; but just too, as Destiny and its Laws. The Laws of God: all men obey these, and have no 'Freedom' at all but in obeying them." 12 The theory that the French Revolution, democratie upheavals and other social cataclys.ms were inevitable because the order of "Nature" had been drastically usurped is repeated in Past and Present.l3 Carlyle satirizes the sacrosanctity of individuel incenti~e, the shibboletb of the profit motive and the principle of governmental non­ intervention in labour-management disputes - factors whose embroilments affect all society. - ?9 -

"we will say rather, the world has been rushing on with such fiery animation to get work and ever more work done, it has had no time to think of dividing the wages; and has merely left them to be scrambled for by the Law of the Stronger, law of Supply-and-Demand, law of Laisse~-feJJre, and other idle Laws and Un-laws,- saying, in its dire haste to get the work done, That is well enough!" 14 Also, there appears in Past and Present, Carlyle's belief that a living God pronounces a moral judgment through the decrees of "Nature" on all human actions. Hence man's choice is hammed in by necessity to the extent of conforming suitably to "Nature". The absentee-God theory is emphatically denied and dismissed as Carlyle underlines the present progressive nature of the workings of God's justice. "For Justice and Reverence are the everlasting central Law of this Universe7" 15

"the ALMIGHTY M.AKER is not like a clockmaker that once, in old immemorial ages, having made his Horologe of a UniveTse, sits ever since-ind sees it go! Not at all. Hence comes Atheism." 16 This does not imply a fatalistic predestinationism on Carlyle's part. God does not pronounce what each man should do nor what his fate will be; but rather the eternal laws are silently in operation and within these liiDits man must confine his actions. Moreover, by this process, an ever-expanding universe is opened to man if he faithfully adheres to its laws. In effect, an omni- potent "Justice" controls the universe. "The Universe, I say, is made by Lawi the great Seul of the World is just and not unjust. Look - 80 -

thou, if thou have eyes or soul left, into this great shoreless Incomprehensible: in the heart of its tumultuous Appearances, Embroil­ ments, and mad Time-vortexes, is there not silent, eternal, an All-just, an All-beautiful; sole reality and ultimate controlling Power of the whole? This is not a figure of speech; this is a fact." 17 With this point established, it is understandable why Carlyle is so "dreadfully in earnest"l8 in exhorting mankind to pursue the highest possible standards. It is not as a sentimental moralist but as an absolute deter- minist, in the light of the facts concerning the nature of the world, that he adopta this stand. "Truth and Justice are capable alone of being •conserved' and preserved! The thing which is unjust, which is not according to God's Law, will you, in a God*s Universe, try to conserve that? ••• If but the faintest whisper in your hearts intimate to you that it is not fair,- ••• Cast it forth at once and forever if guilty." 19 None of Carlyle's statements in this regard leaves any doubt that complete freedom of choice to accept or reject "Nature's Laws" rests with each indiv- idual. While on one hand lamenting that the majority of men are blind to "Nature's" behests, he is constantly expounding the optimistic possibility that all will return to "Nature" and live in harm.ony with its laws. This aspect of Carlyle's thought is often misinterpreted as being a predetermined fatalism. For example, C.F. Harrold, in an article in Studies in Philology for July, 1936, entitled The Nature of Carlyle's , falls short of

Carlyle's meaning at several poin~when he emphasizes - 81 -

"the inevitably predestinarian character of Carlyle's thought. The doctrines of predes­ tination and of the elect are complementary. While most are fated to make the wrong choices, a few will, by nature, make the right ones." 20 The element that -is inevitable and determined in Car- lyle's meaning is the potency of the "Laws of Nature", with the corollary that a considerable deviation from them will result in human disaster. But each man has complete freedom to accept or reject them, besides poss­ essing liberty of choice within the infinite "limits" of the laws. There is no hint of a philosophy of the "elect" or of an absolute fatalism in Carlyle's thinking. "will not one French Revolution and Reign of Terror suffice us, but must there be two? There will be two if needed, there will be precisely as many as are needed. The Laws of Nature will have themselves fulfilled. That is a thing certain tome." 21 The idea of "Might" and "Right" as originally expounded in Chartism - their mutual interdependance and the long-run test of justice to which they are subjected - is in evidence also in several places in Past and Present.22 "Fight on, thou brave true heart. The cause thou fightest for, so far as it is true, no farther, yet precisely so far, is very sure of viotory. The falsehood alobe of it will be conquered, will be abolished, as it ought to be: but the truth of it is part of Nature's own Laws, cooperates with the World's eternal Tendencies, and cannot be conquered." 23 "His right and his might, at the close of the aooount, were one and the same. He has fought with all his might, and in exact proportion to all his right he has prevailed." 24 Once again the usual reference to "Nature" is made by Carlyle as authority for the foregoing statement. - 82 -

The only appreciable practical weakness in Carlyle's scheme of "Nature", (apart from possible philosophical inconsistencies), is his emphatic belief that nothing will perish by the sword which does not deserve annihilation. This criticism bas already been made in this study with regard to specifie incidents in Carlyle's writings. It is not that Carlyle gloried in a show of strength nor advocated its use indiscrimately. The fact is Carlyle dismissed physical power as a non­ deter.mining agent which cannot alter the effects of super­ lor, comprehensive laws. For this verr=reason it is to be expected that Carlyle will be found to minimize the im­ portance of feats of ar.ms. And this is discovered to be the case. When Carlyle praises Cromwell or William the Conqueror, it is because they accomplished some worthwhile work. Any fighting involved was "a distressing impedimental adjunct". 25 Thus the charge that Carlyle did not fully appreciate the potential danger of a dictator has some validity. But this is greatly removed from the unfair and untrue accusation that he advocated the enforcement of power by a fascist tyrant. 26 Carlyle is always thinking cosmically in ter.ms of man's place in the universe, having nothing in common with the petty aims and ambitions of the average autocrat. "Hallucinatory visions rise in the head of my poor fellow man; make him claim over me rights which are not his. All fighting, as we noticed long ago, is the dusty conflicts of strengths, each thinking itself the strongest, or, in other - 83 -

words, the justest;- of Mights which do in the long-run, and forever will in this just Universe in the long-run, mean Rights. In conflict the perishable part of them, beaten sufficiently, flies off into dust: this process ended, appears the imperishable, the true and exact." 2? Carlyle has several references in Past and Present to the complex "strength" required by "Nature",28 as if anticipating, as he did in the ~ lectures, the charges that he was advocating the ascendancy of a strong­ arm dictator. Current social maladies, such as oppor­ tunism and laissez-faire are singled out for attack by him, but always in the perspective of the cosmic, universal "Laws of Nature". "A grand vis inertiae is in thee; how many grand qualities unknown to small men! Nature alone knows thee, acknowledges the bulk and strength of thee." 29 "sheer obstinate toughness of muscle; but much more, what we oall toughness of heart, which will mean persistance hojeful ••• unsubduable patience, oomposed candid openness, clearness of mind: all this shall be 'strength' in wrestling your dragon; the whole man's real strength •••• "it is not the Bucanier, it is the Hero only that can gain victory, that can do more than seem to succeed. These things will deserve meditating." 30

This harmon~ous development of all the finer human faculties is what constitutes the "strength" of the "Aristocracy of Talent", described at length in Book I, Chapter 5 of Past and Present. The "Hero-archy" is diff­ erent from other social, economie and political orders in that its leaders are tested by the criteria of "Nature". In this arrangement man - 84 -

"obeys those whom he esteems better than himself, wiser, braver; and will forever obey such; ••• the Wiser, Braver; these, a Virtual Aristocracy." 31 At the same time "Plausibility, Quack, Falsity and Fatuity" are dis.missed by the "Wise Man", who says to them as "Nature says, and must say, when ctheyJ come to her to spea.k, eternally NO!" 32 Carlyle's attacks on the idle rich classes of England are based on his belief that they have been disloyal to "Nature". "A High Class without duties to do is like a tree planted on precipices;.· from the roots of which all the earth has been crumbling. Nature owns no man who is not a martyr wi thal." 33 By virtue of the same authority the disintegration of these classes inevitably follows. "That such a class is transitory, exceptional, and, unless Nature's Laws fall dead, cannet continue." 34 In dis.missing the "False Aristocracies", Carlyle explains that "The Wiser, Braver; these, carel a Virtual Aristocracyn.35 He is extremely emphatic in stressing that "Nature" insista on the authority of its "Best". Therefore, those who can most competently implement "Nature's Laws" must be placed in power at once. "When a world, not yet doomed for death, is rushing down to ever-deeper Baseness and Confusion, it is a dire necessity of Nature's to bring in her ARIS­ TOCRACIES, her BEST, even by forcible methods. When their descendants or representatives cease entirely to be the Best, Nature's poor word will very soon rusn-down again to Baseness; and it becomes a dire necessity of Nature's to cast them out. Hence French Revolutions, Five-point Charters, Democracies, and a mournful list of Etceteras, in these our afflicted times." 36 - 85 -

Carlyle places the authority for this "Aris­ tocracy of Talent" in the invisible "Justice" of the universe, which, although it cannat be seen, is operating beneath all .men's actions and devrees. This is stated in the language of the "Clothes Philosophy" of Sartor Resartus in Past and Present.

"The clothed embodied Justice ~hat sits in Westminster Hall, with penalties, parchments, tipstaves, is very visible. But the unembodied Justice, ••• is not so visible! For the unembodied Justice ~s of Heaven; a Spirit, and Divinity of Heaven,- ·invisible to all but the noble and pure of soul." 37- In Latter-Day Pamphlets Carlyle is even more forcibly expressive in challenging all human theories, oônstitutions and institutions, of whatever kind, with his omniscient, inflexible "Laws of Nature". In Past and Present also, by constantly adopting the same method, Car­ lyle removes the halo of authority, established by use and wont, from all human symbols of moral or legal supremacy. Having accomplished this, he approaches the bare facts of each situation anew solely in the light of the demands of "Nature". "The fruit of long ages of confir.med Valethood, entirely confirmed as into a Law of Nature; cloth­ worship and quack-worship: entirely confirmed Valethood,- which will have to unconfirm itself again." 38 - Carlyle's uniquely informal style and ter.minology are developed into an efficient instrument with which to impress his points. The use of italics, capitalization and picturesque coinages contributes to a precise impression - 86 - of/his meaning. This method was the beat he could adopt to instil the awareness of his thought into his readers' minds. He insisted that the essence of his meaning could never be transmitted by logiaal discourse. "Nature has appointed happy fields, victorious laurel-crowns; but only to the brave and true: Unnature, what we call Chaos, holds nothing in It but vacuities, devouring gulfs •••• Puffery, Falsity, Mamm.on-wo~rship and Unnature; ••• Believe them not; the Worlds and the Ages, God and Nature and All Men say otherwise." 39 Economie, social and political theories and philosophies were followed more slavishly in Carlyle's day than in the present time. The devotees of auch movements as doctrinaire laissez-faire economie theory and democratie utilitarianism were fast making cults out of these speculative philosophies. It is these Carlyle has in mind in statements such as the following. "The Man of Theory twangs his full-bent bow: Nature's Fact ought to fall stricken, but does not." 40 And, more explicitly:- "All this dire misery, therefore; all this of our Workhouse Workmen, of our Chartisms, Trades­ strikes, Corn-Laws, Toryisms, and the general downbreak of Laissez-faire in these days,- may we not regard it as a voice from the dumb. bosom of Nature, saying to us: 'Behold! supply-and-demand is not the one Law of Nature; Cash-payment is not the sole nexuso of man wi th man. • • • Deeper, far deeper than Supply-and-demand, are Laws, Obligations sacred as Man's Life itself: ••• He that will learn them, behold Nature is on his side, ••• He that will not learn them, Nature is against him, he shall not be able ;o do .work in Nature' s empire. '" 41 Carlyle disregards wbat he believes to be inadequate, superficiel social codes and strikes to the - 87 - bottom of every issue, viewing each incident in the light of its effect on all ether social happenings. Thus no narrow segment of social action can be justified in itself. It must be subjected to the comprehensive test of "Nature". In this process, Carlyle is led to ask:- "What of England's doings the Law of Nature had accepted, cwhatJ Nature's King had actually furthered and pronounced to have truth in them?" 42 To this question Carlyle supplies two sobering conclusions.

The first is that "Nature does ~ ownn43 the contemporary and immediately prier actions of England; moreover, the "Spoken Word of England" has been "not a Word, but a Cant; ••• a very mournful Cant; the Voice not of Nature and Fact." 44 Always there continues the dire, insistent warning that man can only deviate to a limited extent from "Nature's" preappointed ways. "Nature's" judgments on excessive advertising ("Puffery") will serve to illus- trate this point. "I answer, once for all, that the fact is not so, Nature requires no man to make proclamations of his doings and hat-makings; Nature forbids all men to make such •••• Nature's Laws, I must repeat, are eternal: her small still volee, speaking from the inmost heart of us, shall not, under terrible penalties, be disregarded." 45 The solution to this alar.ming situation is the one Carlyle repeated continually - whose meaning he was implicitly and overtly emphasizing throughout all his social criticism: the "Governing Class" at least and ideally all mankind would have to return to "God and Nature and the inflexible law of - 88-

Fact". The insistent message of "Nature and Fact rwould have tol have itself obeyed". 46 Carlyle's two great moral dicta - the "Infinite nature of Duty"47 and the blessedness of "Work" - are also sanctioned by and receive their ultimate authority from "great Nature's ••• unalterable ever-veracious Laws"48 in Past and Present. The idea of the sacredness of work in Carlyle's writings is linked up with his insistance on stability and continuity in all matters. He believed honest work was the most expedient method by which to bring about this desired.end. "I am for permanence in all things, at the earliest possible moment. And to the latest possible." 49 The following passage will indicate the importance of "Work" in the scheme of "Nature":- "The spoken Word, the written Poem, is said to be an epitome of the man; how much more the done work. Whatsoever of morality and of intelligence; what of patience, faithfulness of method, insight, ingenuity, energy; in a word, whatsoever of Strength the man had in him will lie written in the Work he does. To work: why, it is try himself against Nature, and her everlasting unerring Laws; these will tell a true verdict as to the man. So much of virtue and of faculty did we find in bim; so much and no more! He had such ëapacity of har.monizing himself with me and my unalterable ever-veracious Laws; of co-oPërating and working as I bade him,­ and has prospered, and has not prospered, as you see!- Working as great Nature bade him: does not that mean virtue of a kind; nay of all kinds!." 50

It must be repeated that the important point is that Car­ lyle is more than moralizing in this matter. It is a fundamental necess1ty in the achieving of any measure of blessedness to cooperate with the eternal tendencies. - 89 -

It is far from a sentimental desire to be "good" or a self-seeking quest for "happiness", but a duty which has already been set for man by the nature of bis existence in the universe. "A great Law of Duty, high as these two Infinitudes tthe past and the future~ dwarfing all else, annihilating all else." 51 In this way Carlyle supports his claims for reform with more than high ideals and the appeals to man's finer nature. Always there is the grim warning that God's laws must be obeyed or civilization will decline and man will inevitably go down to annihiLation. This adds an arresting challenge to his exhortations - one which cannot be dismissed without first proving the fallacy of bis pre- established "Laws of Nature".

"How, wi th our gross Atheism, we hear i t c.'God' s Volee' sanctioning workJ not to be the Voice of God to us, but regard it merely as a Voice of earthly Profit-and-Loss. And have a Hell in England,- the Hell of not making money ••• as if this were Nature's Law •••• As if in truth, there were no God of Labour; as if godlike Labour and brutal Ma.mmonism were convertible terms." 52 Carlyle makes it absolutely clear that he attaches this great importance to "Work" because of its position in the scheme of "Nature". As the system defies separation into component parts, being itself a harmonious whole, there is no doubt that the complete product, as it were, of "Nature",. is the objective to be aimed at by all men. When studied in isolation from one another, the various aspects of "Nature" appear significant insofar as - 90 - they contribute to an understanding and experience of the grand system of thought epitomized by Carlyle as the "Laws of Nature". "Work ••• is in communication with Nature; the real desire to-get Work done will itself lead one more and more to truth, to Nature's appointments and regulations, which are truth." 53 These references help to explain Carlyle's enthusiasm and even exaggeration in urging men to follow "Nature and the Ways of God", with the stern warning that outside of this frame of reference no valid choice exists. In the same way, all of Carlyle's statements on the method of persona! conduct and human government are based on these all-pervading laws, which proceed like a chorus throughout Past and Present. Because of their subtle, complex, spiritual nature, he cannat be as explicit as would be desired as to their makeup, the ways in which they can be observed in operation in human affaire, and what is more important, the methods by which leaders with the appropriate qualities can infallibly be chosen. Because of "Nature's" essential in9plicability, Carlyle concentrates on the task of stressing the concept's exis­ tence, importance and predominating influence in all of man's affairs. "r.concerning:J this small specimen of 'remedia! measures' r.Past and Presentj: ••• Edi tors are not ·here, ï'oremost of ail,- to say How •••• An Editor's stipulated work is to a~rise thee that it mut be done. The 'way to doit',- is to try it, knowing that thou shalt die if it be not done." 54 - 91 -

"The fact of Gravi tatien known to all animals, is not s~er than this inner Fact, which may be known to all men. He who knows this, it will sink, silent, awrul, unspeakable, into his heart. He will say with Faust: "Who -dare name HIM?"" 55 Finally, there is the underlying and sometimes explicit emphasis running throughout Past and Present that the best refor.m of all would be that begun and effected by eaoh individual on himself. This is the optimistic appeal to heroics which Carlyle later ceased to make, but it for.ms a strong undercurrent of emphasis in Past and Present. This appeal remains, along with the admonition to "Work" and the suggestion for an aristocracy of "Heroes", one of the prao- tical aspects of Carlyle's system of "Nature". Self-refor.m is a proposition which all can understand; but fundamentally, as with all Carlylean ideas, this one m~at be studied with reference to the "Laws of Nature" which lie behind it. That is, the final question becomes - how can a man improve his understanding and experience of "Ntiure"? Carlyle can supply a large portion of the answer to this, but he warns that "the essence" can ultimately be conveyed only by "Nature" itself. "this Beautiful and Awful, which we name Nature, Uni verse and suchlike, the essenc·e of which remains for ever UNNAMEABLE." 56 - 92 -

REFERENCES - VI

1 - Carlyle, in letter to John Sterling, of February 23rd, 1843. In Fraude, Life in , Vol. II, 243. 2 -Op. cit., Book I, Chapter 2, p. 7-10. ~':! ~--\ -Ibid., P• 147. 4 - ~., p. 7. 5 - Ibid., p. 8. ô - -Ibid., P• 10. 7 - -Ibid., P• 25. 8 - -Ibid., P• 23. 9 - -Ibid., P• 27. 10 - ~., p. 27-29. 11 - ll!..Ç!., P• 191. 12 - ~., P• 271. 13 - llll·, p. 207. 14 - !.È!.9:·, p. 21. 15 - ~., p. 106. lô - Ibid., p. 142. 17 - ill.!!·, P• 221. 18 - A description of Carlyle attributed to Francis Jeffrey. Quoted passim throughout text of Carlyle and Froude; e.g., Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 194 (1872 edition). 19 - Past and Present, p. 158-159. 20- Op. cit., p. 480. 21 - Past and Present, p. 263. - 93 -

22- ~., p. 12, 184, 234-235. 23- Ibid., P• 12. 24 - Loc. cit.

25- ~., p. 234-235.

26- See:- Grierson, H.J.C., Carlyle and Hitler, p. 47. Bentley, E.R., in Sewanee Review- Summer, 1944 - p. 441-456. Schapiro, J.S., Carlyle, ProQhet of , p. 94-96. Lippincott, B.E., Victorian Critics of Democracy, p. 93 etr seq. Cazamian, L., Carlyle- p. 85. Wellek, René, Carlile and the - References throughout. 27 - Past and Present, p. 184. 28- Ibid., p. 21, 154, 160. 29- Ibid., P• 154. 30 - Loc. ci t.

31- ~., P• 232. 32- -Ibid., P• 25. 33- Ibid., p. 172.

34 ~';~., 171-172. 35- Ibid., P• 232. 36- Ibid., p. 207; see also Chapter 5, The Aristocracy of Taïënt, p.26-27; and p. 174. 37 - Ibid.,- P• 13. 38 - -Ibid., p. 84. 39 - lli.9:.·, P• 137-138. 40 - -Ibid., P• 153. 41 - ~-, P• 179. 42 - Ibid., p. lôl. - 94 -

43 - Loc. ci t. 44 - Ibid., P• 162. 45 - -Ibid., P• 13?. 46 - ~., P• 1?0-1?1. 4? - -Ibid., P• 106. 48 - -Ibid., P• 152. 49 - lli.9:·' P• 269. 50 - ill!!·' P• 152-153. 51 - Ibid., P• 112. 52 - Ibid., P• 163.

53 - ~., P• 189. 54 - -Ibid., P• 259. 55 - ~., P• 221. 56 - Ibid., P• 126-12?. VII. OLIVER CROMWELL; EXODUS FROM HOUNDSDITCH; THE NIGGER QUESTION

'"Rhetoric ali this?' No, mJ[ brother, very singular to say, it is Fact all this. For­ gotten in these days, it is as old as the foundations of the Universe, and will endure till the Universe cease." - Fast and Present VII. OLIVER CROMWELL; EXODUS FROM HOUNDSDITCH; ~ NIGGER Q.UESTION

Between 1840 and 1845 Carlyle was working on one of his three epie histories, that of Dliver Cromwell. Although he had been gathering materiel since 1840, most. of the actuel writing was done between 1843 and 1845. How- ever, just as Froude's famous bfuography of Carlyle is more Carlyle than Froude in textuel material, so also the Crom- welliad contains as much original materiel by Cromwell as by Carlyle. In fact, Carlyle never considered himself more than an editer or compiler, wishing to assemble the Cromwell papers and let them speak ror themselves. At the s~e time, in resurrecting Cromwell, who had undoubtedly been unjustly treated prior to this, Carlyle places his hero in the best possible light. As an example of Carlyle's complete devo­ tion to Cromwell, it is noteworthy that in Past and Present he gave his highest sanction to authorize Cromwell's actions. "in the way of solemn Public Fact and as a new piece of English Law, what informally and by Nature's eternal Law needed no asserting. That he, Oliver, was the Ablest Man of.England, the King of England." 1 - 97 -

However, owing to the form that Carlyle's history took, it is to be expected that Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, with Elucidations, by Thomas Carlyle, will not contain a great deal of explicit exposition with what concerns us here - the "Laws of Nature" as the governing entity in Carlyle's thinking. And this is found to be the case. In his role of narrator and interlocutor, Carlyle defends many of Cromwell's actions on the highest grounds. Moreover, he usually allows the emergency of the situation to support this sanction, a method similar to that employed in The French Revolution. In this process, several striking arguments are put forward for the drastic expedients used by Cromwell, and by inference, the Carlylean "Hero" in general. For example, the following comments, in connection with Pride's Purge and the Ar.my's taking over of the King and London in November, lô48, will serve to illustrate this point. "They have decided to have Justice, these men; ••• on this Earth •••• "Shedders of blood?" Yes, blood is occasionally shed. The healing Surgeon, the sacrificial Priest, the august Judge pronouncer of God's oracles to men, these and the atrocious Mur­ derer, are alike shedders of blood; and it is an owl's eye that, except for the dresses they wear, discerns no difference in these!-" 2 In this way Carlyle takes his "Clothes Philosophy" and "Laws of Nature" throughout his writings with him, although they appear mostly by inference and implication in a work such as Cromwell. After the completion of Oliver Cromwell, Carlyle spent a protracted period of inactivity as regards his own - 98 - writings. "For above two years now I have been as good as totally idle, composedly lying fallow •••• Art, etc., bas all gone down with me, l1ke ice too thin on a muddy pond." 3 There is no doubt that during this period he was med­ itating another book in the grand scale of Past and Present. It would not deal with past and present histor- ical situations as such, but rather, man's perennial position in the world, and how he must adjust all of his life to conform to the eternal facts. Carlyle always considered this subject more important than historical occurrences in themselves or any of his heroes throughout the ages. Indeed, these matters and men were only important insofar as they exemplified the workings of the eternal laws. At the same time, Carlyle felt there was a limit to the extent to which these laws could be conveyed through literature. In this regard, he himself felt incapable of doing them full justice. In his Journal for February 9, 1848, there is the entry:- "Schemes of books to be now set about. 'Exodus from Houndsditch'.4 That, alas! is 11p>ossible as yet, though it is the gist of all wri ings and wise books, I sometimes think - the goal to be aimed at as the first of all for us. Out of Houndsditch, indeed! Ah, were we but out, and had our own along with usJ'But they that come out hitherto come in a state of brutal nakedness; and impartial bystanders say sorrowfully, 'Return rather, it is better even to return'." 5 Carlyle's explicit avowal that this type of writing is - 99 -

"the goal to be aimed at as the first of all for us" provides corroboration for the thesis held in this study. It is sïgnificant that an almost identical statement appears in the text of Fast and Present. This helps to establish the connection of purpose between Fast and Present and Exodus from Houndsditch. In fact, it is direct proof that Çarlyle considered the cosmic, inter­ pretative type of writing the most important,· and that all writing should implicitly illustrate "Nature", if not directly invoke the subject. "Certainly, could the present Editer instruct men how to know Wisdom, Heroism, when they see it, that they might do reverence to it only, and loyally make it ruler over them, yes;-he were the living epitome of all Editors •••• Let no Able Editer hope such things •••• and yet let all Editors aim towards such things, and even towards such alone! One knows not what the meaning of editing and writing is, if even this be not it." ô Carlyle's meaning in the closing sentences of

the passage quoted f~gm Houndsditch - "Return, rather it is better even to return" - is, that if the old clothes or beliefs were suddenly torn off mankind they would have nothing to turn to but "Mammonism", or the "Gospel of Progress" or some similar spiritual malady. Hence this is another reason - (in addition to Carlyle's feeling that he has already said all he adequately can on the subject) - for his not formally writing the Houndsdit~h book. Houndsditch - which in fact was an old Jewish marketing district of London, inhabited by. such types as Bobus Higgins, the "sausage maker on the grand scale" from - 100 ~

Past and Present - represented the stronghold of mammonism and cultural opacity in Carlyle's literary idiom. Hounds­ ditch symbolized the infir.m foundation of all cultural, spiritual, religious aberrations, from whatever time or place, which infested the minds of nineteenth-century Europeans. "All sorrows are included in that, the fountain of degradation for the modern man, who is thereby reduced to baseness in every department of his existence, and remains hopfilessly captive and caitiff till that nightmare be lifted off him. Oh, ye Colleges of Ancient Art, Modern Art, High Art! oh, ye Priest Sanhedrims! ye Modern Coll­ ages, Royal Academies, ye Greek Nightmares, and still · worse Hebrew Nightmares, that press out the soul of poor England and poor Europe, when will you take flight,_ and let us have a little breath, think you? Exodus from Houndsditoh, I believe, is the first beginning of such deliverance." 7 However, Carlyle believed it was dangerous to sweep away immediately all these misconceptions, mentioned in the above passage from his Journal, as men would be left in a cultural and spiritual vacuum. He did not believe they could begin to comprehend the "Laws of Nature" overnight, as it were, and so discarded the idea for a book entitled Exodus from Houndsditoh. Instead, he turned to more specifie issues which he considered in The Nigger ~uestion (1849), and undertook a biographical defence of his friend, John Sterling, whose abandoning of clerical orders had brought charges that he was a volatile misfit. Even this pleasant, if painstaking duty, which occupied Carlyle throughout most of 1851, was - 101 - sanctioned by his highest authority. "'Why write the Life of Sterling?' I imagine I had a commission higher then the world's, the dictate or Nature herselt, to do what is now done. Sic prosit." 8 However, this is anticipatory, because-before the writing of Sterling, Carlyle had completed his second great expos­ ition of the "Laws of Nature", in the form of the eight Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850). It may be asked - if Carlyle discarded the Exodus from Houndsditch - why did he a short time later complete the Latter-Day Pamphlets? If the Exodus was to have considered essentially the same subject, why was it not completed? In his stating emphatically what he con­ sidered to be the only fit subject for worthy literature, Carlyle himself bas partially given the answer to this. The domestio and political situation. in Britain continued to deteriorate, driving Carlyle to make another sustained utterance on these matters from the perspective of the "Laws of Nature". The Exodus book envisaged a unified plan to present his ideas, whereas the Pamphlets are at first sight more detached in subject matter. However, the basic unity of Latter-Day Pamphlets is assured by the book's pre- occupation w1 th "Nature". Thus Carlyle changed only the form of presentation of his deepest thinking in publishing the Pamphlets. The fear of the Exodus that men would be left in an even worse position if shorn of their old beliers, is superseded in - 102 - the Pamphlets by the emergency of the times and a trace of disappointment in Carlyle's realization that literature oan do little in any case to change the thinking habits of men en masse. The works which brought the great storm of abuse down upon Carlyle were Shooting Niagara: and After?, the Latter-Day Pamphlets and the essay entitled Occasional Dis­ course on the Nigger Question. This latter was actually a "precursor to Latter-Day Pamphl~", 9 being completed in December, 1849. In The Nigger Question and Shooting Niagara, Carlyle, while frequently appealing to "Nature" and "Heaven's Laws", is mainly intent on getting to the bottom of two thorny contemporary issues - philanthropie anti-slavery and democracy;- whereas in the Pamphlets he manntains throughout the cosmic penetration of Fast and Present. The latter method per.mits him to consider also higher issues and what lies behind human actions, in addition to the contemporary matters which constitute the titles of the various pamphlets. Carlyle's main purpose in The Nigger Question is to impress upon his "Philanthropie Friends" that "rose­ water philanthropy" and "sentimental Benevolence", as sponsored by the "Universel Abolition-of-Pain Association" and the "Sluggard-and-Scoundrel Protection Societyn,lO are in flagrant opposition to the 'Law o:tU~e' s' pre-imposed decrees. Much as all of mankind would desire the universal- - 103 -

emancipation principle to be put into practice, the state of the world precludes the immediate achievement of this goal. In the preamble, Carlyle mentions his "painful duty" concerning the "Rights of Negroes",ll but with savage he soon adopts the style of terminology almost univer- sally employed at that time in connection with negroes and other underprivileged groups. The "supreme slavery" of all men is the "slavery of Wisdom to Folly":- "My friends, I have come to the sad conclusion that SLAVERY, whethe~ established by law, or by law abrogated, exists very extensively in this world, in and out of the West Indies; and, in fact, that you cannot abolish slavery by act of par~iament, but can only abolish the name of it, which is very little!" 12 - In this essay Carlyle also emphasizes one of the main themes of Chartism again, that is, the interconnection of man's "Mights and Rights". The treatment is similar, excep~ that Carlyle's warning is grimmer, if possible, ooncerning the dire necessity of allegiance to "Nature's Laws" and not those of "Exeter Hall" and the "paper parch- ments". While protesting extrema sympathy and tenderness for the "poor Negro's slavery" and his "black fellow-man",l3 Carlyle insists mankind cannot forget the conditions which govern man's existence. "Conditions which Exeter Hall ••• has forgotten; but which Nature and the Eternal Powers have by no manner of means forgotten, and do at all moments keep in mind; and, at the right moment, will, with the due impressiveness, perhaps in a rather terrible manner, bring again to our mind also!" 14 It was not so much that the freeing of the slaves - 104 - in itself in the British West Indies disturbed Carlyle. Rather, it was what resulted from this action. Permanency of contract and the blessedness of work are strong components of Carlyle's scheme of "Nature". Both of these conditions were abrogated by the abolition of slavery and its consequent confusion. "In all human relations permanency is what I advocate; nomadism, contlnual change, is what I perceive to be prohibitory of any good what­ soever." 15 The idleness, wanderings and unproductivity of the negroes were far more significant to Carlyle than a theoretical consideration of their rights and privileges. Carlyle acknowledges in the essay that he believes slavery to be contrary to the "Laws of Nature". "If buying of Black war-captives in Africa ••• for sale again be, as I think it is, a contradiction of the Laws of this Universe, let us heartily pray Heaven to end the practice; let us ourselves help Heaven to end it, wherever the opportunity is given." 16 However, what is more immediately important is that far­ re~ching disorder would result from the immediate emanci- pation of all compulsory workers who were already working in the Western hemisphere. "The gods are long-suffering; but the law from the beginning was, He that will not work shall perish from the earth; an4 the patience of the gods has limits!" 17 Nevertheless, it should be stated that Carlyle, in the grimly satirio Nigger Question, reoommended a polioy of enlightenment and education to ultimately release all - 105 -

bonded labourera at the appropriate time. This would be when they had proven they could fulfil the responsibilities of freedom. 18 But befQre such a step wo~d be possible, the resulta of the freeing of compulsory workers would have to comply with the "Laws of Nature", Carlyle's authority in­ voked constantly throughout The Nigger Question. He does not elaborate to a great extent on "Nature's" role with regard to slavery, but explicitly mentions his system of "Nature" in several places as the opposition to philanthropy, excessive and mass emancipation. "Heaven's laws are not repealable by Earth, however Earth may try,- and it has been trying hard, in some directions, of latei I say, no well-being, and in the end no being at all, will be possible for you or us, if the law of Heaven is not com­ plied wi th." 19 - 106 -

REFERENCES - VII

1 -Op. cit., p. 214. 2 - Oliver Cromwell, Vol. I, p. 396-397. 3 - Carlyle's Journal, 9th February, 1848; quoted in Wilson's Carlyle, Vol. III, p. 409. 4 - Pamphlet #8 ( "Jesui ti sm") of !&tter-Day Pamphlets, p. 280 (1872 ed.) also contains a reference to the Exodus from Houndsditch idea. 5 -Op. cit., quoted in Wilson, Vol. III, p. 409. 6 - Past and Present, p. 37. 7 - Carlyle's Journal: in Froude's Life in London, Vol. II, p. 363. 8 Life of John Sterling, p. 236. 9 - Subtit1e to the essay.

10 - OJ2· cit., P• 304. 11 - -Ibid., P• 303. 12 - -Ibid., P• 313. 13 - ~-, p. 312.

14 - Ibid., P• 326. 15 - -Ibid., p. 319. 16 -Ibid., P• 331-332. 17 -Ibid., p. 327.

18- Loc~ ci t. 19 - Ibid., p. 329;_ see a1so pp. 322, 323, 324, 326, 330, 331, 332, 333 and passim. VIII. LATTER-DAY PAMPHLETS

"All real talent, I fancy, would much rather, if it listened only to Nature's monitions, express itself in rhythmic facts than in melodious words, which latter at best, where they are good for anything, are only a feeble echo and shadow or fore-shadow of the former."

- Latte~Day Pam~hlets VIII. LATTER-DAY ~BLETS

The Latter-Day Pamphlets, written in 1850, for.m the second and last of Carlyle's studied statements of his underlying philosophy of "Nature". Although ostensibly several oontem~orary issues were the object of the ~ phle.ts - dem.ocracy, the Downing Street question, "stump oratory", mo del prisons, "J"esui ti sm", philanthropy, "flunky­ worship" of millionaire tyooons and others - their lasting importance rests in the renewed and sustained light thrown upon the laws underlying all human oonduct and government. The work is an inspired poem in the manner of Past and Present, except that it has not the same unity of subject as the latter; although, in their intense preoccupation with "Nature" the two books claim a close kinship. In the Pamphlets Carlyle displays a trace of bitterness in the forrn of concentrated tongue-lashings directed at all "fool­ ish, slavish, wioked, insincere persons".l Still, like their predeoessor Past and Present, the Pamphle~ are primarily of a positive nature, attempting to indioate - 109 -

the everlasting way to "the wise and noble-minded".2 Carlyle repeats, eloquently and convincingly, the main tenets of his scheme of "Nature's Laws" in Latter- Day Pamphlets. However, the aspect of "Nature" he is mainly concerned with conveying is his belief that human laws and decrees are eventually useless and positively har.mful if they are not an exact copy of "Heaven's Laws". For this

reason he has no profound ~espect for any human hierarchy or institution. Rather, he opposes "Nature" to all human principalities and powers e:x:cept insofar as they conform to the "World's Laws". He advises allegiance to any and all authorities whose methods follow "the regulations of the Universe- ••• were it Russian Autocrat, Chartist Parliament, Grand Lama, Force of Public Opinion, Archbishop of Canterbury; clet him follow whatl sets him in the sure way to please the Author of this Uni­ verse, and is his friend of friends." 3 This passage indicts the popular fallacy that Latter-Day Pamphlets is primarily a dismissal of democracy as a system of government. Throughout Pamphlet two Carlyle emphasizes the duality of "Good" and "Evil", the high e:x:ternal moral judgment passed on all human actions, and the basic error of philanthropy and associated movements, however laudable their original motives and immediate results. For one to be in perfect harmony with the universe, energy must be exerted, the "Infinite nature of Duty" and "Work" realized, and the necessarily unhealthful, unnatural aspects of free - llO - relief appreciated. "Philanthropy, emancipation, and pity for human calamity is very beautiful; but the deep oblivion of the Law of Right and Wrong; this 'indiscrim­ inate mashing-up of Right and Wrong into a patent treacle' of the Philanthropie movement, is by no means beautiful." 4 Another precise statement of the omnipresent, inevitab.be "Laws of Nature" as opposed to arbitrary human decrees can be taken from Pamphlet six. "And is aritbmetic, think you, a thing more fixed by the Eternal, than the laws of justice are, and what the right is of man towards man? The builder of this world was Wisdom and Divine Foresight, not Folly and Chaotic Accident. Eternal Law is silently present, everywhere and everywhen •••• No pin's point can you mark within the wide circle of the All where God's Laws are not •••• You will carry it, you, by your voting ••• and the adamantine basis of the Universe shall bend to your third reading ••• ? What will become of you?" 5 Carlyle repeatedly underlines the idea that the "Laws of the Universe" must be confor.med to;- they will not relax their rigour in the least in order to har.monize with man's independant judgments. "Practically men have come to imagine that the Laws of this Universe, like the laws of consti­ tutional countries, are decided by voting •••• It is an idle fancy. The Laws of this Universe, of'~~·which if the Laws of England are not an exact transcript, they should passionately study to become such, are f'ixed by the everlasting con­ gruity of things, and are not fixable or change­ able by voting!" ô

Usin~ the contemporary issues of philanthropy and prison reform as illustrative material~ Carlyle repeatedly ~phasizes, under a variety of symbols and - lll - images, the incompatibility of "Nature's Laws" with any human oonduct or law which deviates from these precepts. "no world, or thing here below, ever fell into misery, without having first fallen into folly, into sin against the Supreme Ruler of it, by adopting as a law of conduot what was not a law, but the reverse of one; and that, till its folly, till its sin be cast out of it, there is not the smallest hope of its misery going,- that not for all the charity and rose-water io the world will its misery try to go till thenl" 7 Carlyle challenges all the well-meaning reform and liber­ alis.m of his day with the arresting thought that possibly these philanthropie movements will, in the long run, result in disorder and a debasement of human character. Certainly refor.m was needed, but not of the type which was being effected. Once again, Carlyle's authority for taking issue against virtually every voice in the nation is bis "Laws of Nature". Upon this he bases all his command­ ing certainty, and by the validity of this standard he, in turn, must be judged. "I take the liberty of asserting that there is one valid reason and only one, for either pun­ ishing a man or rewarding him in this world; ••• That you ~ay do the will and commandment of God with regard to him; that you may do justice to him. • •• Find out what the L.aw of God is wi th regard to a man; make that your human law, or I say it will be ill with you, and not well! If you love your thief or murderer, if Nature and eternal Faot love him, then do as you are now doing. But if Nature and Fact do ~ love him?" 8 Carlyle makes an impressive point when he warns men of the danger of falling into the democratie fallacy which believes that everything can be settled properly by - 112 - majority rule. Rather, man must bend his ways and ideas to conform to the eternal pattern, as it cannet be ad- justed to suit his passing modes. Carlyle insisted that strenuous striving towards an ideal would in time reveal the meaning and wisdom of such a course. But to stop short at pragmatic expedients was to sell man short of "Nature's" destiny for him. Hence Carlyle's alarm that the first desires of the multitude, through the new, reformed type of government, were to become in effect the highest will of the nation. As man's social and economie interrelations are largely carried on by meaas of laws and regulations of all kinds, Carlyle becomes increasingly alar.med as the number of human decrees contrary to "Nature" becomes larger. These man-made laws are framed in ignorance of hmnanity's true destiny, but they remain the sole author­ ity for a large measure of human conduèt. Hence the general lowering of moral standards in human affaira, or, in Carlyle's vernacular, the greater aberration from "Nature's Laws". "'Laws'; in whose soul, full of mere vacant hearsay and windy babble, is and was no image of Heaven's Law; whom it never struck that Heaven had a Law, or that the Earth - could not have wbat kind of Law you pleased! ••• Human Statute books ••• are ••• an impiety and poisonous futility •••• all Nature is against it; it will and can do nothing but mischief wberesoever it shows itself in Nature: and sucb Laws lie now like an incubus over the Earth, so innumerable are they." 9 - 113 -

A specifie infraction of "Nature's Laws""to which Carlyle objected in this connection was the contemporary movement for the relaxing of the criminal code. This movement he satirized as one fostered by the "Universal Abolition-of-Pain Association", being led by such types as Mr. Hesperus Fiddlestring. "'Eloquent individual, pleading here against the Laws of Nature,- for many reasons I bid thee close that mouth of thine •••• Depart thou; do some benevolent work; at lowest, be silent7' ••• Exeat FiddlestringZ- Beneficent men are not they who appear on platfor.ms, pleading against the Almighty Maker's Laws." 10 Far from not realizing the needs of the masses in society, Carlyle clearly sees the evil of class war- fare and class legislation; also, he is aware of the strained relations in society resulting from powerful pressure groups each lobbying for its own private ends. While ardently desiring "all-classes legislation",ll which would result in a harmonious brotherhood in society, Carlyle accentuates the great difficulty in achieving this - a difficulty as great as the achievement of a complete under- standing of "Nature's Laws". "Sure enough, just laws are an excellent attain­ ment, the first condition of all prosperity for human creatures; but few reflect how extremely difficult such attainment is! Alas, could we once get laws which were fust ••• which were the clear transcript of the D vine Laws of the Universe itself." 12 With his apt comparison of the ship attempting to round Cape Horn by count of popular ballot,l3 Carlyle - 114- makes his most convincing illustrative figure of "Nature•s Laws" in the Latter-Day Pamphlets. Just as the laws of ocean currents and navigation are not written on the sur­ face of nature for everyone to see, so all human endeavour is governed inexorably by subtle, complex laws which are inextricably connected with the essential nature of the world. "Ships accordingly do not use the ballot-box at alli and they reject the Phantasm species of Captains: one wishes much some other Entities,­ since all entities lie under the same rigourous set of laws,- could be brought to show as much wisdom, and sense at least of self-preservation, the first command of Nature." 14 These laws which govern all entities are not simple in any case; moreover, they attain a refined intricacy in the for.m they take in determining the proper methods of human government. As the process of social organization concerns the greatest number of people, it follows that a most profound insight into the fundamental "Laws of Nature" would be required to adequately govern human affairs. For this reason, Carlyle i_s most doubtful that a popularly selected parliament, placed in power by the conventional methods, can ever be more than a mediocre compromise of "Nature's" ideal. "Parliament, oblivious of Heavenly Law, will find itself in hopeless reductio ad absuTdum in regard to ••• all questions whatsoever by and by •••• Parliament, in its law-makings, must really try to attain some vision again of what Heaven's Laws are. A thing not easy to do; a thing requiring sad sincerity of heart, rev.rence, pious earnestness, vallant manful wisdom." 154 - 115-

"If a Parliament, with suffrages and universal or any conceivable kind of suffrages, is the method, then certainly let us set abour-discovering the kind of suffrages •••• But it is possible a Parliament may not be the method! Possible the inveterate notions of the English People may have settled it as the method, and the Ever- 1asting Laws of Nature may have settled it as not the m~thod! Not the whole method; nor the method at all, if taken as the whole? If a Parliament with never such suffrages is not the method settled by the latter authority, then it will urgently behove us to become aware of that fact, and to quit such method;- we may­ depend upon it, however unanimous we be, every step taken in that direction will,-sy the Eternal Law of things, be a step from improvement, not towards it." 16 - Carlyle repeatedly attacks the credulous faith which is placed in human institutions, strongly appealing for a return to "Strenuous faithful scrutiny, not of what is thought to be what in the redtape regions, but of what really is what in the realms of Fact and Nature." l? Carlyle underlines his exhortations with the seme type of warning he issued concerning the analogy between the French Revolution and the Chartist movement in England. That is, the "Laws of Nature" can only be contravened to a certain point, at which a restitution of the proper balance of "Nature" must take place. "Intellect has to govern in this worl.d; and will do it-:7. in the end, as sure as Heaven is higher than Downing Street, and the Laws of Nature are tougher than .redtape, with entire victory over them and entire ruin to them." 18 As democraoy is one of the predominant con­ temporary issues under consideration in the Pamphlets, Carlyle constantly tests its merits by the rigid standards - 116 - of "Nature's Laws". While men can change their thoughts and customs and even come to accept passively the mediocre compromise of expedient and laissez-faire in government, Carlyle insists that these evils, along with "Mamm.onism", are emphatically rejected by the "Universal Laws". "but bas Nature grown to accept i t ('Cons ti tuted Anarchy'3 as a veracity ••• ? Nature at all moments knows well that it is a lie; and that, like all lies, it is cursed and damned from the beginning." 19 That is, although all humanity might receive complacently the decisions of democratie governments - and even think that a democratie system was the best possible for.m of polity - inevitable judgment would be passed on human affairs by higher intraotable laws. Therefore it is not so muoh that Carlyle is attaoking democracy as such - the charge which is most frequently levelled against him; rather, he is attacking any and all forms of government which do not adhere to "Nature". "In parliaments and ether loud assemblages, your eloquent talk, disunited from Nature and ber facts, is taken as wisdom and the coDDect image of said facts: but Nature well knows what it is, Nature will not have it as such, and will reject your forged note one day, with buge costs." 20 And so it is seen that Carlyle is not primarily intent on dismissing democracy, or any human system or tbeory of government. What he does say is that unbridled democracy, as conditions stood in England, was one of the most difficult methods by which the nation could achieve - 117 - its nob1est destiny. Obvious1y, the considerab1y demo- cratized government in operation was failing to organize effective1y British society of the mid-nineteenth century, however evident the materia1 progress of the period might have been. "Get, by six-hundred and fifty-eight votes, or by no vote at al1 ••• a correct image of the fact in question, as God and Nature have made it; that is the one t~ng needful •••• the Nature's Fact, ••• What e1se? Wi1l.Nature change, or sulphuric acid become sweet milk, for the noise of vociferous blockheads? Surely not. Nature, I assure you, has not the smallest intention of doing so." 21 Thus Carlyle continues, by what is essentially a positive, constructive method, to invoke his system of "Nature" as the final criterion by which all human actions must be judged. Democracy, dictatorship, monarchism, republican- ism - these and all earthly types of government fade into the background of Carlyle's cosmic thought, being entirely incidental ~o the absolute necessity of proper compliance with the "Laws of Nature", under whatever form, in the affairs of mankind. It will now be seen that in an effort to be practical, and supply the link: which will bring the universel "Laws of Nature" into &peration in human affairs, Carlyle in Latter-Day Pamphlets once again invokes his men of prophetia wisdom - the "~ristocracy of Talent" of ~ and Present and the "Great Men" of On Heroes and Hero-worship. Having established categorically the immanent nature of the universe, which demanded worldwide confor.mity, - 118-

Carlyle is left with the question: "'What method, then; by what method?'".22 As a solution to this question, Carlyle had hopes for the eventual development of an "Aristocracy of Talent", and he even looked forward to the period when all humanity would be "Heroes", compre- hending the "Laws of Nature". His plans for the gradual supremacy of wisdom and enlightment are outlined in the following pages, along with references to his hopes for the ultimate achievement of the ideal in government. Louis Cazamian, in criticizing Carlyle's method, suggestedJ has apparently neglected completely Carlyle's 1ong-run aspirations. Although Carlyle may have advocated that peremptory power be assumed by a capable ruler in certain serious situations, ·his final scheme included progression towards an uni versal understanding of ''Nature' s" intendea purposes for man. Thus the superficial inadequacy of Cazamian's analysis is obvious. "the sage of Chelsea believed only in the solution which could be achieved at once; in the solutions which were already achieved." 23 Such criticism ignores the visionary refor.ms Carlyle had in :mind in the "Aristocracy of Talent" section in Fast and Present. In Latter-Day Pamphlets, Carlyle with renewed emphasis makes a plea for the wise and noble to be chosen as leaders, while the insincere and the "quacks" are to be deprived of power. Carlyle includes a practical touch in the Pamphlets also, suggesting that the "New Downing Streetn24 should be inhabited by a board of wise governors, - 119 - numbering possibly ten, whose duties would be comprehensi•e in the control of the country. "To secure an increased supply of Hurn.an Intellect to Downing Street.; there will, evidently be no quite effectual 'method' but that of increasing the supply of Human Intellect, otherwise defined as Hum.an Worth, in Society." 25 As possible members of the "New Downing Street", Sir Robert Peel and the Duke of Wellington are mentioned most favourably by Carlyle. While possibly not complete "Heroes", qualified to assume autonomous authority, Carlyle intimates they are definitely capable of serving on a panel of wise men appointed to govern the rea1m. 26 Carlyle's authority for condemning democracy as a system of goverhment is, once again, the nature of the universe itself. Man must take his place in the hierarchy of "Nature", and pattern his government after the design of "Nature". "Democracy, we apprehend, is forever impossiblel So much, with certainty of loud astonished contra­ diction from all manner of men at present, but with sure appeal to the Law of Nature and the ever­ abiding Fact, may be suggested and asserted once more. The Universe itself is a Monarchy and a Hierarchy; with Eternal Justice enforced by Al­ mighty Power! This is the model of 'constitutions'; this, ••• the Noblest, with his select series of Nobler •••• The Noble in the high place, the Ig­ noble in the low; that is, in all times and in all countries, the Almighty Maker's Law." 27 The constant warning that the democratie method will never result in the best government is present throughout the

Pamphlets. Always, Carlyle's s~ction for making such an absolute statement is the "Hierarchy of Nature" and its - 120 - immutable laws. "For ignobleness cannot, by the nature of it, choose the noble: no, there needs a seeing man who is himself noble, cognizant by internal experience of the symptoms of nobleness •••• It is forever true; and Nature and Fact, how­ ever we may rattle our ballot-boxes, do at no time forget it." 28 "Nobody, or hardly anybody, having in himself an earnest sense for truth, how can anybody recognize an inarticulate Veracity, or Nature­ tact of any kind; a Human Doer especially, who is the most complex, profound, and inarticulate of all Nature's Facts?" 29 As in Fast and Present, one method Carlyle adopts of expounding the "Laws of Nature" in Latter-Day Pamphlets, is to state emphatically that the laws are the supreme governing authority of human conduct. In this process Carlyle devotes himself not so much to an explicit statement of what the "Laws of Nature" are, or are not, but rather he maintains his passionate insistance that they exist and must be observed. This is the grand "Fact" to which all ei.se is incidental. However, a know- ledge of "Nature's" workings is only difficult to obtain, not impossible. Carlyle throws a great deal of light on his meaning, although he makes it clear that finally an understanding of the laws depends on the character and qualities of each individual. "How decipher ••• the eternal regulation of the Universe; and read, ••• what the real Divine Message tous is? ••• the Universe cisJ of some­ what abstruse nature; by no means carrying its secret written on its face, legible to every passer­ by; on the contrary, obstinately hiding its secret - 121 -

from all foolish, slavish, wicked, insincere persons, and partially disclosing it to the wise and noble-minded alone, whose number was not the majori ty in my time!" 30 Throughout Latter-Day Pamphlets Carlyle repeats the necessity for all men's becoming cognizant of the "Laws of Nature". The reason for stating the case so extremely is that "Nature" comprehends an universal moral code, em- bodying the highest practical precepts of all religions; moreover, it is sanctioned by a divine power existing at the heart of the universe. The efficacy of this compul- sive norm is inevitable, whether consciously accepted by mankind or not. With this beliet Carlyle faveurs a return to the simple, yet all-pervading, genuine belief of the "primitive man", who se undogmatic, non-sectarian approach intuitively grasped the peremptory mandate, the incon- trovertible essence of God's laws. Such a man would not stop short at a worship of the human ritualistic super­ structures later evolved, which had the effect of clothing the heart of religion. "all manner of 'moral rules', and well •sanc• tioned' too, flowed naturally out of this primeval Intuition into Nature;- which, I believe, is still the true foundation of moral rules, though a much-forgotten one at present; and indeed it seems to be the one unchange­ able, eternally iadubitable 'Intuition of Nature' we have yet heard of in these parts." 3L Carlyle makes it clear that beneath men's surface passions and follies, there lies the potential capacity for an understanding of "Nature's Laws". Thus - 122 -

the point is that it is not that only a privileged few

~ know "Nature's Laws", but that the number who wisely use their talent in this respect is a small minority. This idea supports the contention for a basic optimism in Carlyle, far removed from Machiavellianism and ether diaboliual theories concerning humanity. "but their instincts 1:all men'sl where these can be deciphered, are wise and human; these, hidden under the noisy utterance of what they call their opinions tvotesJ, are the unspoken sense of man's heart, and well deserve attending to. Know well what the people inarticulately feel, for the Law of Heaven itself is dimly written there." 32 However, in spite of this note of hope sugges- ting ultimate resolution, the present situation must be faced. It is one in which the dearth of "Heroes" constitutes a serious crisis, and which the temper of the age does little to alleviate. For this reason, the "Hero" for the most part must "discover himself" before he can do effective work. This is the situation which has led some critics to charge Carlyle with the advocation of a self-seeking, self-appointed dictator-.-33 How far Carlyle' s complete meaning is removed from this convenient conclusion can be seen in a detailed study of his writings. For instance, the "Hero" enjoys his position because he can intuitively interpret "Nature's Appointments"; the seeking of personal desires would immediately invalidate his position. "The true •commander' and klngi he who knows for himself the divine Appo~ntments of this Universe, the Eternal Laws ordained by God the Maker •••• Difficult indeed to discover: and not very much - 123 -

assisted, or encouraged in late times, to discover himself;- which, I think, might be a kind of help?" 34 Carlyle's supreme utterance to illustrate the inability of the masses to make the wisest choice also comes in Latter-Day Pamphlets. Here all the drama and force of his style are utilized. Part of his method was to present a scenic tableau, with flesh-and-blood characters, have them enact their drama, and then with the scene vividly fresh in readers' minds, strike home with telling conclusions and criticisms when the readers are in the most pliant, recep- tive mood. In the following susyained example of the "prosperous Semblances" versus the "Supreme Fact", Carlyle achieves a heightened effect by not directly mentioning Christ, a frequent practice with him. "A certain People, once upon a time, clamourously voted by overwhelming majority, "Not he; Bar­ abbas, not he! Him and what he is, and what he. de serves, we knowwell.. enough: • • • To the gallows and cross with him: Barabbas is our man: Barabbas, we are for Barabbas!m They got Barabbas:- have you well considered what a fund of purblind obduracy, of opaque flunkyism grown truculent and transcen­ dent, what an eye for the phylac~eries, and want of eye for the eternal noblenesses: sordid loyalty to the prosperous Semblances, and high-treason against the Supreme Fact, such a vote betokens ij these natures?" 35 To digress for a moment, it might be stated that the difficulty in appreciating Carlyle's undogmatic, indiv­ idualistic approach to all philosophies and religions can be observed in a study of the consensus of opinion con- cerning his views on Christianity. Several important - 124 -

critics come to the conclusion that because Carlyle criticized the outworn clothes of Christianity, he also denied its essential truth. H.J.C. Grierson, in his sensationally titled book, Carlyle and Hitler, makes the damaging statement:- "No reader of his life and conversation can doubt that he ~Carlyle~ thought of Christianity as something that had had its day." 36 Such a statement cannet even be remotely identified with Carlyle's high utterances on a subject which he usually

considered too sacred for sp~ech or writing. '"look on our di vinest Symbol: on Jesus of Nazareth, and his Life, and his Biography, and what followed therefrom. Higher has the human Thought not yet reached: this is Christ­ ianity and Christendom; a Symbol of quite per­ ennial, infinite character; whose significance will ever demand to be anew inquired into, and anew made manifest'." 3? "'Look eighteen hundred years ago, in the stable at Bethlehem: an infant laid in a manger! ••• it is a fact,- the most indubitable of facts: thou wilt thereby learn innumerable things. Jesus of Nazareth and the life he led, and the death he died, does it teao~ thee nothing? Through this, as through a miraculous window, the heaven of Martyr Heroism, the 'divine depths of Sorrow', of noble Labour, and the unspeakable silent ex­ panses of Eternity, first in man's history disclose themselves. The admiration of all nobleness, divine worship of godlike nobleness, how universel it is in the history of man!'" 38 "Canst thou read in thy New Testament? ••• The Highest Man of Genius, knowest thou him; Godlike and a God to this hour? His crown a Crown of Thorns?" 39 "Hero-worship, heartfelt prostrate admiration, submission, burning, boundless, for a boblest godlike For.m of Man,- is not that the germ of Christianity itself? The greatest of all Heroes - 125 -

is One - whom we do not name hereZ Let sacred silence meditate that sacred matter; you will find it the ultimate perfection of a principle extant throughout man's whole history on earth." 40 These references, scattered throughout Carlyle's works, make it certain that the essence of Christianity is in perfect harmony with his schema of "Nature". They lend a significant authority to Carlyle's pronouncements, adding weight to the contention that his deeper meaning should be analyzed for its contemporary and universal value. Carlyle covers all of the component elements of his system of "Nature" in the Pamphlets, al though most of the emphasis is placed on the two aspects considered above: the "Aristocracy' of Talent" and the "Laws of Nature" as opposed to human laws in whatever form. The living, omni­ present judgment of "Nature", more fully emphasized in Past and Present, is also observed passing judgment on all human activities in the ?amphlets. "'I have no pocket-definition of Justice •••• 'But one thing I can tell you: Justice always ~' whether we define it or not. Everything done, suffered or proposed, in Parliament or out of it, is either just or else unjust; either is accepted-oy the gods and eternal facts, or is rej ected by them. '" 41 This aspect of "Nature" is related to the sternest feature of the "Laws", that-which is considered at length in Fast and Present in the chapter on The SEhinx. However, Carlyle does not mean to imply that "Nature" representa a God of revenge. As in his earlier works, he makes it plain that to those who work faithfully, a state of infinite - 126 - blessedness is revealed. "Be noble of mind, all Nature gives response to your heroic struggle for recognition by her; with her awful eternal voices answers to every mind, 'Yea, I am divine; be thou'." 42 It is only to "those who will have no pity on themselves, and will force the Universe and the Laws of Nature to have no pity on themn43 that the laws seem punitive. "For no man, and for no body: or biggest multitude of men, lla.a: Nà:t.ur:e faveur, if they part company with her facts and her •••• Nature for such a man, and for Nations that follow such, has her patib­ ulary forks, and prisons of death everlasting:­ dost thou doubt it? Unhappy mortal, Nature ether­ wise were herself a Chaos and no Cosmos. Nature was not made by an Impostor." 44 In this way Carlyle makes it indubitably clear that it is because of the uncompromising nature of the universe that he puts forward his equally intransigeant claims. All human conduct, bath individual and collective, will be brought to account morally before the great tribune of "Nature". Therefore it were best for mankind to devise a system of government which would strive above all to keep constantly in conformity with the eternal authority. "Quiet as Nature's countinghouse and scrip­ ledgers are, no faintest item is ever blotted out from them, for or against; and to the last doit that account tao will have to be settled. Rigourous as Destiny;- she ~ Destiny." 45 Carlyle's definitions of freedom and despotism, in the context of his "Laws of Nature", are also a point of emphasis in Latter-Day Pamphlets. On all hands people were becoming slaves to the shibboleths of "freedom" and - 127 -

"democrac;Y", without enquiring into their true nature, responsibilities and possible consequences. Wnile Car­ lyle was being negated for his "undemocratic" viewpoints and apparent backwardness in this modern age, he was constantly invoking the immutable authority which recog- nized no man-made age nor movement. "The free man is he who is loyal to the Laws of this Universe; who in his heart sees and knows, across all contradictiohs, that injustice cannet befall him here; that excep' by sloth and cowardly falsity evil is not possible here. The first symptoms of such a man is not that he resists and rebels, but that he obeys •••• The essence of all 'religion' that was and that will be, is to make men free. Who is he that ••• will consecrate himself at all hazards to obey God and God's servants, and to disobey the Devil and his?" 46 It is from a study of passages such as the preceding one that the deep significance of Carlyle's conception of "freedom" can be conveyed. The fact that his approach to the study of all human problems was cosmic accounts for several of the shortsighted, ill-founded conclusions which critics have reached with regard to

his work. They often do not ext~nd their criticism beyond a strictly human frame of reference - that is, the immediate effect of one man's conduct upon ether men - · without also considering the broader background of the nature of the world in which man lives. Hence arise criticisms in the mood of C.F. Harrold's opinion that in Carlyle "all desire for freedom, all hope of indiv­ iduel self-sufficiency"47 is lost and denied to mankind.

It is a damaging comment on this criticism that ex~ctly - 128 - the reverse of Harrold's two related ideas was what Carlyle explicitly desired for mankind. The Utilitarian axioms that "a man can do what he likes with his own" and that every person should have complete freedom of action (provided this does not infringe on anotherrperson's similar freedom), are precepts which concentrate heavily on the basic human desires. They appear shortsighted and superficiel when compared with Carlyle's conception of freedom, one which refers the human being to complex universal laws for his primary authority. Car­ lyle held that humanity was intrinsically a part of the cosmic order, and as such must subordinate its initial claims and personal desires to this immutable power. The eventual result of following this method in human affaira would be a blessedness far surpassing the desired ~appiness of pragmatic philosophies. "The free men, if you could have understood it, they are the wise men; the patient, self-denying, val­ iant; the Nobles of the World; who can discern the Law of this Universe, what it is, and piously obel it." 48 Carlyle's definition of "freedom" can be stated simply and straightforwardly: there is only one line of conduct which will result in prosperity. However, it is in de­ fining, explaining, and fina+ly, experiencing what exactly is meant by Carlyle in this regard that an infinite range of study is revealed.

"yet unless the vo:}.itions and op~n~ons are wise and not foolish, not the smallest ultimate - 129 -

prosperity can attend him; and all the acclam­ ations of the world will not save him from the ignominious lot which Nature herself has appointed for all creatures that do not follow the Law which Nature has laid down:w-49 As was mentioned previously in this section, Carlyle dwells at some length in Latter-Day Pamphlets on his belief that individual miseries and social outbreaks are caused by an infraction of "Nature's Laws". Moreover, when this disastrous aberration has reached an advanced state, "Nature" will sj:lep in summarily either to restore the balance or completely overturn the entity at variance with its decrees. "and furthermore, by due âequence, infallible as the foundations of the Universe and Nature's oldest law, the light returns on you, condensed, this time, into lightn1nÎ, which there is not any skin whatever too th ck for taking in!" 50 As Carlyle had mentioned several times before, and ex- plicitly in his history of the French Revolution, that phenomenon was caused by France's gross disloyalty to "Nature's Laws". This point has also been treated at length in this study, especially in Section IV. It was seen how the infringement of "Nature" made a serious cataclysm inevitable, apart from the incendiary influ­ ence of liberal philosophism and the agitation aroused by republicanism in pre-revolutionary France. "The French Revoit::4tmon, a Fact decreed in the Eternal Councils, could not be put down~ the result was, that heavenborn Pitt had actually been fighting (as the old Hebrews would have said) against the Lord,- that the Laws of Nature were stronger than Pitt." 51 - 130 -

As with ether aspects of the "Laws of Nature", Carlyle adds a practical element to the idea that omnipotent "Nature" restores a moral equity in. soma measure to human affairs, by his suggestion that wise men are usually the medium through which "Nature's" behests are effected in society. "in spite of rumeurs to the contrary, it always is with evils, with solecisms against Nature, and contradictions to the divine fact of things: not an evil ol!, them has ever wrought its own cure in my experience;- but has continually gro.wn worse and wider and uglier, till some ~ (generally a goodman) not able to endure ~abomination longer,-rûse upon it and cured or else extinguished it." 52 Continuing with a consideration of ether •. components of the "Laws of Nature" concept in Latter- Day Pamphlets, it is noticed that the complex meaning of "Might and Right" is also included in the work. The significant point lies in the reiteration that physical force in itself plays no lasting part in Carlyle's system of thought. "'But how? ••• Are not two men stronger than one; must not two votes carry it over one?' I answer; No, nor two thousand nor two million •••• none counts except the few who were in the right •••• If the King's thought is according to the will of God, orto the law appOI'nted for this Universe, ••• the King will ultimately carry that, were he but one in it against the whole world." 53 The categorical insistance on the "Infinite nature of Duty" also appears throughout the pamphlets. In this respect Carlyle's cosmic, universal glanee sees all of time and space as essentially one entity governed by - 131 - the same ever1asting 1aws. This idea1izing of the con- ventiona1 conceptions of space and time carries a strong suggestion of "Natura1 Supernatura1ism", one of the bases of Car1y1e's "Clothes Philosophy". "The first heroic sou1 sent down into this wor1d, he, 1ooking up into the sea of stars ••• and the illimitable loud-thundering Loom of Time,- was struck dumb by it •••• to him the 'open secret of this Universe' was no longer quite a secret, but he had caught a glimpse of it •••• "Do nobly, thou shalt resemble the Maker of all this; do ignobly, the Enemy of the .Maker." This is the 'divine sense of Right and Wrong in man'; true reading of his position in this Universe forever­ more; the indisputable God's-message still legible in every created heart,- though speedily erased and painted over, under 'articles', and cants and empty ceremonials." 54 In contrast to the description ·of the true worker, Carlyle devotes some of his most scathing dia- tri be to a description of those who follow "Mammon", directly seeking gain, and not working according to "Nature's Laws". His writing might sound exaggerated, but still it is not strong enough to deter critics such as B.E. Lippincott from stating that Carlyle advocated a "tiger ethic" of rugged which would result in the supremacy of aggressive self-assertion in business 55 and industry. Here is Car1y1e's description of a type of worker out of joint with "Nature";- Car1yle's awareness of the commanding position of economie and financial power in society can also be observed in this passage. "'Have not yeu also overgrown anomalous Dukes after a sort, appointed ~ by patent? Overgrown Monsters of Wea1th, name1y; who have made money by dea1ing - 132 -

in cotton, dealing in bacon, jobbing scrip, digging metal in California; who are becoming glittering man-mountains filled with gold and preciosities; revered by the surrounding flunkies; invested with the real powers of sovereignty; and placidly admitted by all men, as if Nature and Heaven had so appointed it.'" 56 Thus, besides the completely idle person, there is the evil of the person who does his work wrongly, "as the rules of office prescribe i t, ••• cas l if Nature and Fact say nothing". 57 And so Carlyle leaves the warning that work must be more than a makeshift pastime and a means to material gain. "Work" must be considered primarily for its ultimate value and significance in the cosmic order of "Nature". "You cannot have y.our work well done, if the work be not of the right kind, if it be not work pre­ scribed by the law of Nature as well as by the rules of the office." 58 The insistence on the blessedness of "Work" and "Duty" leads naturally into the grand Carlylean solution - the culminating aspect of the "Laws of Nature" - that each person should effect a reform on himself. Carlyle's ess- ential contribution to philosmphy and social thought is that immutable, inexorable "Laws of Nature" govern the universe, including man; all of Carlyle's ether pronounce­ ments proceed from this basis. Therefore, if each man can improve himself, as Carlyle held, then it must be true that each person may divine the workings of the universe and interpret "Nature" through his own experience. And this is, - 133 -

in fact~ the message which Carlyle has left in Latter­ Day Pamphlets, as in On Heroes and Fast and Present. A work which has for the most part been "neglected as stu­ pendous growls from a misanthropie recluse",59 has, in fact, left the optimistic, if idealistic, solution of common sense which follows:- "What this Law of the Universe, or Law made by God, is? Men at one time read it in their Bible. In many Bibles, Books and authentic symbols and monitions of Nature and the Word (of Fact, that is, and of Human Speech, or Wise Interpretation of Fact), there are still clear indications towards it •••• And if no man could now see it by any Bible, there is written in the heart of every man an authentic copy of it direct from Heaven itself: there, if he have learnt to deoipher Heaven's writing, and can read the sacred oracles, every born man may still find some copy of: i t." 60 - 134 -

REFERENCES - VIII

1 .. - Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 15. 2 -Loc. cit.,. 3 -Ibid., p. 14-15.

4 - ~-, p. 43.

5 - ~-, p. 236.

ô - ~., P• 234

7 - ~-, p. 42. 8 -Ibid., p. 64.

9 - ~., P• 61. 10 - Loc. ci t.

11- ~.,p. 272. 12 - Loc. cit. 13- Ibid., p. 14. 14 - Loc. ci t.

15- ~., p. 72-73.

16- ~., P• 13.

17- ~., p. 83 (1872 edition). 18- Ibid., p. 110 (1872 edition).

19 - ~·, p. 119 (1872 edition).

20- ~., p. 152 (1872 edition).

21- ~., p. 174 (1872 edition}.

22- ~., p. 113. 23- L. Cazamian, op. cit., p. viii. - 135 -

24 - O:Qo ci t., Pamphlet # 4. 25 - llll·' P• 113. 26 - ill!!·' p. 152. 27 - Ibid. , p. 19i see a1so p. 21.

28 - Ibid., P• 118. 29 - -Ibid., P• 166 (1872 edition). 30 - ~., P• 15. 31 - -Ibid., P• 235 (1872 edition). 32 - ~., p. 240.

33 - ~., Schapiro, J.S., Op. ci t., P• 101.

34 - Latter-Da~ Pamphlets, P• 28. 35- Ibid., p. 29. 36- Op. cit., p. 14. 37 - Sartor Resartus, p. 182-183. 38- Latter-Day·Pamphlets, p. 282 (1872 edition) • • 39 - Past and Present, p. 280-281. 40 - On Heroes and Hero-Worship, p.15. 41- Op. cit., p. 62.

42- ~., p. 283 {1872 edition). 43- Ibid., p. 47. 44- Ibid., p. 175 (1872 edition).

45- ~., p. 244-245 (1872 edition).

46- ~., P• 251.

47 - C.F. Harro1d: Car1yle's Calvi~, p. 479. 48 - Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 35. 49- Ibid., p. 207 (1872 edition). - 136 -

50-~., p. 107 (1872 edition).

51-~., p. 124 (1872 edition).

52- Ibid., p. llO (1872 edition). 53 ~~Ihid.,-- p. 245. 54- Ibid., p. 334-335. 55- Lippincott, Op. cit., p. 14. 56 - Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 268. 57- Ibid., p. 82 (1872 edition). 58 - Loc. ci t.

59 Sir Leslie Stephen, in Dictiofary of Nati~ Biography, Vol. IX, p. 122. London, Smith, Elder, 1887.) . 60 - Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 66-6?. IX. SPIRITUAL OPTICS; FREDERICK THE GREAT_i_ CARLYLE' S

CONSISTENT REFERENCE TO THE "LAWS OF NATURE".

"Out of all Evil cornes Good; and no Good that is possible but shall one day be real. Deep and sad as is our feeling that we stand yet in the bodeful Night; equally deep, indes­ tructible is our assurance that the Morning also will not fail. Nay already, as we look round, streaks of a dayspring are in the east; it is dawning; when the time shall be fulfilled, it will be day. The progress of man towards higher and nobler developments of whatever is highest and noblest in hi~lies not only pro­ phesied to Faith, but now written to the eye of Observation." - Characteristics IX. SPIRITUAL OPTICS; FREDERICK THE GREAT; CARLYLE'S

CONSISTENT REFERENCE TO THE "LAWS OF NATURE"

In 1852 Carlyle contemplated writing another lengthy work in which he hoped to make clearer in some degree the laws which he believed deter.mined human life. The name of this work was to have been Spiritual Optics, the main thesis being a parallel and comparison between the Ptolemaic error of regarding the earth as the physical centre of the universe and the contemporary aberration which considered that the spiritual laws which governed man could be made by hlm, and would, in a sense, revolve around him. Carlyle again had discovered a most apt symbol with which to convey his meaning, but for some reason he discarded the manuscript of Spiritual Optios. Possibly he believed he had already saitd all he adequately could on this matter, and that in any case the subject could not ultimately be properly expressed in human language. In any c~se, the importance in Carlyle's thought of the conception that man's place in the unified physical, moral and spiritual universe is irrevocably - 139 - preordained is corroborated by this incident. It also adds weight to the contention that Carlyle himself was not satisfied with his definition of these laws, but in large measure confined himself to illustrating them and startling men into an unawareness of their existence. The idea for Spiritual.Optics arose as Carlyle was finishing the Life of John Sterling. In his Journal for April, 1851, he wrote:- "In the spiritual world, as in the astronomical, it is the earth that turns and produces the phenomene of the Heavens. In all manner of senses this is true; we are in the thick of the confusion attendant on learning this; and thus all is at present so chaotic wit~. Let this stand as an aphoristic saying? or work it out with some lucidity of detail? Most true it is, and it forms the secret of the spiritual epoch we are in." 1 Carlyle actually commenced an outline of what was to bave been Spirituel Optics, in which a direct parallel was drawn between the Ptolemaic error as regards the physical universe and the misconception that moral systems could be devised by man. However, Carlyle doubted his own ability to play the role of a Galileo in the spiritual realm and to convey properly to his readers the subtle, immutable connections between the physioal and moral laws of the universe. This doubt, and the fear that language was an insufficient medium through which to achieve this aim are noted in a section of the outline of Spiritual Optics. The same passage also contains a reference to Carlyle's disappointment at his being unable to elucidate - 140 - the "Laws of Nature" in his earlier works, by implication Past and Present and Latter-Day Pamphlets. "I would fain sometimes wri te a book cSpiri tual OpticsJ about all that, ·and try to make It plain to everybody. But _alas! I find again there is next to nothing ta be said about it in words at present - and indeed till lately I had vaguely understood that everybody understood it, or at least understood me ta mean it, which it would appear they don't at all. "A ward ta express that extensive or universal operation of referring the motion from your­ self ta the abject you look at, or vice versa? Is there none?" 2 Towards the end of his abandoned outline of Spiritual Optics, Carlyle, still groping for a vehicle of expression with wbich ta convey his meaning, returns ta the idiom of the "Laws of Nature". He has added appropriate symbols linking man's moral dependance on universal laws ta his similar physical subservience, but still the passage closely resembles one of the vehement sections from Fast and Present or Latter-Day Pamphlets. Carlyle cauld add little ta his exposition of, and insistance on "Nature's Laws" as presented in the two published works mentioned, and sa was led ta abandon Spiritual Optics. This, in spite of the fact that Carlyle believed his essential mess~ge was far from being fully understood and appreciated. The following is the passage from the discarded Spiritual Optics:- "Old piety was wont ta say that God's judgments tracked the footsteps of the criminal; that all violation of the eternal Laws, done in the deepest recesses or on the conspicuous high places of the world, was absolutely certain - 141 -

of its punishment. You could do no evil~ you could do no good, but a god would repay it to you. It was as certain as that when you shot an arrow from the Earth, gravitation would bring it back to the earth. The all-embracing law of Right and Wrong was as inflexible, as sure and exact, as that of Gravitation •••• "My friend, it still behoves us to reflect how true essentially all this still is: that it continues, and will continue, fundamentally a fact in all essential particulars - its certainty, I say its infallible certainty, its absolute justness, and all the other particulars, the Eternity itself included. He that has with his eyes and soul looked into Nature from any point - and not merely into distracted theological, metaphysical, modern philosophical, or other cobweb representations of Nature at second hand - will find this true, that only the vesture of it is changed for us; that the essence of it cannot change at all. Banish all miracles from it. Do not name the name of God; it is still true." 3 This selection from what would have been Carlyle's last great exposition of his fundamental thoughts indicates the profundity and complexity of his meaning. One thing is certain: although he may have been wrong in the details, Carlyle meant that the moral power of God and not the strength of man in any sense should and must be the final authority for all human conduct. However, although Carlyle insists that a moral judgment is passed upon the freewill actions of men by "Nature", reputable critics persist in equating "Nature" and "the divine will" with "the blind process of nature"_and "mere natural might" in their considerations of Carlyle's writings. For example, Louis Cazamian's conclusion concerning Carlyle's - 142 -

"Nature" is:- "The eternal course of the divine will is no longer distinguishable for Carlyle from the blind process of nature; and in his glor­ ification of human energy the prophet ends by refusing to the highest and purest per­ ceptions of the soul their holy privilege of passing judgment upon the deeds of mere natural might." 4 A comment of this sort neglects Carlyle's adverse criticism of the use of "mere natural might" in his

statements on Napoleon, Frederick the Gre~y and in

effect, all who used physical force to any exten~ with the possible exception of Cromwell, whom he was res- cuing from almost complete disrepute. The Spiritual Optics manuscript, which confined itself to the theory and essence of Carlyle's highest thoughts on religion and philosophy, was abandened in 1852; for the next twelve years Carlyle laboured on his opus magnum, The History of Frederick the Great. In

Frederick, Carlyle descends from the cosmic atmo~ere of the Pamphlets and Spiritual Optics to concern himself with battlefields and royal courts. The higher laws are summoned inferentially and govern Carlyle's thinking, but on the whole there are few explicit references which would illustrate or explain directly the working of the "Laws of Nature" concept. However, Carlyle does invoke the "Laws" overtly in a few instances in Frederick. He continues to cite "Nature" as the proper authority for undertaking - 143-

individual and collective action. For instance, in considering the rights of the Emperor Friedrich Wilhelm ( th.e father of Frederick the Great) - when the former had demanded a payment from his Landholders in lieu of the ancient feudal service - Carlyle returns momentarily to a direct appeal to "Nature". "if your plan is just, and a bit of Nature's plan, persistin it like a law of Nature." 5 Again, Carlyle overtly cites the "Laws of Nature" as his authority for his philosophy of history and the reason for choosing Frederick as the subject.

"only what of the Past was ~ will come back tous •••• that is still ours, blessed by Heaven, and only that. By the law of Nature, nothing more than that; and also, by the same law, nothing less than that." ô Although choosing Frederick the Great as the subject of his history, Carlyle does not make him a "Hero" at all points. In fact, he directly denies Frederick this honour in the history. Rather, Carlyle is mainly inter- ested in the constructive achievements of Frederick's reign. Carlyle's greatly qualified approval of Fred- erick within the text of the history stands in sharp distinction to the popular misconception that he consid- ered the German emperor a "Hero" at all points. For

example, Ren~ Wellek, in Philological ~~rterly for Jan­ uary, 1944, says Carlyle "absurdly exalted Frederick to

a Carly~ean hero of truthfulness and faith"; Wellek goes on to say that Carlyle adored "mere power".? 1i;'hat exactly - 144 -

Carlyle admired and disliked in Frederick can be seen in his own words from the history •.

"Friedrich is by no means one of the perfect demigods; ••• To the last, a questiona:ble hero; with much in him which one could have wished not there, and much wanting which one could have wished. But there is one feature ••• That in his way he is a Reality; that he always means what he speaks." 8 As mentioned in Section VII, the essay Shooting

Niagara; and Af~ - described by Carlyle as "very fierce, exaggerative, ragged, unkempt and defective", 9 - is more concerned with the issue of democracy as such than an exposition of the "Laws of Nature". wnat reference it does openly make to this scheme of thought are similar to the points stressed in Chartism and The Nigger Question, adding nothing to the fundamental basis. For instance, there is reference in the essay to the "Aristocracy of Nature",lO to whom Carlyle looked for a solution of the country's problems. This group was to be recruited mainly from the "Aristocrats by nature", who battled "Practical Chaos" in everyday life.11 The group could be broadly divided into two sections: the spoken, or vocal "Hero" (poet) and the si lent, indus trial "Hero" ( worker). To these representatives of the saving grace in society, Carlyle did not entirely despair that the aristocrat by title would align himself ("coalescing nobly with his two Brothers"), but the reservations he placed on the chances of the nobility's adopting a strict adherence to "Nature's - 145 -

Laws" can be seen in the following passage from Shoot- ing Niagara. "Few Noble Lords ••• will think of tak:ing this course; ••• Dilettantism will avail nothing in any of these enterprises; the law of them is, grim labour, earnest and continua!; certainty of many contradictions, disappointments; a life, not of ease and pleasure, but of noble and sorrowful teil; the reward of it far off,- fit only for heroes." 12 Thus it was the "Aristocracy of Talent" Carlyle was primarily appealing to in Shooting Niagara. As he was over seventy when Niagara was written, it should refute the common charge that Carlyle turned to a cultivation of the titled and monied aristocracy in his old age. However, apart from a few direct references in Shooting Niagara, it is apparent that from the time Car­ lyle put away the Spiritual Optics idea, he did not again deal at length with an objective consideration of the "Laws of Nature". But this does not mean that Carlyle wavered or compromised in his belief as expounded so eloquently throughout his works. Notes in his Journal to the very end resemble an extract from On Heroes, Fast and Present or Latter-Day Pamphlets as the basic tenets of "Nature's Laws" are repeated, in the same language and with equal emphasis. "The universe is full of love, and also of inex­ orable sternness and severity; and it remains for ever true that 'GOD reigns•. Patience, silence, hope!" 13 Thus, the ideas of the world's sternness and the living, - 146 - active presence of God are included in the above passage. A year later, when Carlyle was seventy-three, he is empha- sizing the "Eternal ~", the "nature of Duty" and the contrast between the "Hero" and "slave". "If they do abolish 'God' from their own poor bewildered hearts ••• But I never dread their 'abolition' of what is the Eternal Fact of Facts, and can prophesy that mankind generally will either return to that with new clearness and sacred purity of zeal, or else perish utterly •••• another thing ••• the chosen few who do continue to believe in the 'eternal nature of duty', and are in all times and all places the God-appointed rulers of this world, will know at once who the slave kind are; who, if good is ever to begin, must be excluded totally from ruling." 14 Carlyle's last recorded statement on "Might and Right", made when he was approaching the age of eighty, will be used to close this section. The passage is significant because it shows that even in Carlyle's own time the central issue in the battle concerning his lasting worth was decided. Carlyle himself has given the answer which, if it had been properly read and understood, would have forestalled the avalanche of adverse criticism which surrounded his name in the l920's, -30's and -40's.15 The especially significant words are "descending miles and leagues beyond his present phil­ osophy", a duty which contemporary students of Carlyle must bear in mind if they are to arrive at his fully developed, comprehensive meaning. "With respect to that poor heresy of might being the symbol of right 'to a certain great and - 147 - venerable author', I shall have to tell Lecky one day that quite the converse or reverse is the great and venerable author's reâï opinion - namely, that right is the eternal symbol of might: as I hope he, one day descending miles and leagues beyond his present philosophy will, with amazement and real gratification, discover; and that, in fact, he probably never met with a son of Adam more contemptuous of might except where it rests on the above origin." 16 - 148 -

REFERENCES - IX

1 ~uot•d in Wilson's Carlyle, Vol •. IV, p. 374.

2 -Ibid., p. 37?. 3 -Ibid., p. 380. 4 - L. Cazamian, Op. cit., p. 181. 5 -Op. cit., Book IV, Chapter 3, p. 289.

ô - Ibi~., Book I, p. ? 7 -Op. cit., in an article entitled Carlyle and the Philosophy of History, p. ?3-74. 8 - Frederick the Great, Book I, p. 12. 9 - Journal for August 3, 1867; quoted in Froude's Life in London. 10 - Shooting Niagara; and After?, p. 318. 11- Ibid., p. 336-337 and Eassim. 12 - Loc. cit. 13 - Journal for March 8, 1867; included in Carlyle's Reminiscences, p. 365. 14 - Journal for June 29, 1868; in Froude's Life in London, Vol. II, p. 373. 15 - See suEra, especially Section VI, and bibliography for a consideration and list of some of these studies. 16 In Journal of the year 1873; in Froude's Life in London, Vol. II, p. 422. X. RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION

"Mount into your railways; whirl from place to place, at the rate of fifty, or if you like of five hundred miles an hour: you cannot escape from that inexorable all­ encircling ocean-moan of ennui. No: if you would mount to the stars, and do yacht­ voyages under the belts of Jupiter, or stalk deer on the ring of Sat~rn, it would still begirdle you. You cannot escape from it, you can but change your place in it, without solacement except one moment•s. That prophetie Sermon from the Deeps will continue with you, till you wisely interpret it and do it, or else the Crack of Doom swallow it and you. Adieu:: Au revoir." - Latter-Day Pamphlets X. RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION

In the foregoing sections a presentation has been made of the manner in which the "Laws of Nature" concept conditions Carlyle's thinking throughout his major works. This has bèen done within the context of his own meaning of the term without an attempt to trace and analyze fully the significance of the concept "Nature" in itself. However, the vast scope of a task of this kind was realized and noted. In order to provide more definite material with which to explain the background of Carlyle's thought, the introductory sections considered his personal life, education and philosophical influences - J specifically the German. These factors were noted for their roles in helping to develop the particular concept of "Nature" as it appears in the works of Carlyle under study here. The first appearances.of the idea of "Nature" in Carlyle's works are traced, followed by evidence of the concept's speedy growth and crystallization. Detailed - 151 -

explanation of the concept's component parts is pro­ vided as far as possible so that Carlyle's utterances on "Nature" can be checked for consistency and stability. From this treatment it can be seen that in his social and

political criticism- particularly Fast and P~sent, Latter­ Day Pamphlets and several essays and shorter works - Carlyle constantly and inevitably appeals to the same divine stan­

dard for his authority. Sartor Resart~ provides in some measure an abstract consideration of the main elements of "Nature"; several of these aspects Carlyle later applied

in a more practical way. On Heroes and Hero-Worshi~ supplies the human intermediary in the carrying out of "Nature's Laws". In this work it was seen that it is always the "Heroes'" relation to the "Laws of Nature" and not Carlyle's "Great Men" in themselves which constitutes the latter's final authority. The historical works for the most part deal at length with situation and character­ ization which is essentially localized. At the same time all available significant material from them was brought out in this study to aid in substantiating the thesis held.

1 A study of the major histories revealed nothing to contra­ dict the idea developed here. Carlyle's criteria of "Nature"

~an be observed governing by implication his important decisions and conclusions. But the form taken by the his­ tories, with the partial exception of The French Revolution, differs from the cosmic, comprehensive approach of the - 152 - polemical criticisms, thereby precluding the inclusion of a large number of overt appeals to the "Laws of Nature". It is hoped this study will help to place Car­ lyle in a new perspective, from which it will be possible to arrive at the broader, deeper implications of his involved meaning. Recent works have tended to narrow the scope of his message. For example, there is an increasing tendency to regard him as a stylistic phenomenon whose writings provide a literary antique for this age to study. Other "popular" studies, of the psychoanalytic variety, regard Carlyle's writings as the product of a frustrated, domineering personality.1 This type of approach tends to overemphasize the influence of Carlyle's environment, heredity, education and family religion. Other attempts to interpret Carlyle uphold the belief that he advocated a regime of the strong, aggressive ruler. There is also a narrowing tendency in attributing all that is significant in Carlyle to the German transcendentalists. They were, it is true, his greatest source of inspiration, but with his shrewdly practical eye for humanity's worldly needs, Carlyle applied their mysticism and idealism in a strikingly forceful way. Other derogatory criticisms simply discard Carlyle as a nineteenth-century romantic, and one who had not outgrown the "Satanic" element at that. The reason for the attraction of all these theories is that Carlyle,did, in fact, in some measure, - 153 -

correspond to certain of their findings. Several of them2 represent a fraction of truth with regard to the complex body of thought which Carlyle finally evolved. He took what would serve his purpose from all the movements and methods mentioned above, in addition to several not mentioned and not known to history and criticism. To all these he added intense study, a keen knowledge of history and the contemporary situation,and finally, an intuitive, prophetie grasp of "what is what", as he would say. Here he concedes that the ultimate, the essential in his doc­ trine is impossible by its intrinsic nature to exp&ain and analyze. However, this does not imply that we are to be left completely in the dark concerning Carlyle's meaning. By practical example and forceful illustration Carlyle demonstrates his meaning as far as is possible in the form of language. But he would have insisted that the way to prove the "Laws of Nature" is to put them into active practice in human affairs. In this way his mystic certainty as to the divine authority whose compulsive moral, spirituel force governed the universe might become known to all men. If Carlyle's practical admonitions to adhere to work, duty, reverence, sincerity and foresight were honestly applied, their fulfilment might reveal an endless vista of the noble human experiences for which Carlyle so eloquently pleaded:- - 154 -

"Do the Dut;x: which lies nearest ~' which thou knowest to be a Duty! Thy second Duty will already have become clearer." 3 However, until such a general movement takes place, or Carlyle's meaning is exhaustively studied, his own author­ ity must be accepted for tbe validity of the "Laws of Nature". In fact, the concept embodies the only large issue on which his permanent reputation as a thinker and social theorist can be challenged. This question leaves a large field of study to be developed in the future. The point which it has been the attempt to establish in this study is that the central, conditioning element in Carlyle's thought is a cosmic, moral nor.m, accepted intuitively by Carlyle and term.ed by him the "Laws of Nature". In tracing the dominating influence of this complex entity which came to be known as "Nature's Laws" (or a similar variant) in Carlyle's works, there is given as much explanation as possible in order to demonstrate his meaning and consistency. It has been shown that the "Laws of Nature" concept governs all of Carlyle's higher decisions and makes the final, infallible judgment in all human affairs. It is hoped that the method of detailed docu­ mentation and exegesis followed in this study will establish this basic principle concernine Carlyle's works - a point which must be accepted before a just appraisal can be made of the lasting significance and current value of Carlyle's highest pronouncements concerning human life and society. - 155 -

It is unlikely that science and philosophy will be able to demonstrate logically and definitively the validity of his claims. However, as suggested, study and inter­ pretation of the practical application of "Nature's Laws", where this is possible, would be useful in proving the accuracy and reliability of Carlyle's system. In the meantime, the heart of Carlyle's message will co~tinue to be that of the inspired seer, the intuitive prophet who believed to the end that it was "the heart always that sees, before the head can see: let us know that." 4 "Good Heavens, from the wisest Thought of a man to the actual truth of a Thing as it lies in Nature, there is, one would suppose, a sufficient interval! The faithfulest, most glowing word of a man is but an imperfect image·of the thought, such as it is, that dwells wi thin him; his:.1best word will never but with error convey his thought to other minds: and then between his poor thought and Nature's Fact, which is the Thought of the Eternal, there may be supposed to be some discrepancies and shortcomings! Speak your sincerest, think your wisest, there is.still a great gulf between you and the fact." 5 - 156 -

REFERENCES - X

1 - ~' Halliday, Jame~M., Mr. Carlyle, my Patient: a Psychosomatic Studl· {New York, Grune and Stratton, 1950). 2 - See Bibliography to this study for a list of several important criticisms of Carlyle's thinking. 3 - Sartor Resartus, p. 159-160. 4 - Chartism, p. 190. 5 - Latter-Day Pamphlets, p. 203 BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Texts:- Works, complete in thirty volumes; ed. by H.D. Traill. London, Chapman & Hall, 1898. Essaya: 2 volumes. London and New York, Dent, Dutton, 1932, 1940. (Ever~t. Note: These are the texts used throughout rn-ëitations from the following essays:­ Volume I: Sir , Characteristics, Signs of the Times and Shooting Niagara: and After? Volume II: On Histotl, On History Again, Chartism and The Nigger Quest on. Modern British Essaftists. Volume V·(Carlyle). Philadelphia, A. art, 1851. Note: This is the text used for Carlyle's essay on Goethe's Works; also the essaya Death. of Goethe, Novalis and The State of, German Literature. The French Revolution; a History. New York, Random House, tn.d.J (Modern Library) History of Friedrich II of Prussia, called The Great. London, Chapman & Hall, 1872. (10 volumes.) Latter-Day Pamphlets. London, Chapman & Hall, 1872, 1903. Note: Citations from the Pamphlets for the first erghty pages (p. 1-80 of the Chapman & Hall text) and also those specially marked are from the 1872 edition. All others are from the 1903 edition. Life of John Sterling. New York, P.F. Collier, 1901. Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, with Elucidations. . New York, Collier, 1901. ('~ vo!umes) On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History. London, Oxford University Press, 1946. (World's Classics) Past and Present. London, (Dent) and New York (Dutton), 1947. (Everyman) - 158 -

Sartor Resartus. New York, Macmillan, 1938. (The Modern Readers' Series.) Note: This is the text cited from throughout. - Annotated and edited by Rev. James Wood. -----~~-London, Dent, 1902. Reminiscences - ed. by C.E. Norton. London and New York, Dent, Dutton, (Everyman).

II. Biography, (including Correspondance and Criticism). Froude, James Anthony. Thomas Carltle; a history of the First Fortz Years of hisife. London, Longmans, Green, 1914 {1919). (2 volumes) Thomas Carlylei His Life in London. London, Longm.ans, Green, 1884, l902. ( 2 volumes). Wilson, David Alec. Life in ô volumes. London, K. Paul, Trench, Trutrner & Co., 1923-1934. (a) Carlyle till Marriage (1795-1826). (b) Carlyle to the French Revolution (1826-37). (c) Carlyle on Cromwell and Others (1837-48). (d) Carlyle at his Zenith (1848-53). (e) Carlyle to threescore-and-ten (1853-65).

(f) Carlyle in Old Age (1865-81); by D.A. Wilson and David Wilson MacArthur. Correspondance of Thomas Carl Waldo Emerson; 1834-72 • ed. by London, Chatto & Windus, 1883. (2 Correspondance between Goethe and Carlyle; ed. by C.E. Norton. London, Macmillan, 1887. Love.Letters of Thomas Carlyle and Jane Welsh; ed. by Alexander Carlyle. London, John Lane, 1909. (2 volumes) Letters and Memorials of ; prepared for publication by T. Carlyle; ed. by J.A. Froude. New York, Scribner's , 1903. - 159 -

Carlyle, Alexander. The Nemesis of Froude, by A.C. and Sir James Crichton-Browne. London, John Lane, 1903. The Carlyle Mytb Refuted. University Press, 1930. (Private publication) Froude, James A. My Relations with Carlyle. New York, Scribner's, 1903.

/ Garnett, Richard. Life of Thomas Carlyle. London, Walter Scott, 1887. Hamilton, (Mrs.) Mary A. Thomas Carlyle. London, L. Parsons, 1926.

Larkin, Henry. Carlyle and the Open Secret of his ~· London, Kegan, Paul, Trench, 1886. Masson, David. Carlyle Personally and in bis Writings. London, Macmillan, 1885. Wylie, w. H. Thomas Carlyle; the Man and his Books. London, T. Fisher Unwin, 1909.

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Bentley, E. R. 'A Century of Hero-Worship. Philadelphia, J.B. Lippincott, 1944. Burdett, Osbert. The two Carlyles. London, Faber & Faber, 1930. Ca&amian, Louis. Carlyle; translated by E.K. Brown. New York, Macmillan, 1932. Craig, R. S. The Making of Carlyle. London, Eveleigh Nash, 1908. Gough, Roger. The Political Philosophy of T. Carlyle, with special emphasis upon his Theorf of the Hero. Montreal, McGill University, l930.thesis) - 160 -

Grierson, Herbert J.C. Carlyle and Hitler. London, Cambridge University.Press, 1933. Thomas Carlyle: (Annual Lecture on a Master Mind). London, (Proceedings of) The British Academj, 1940. (Volume 26) Harrold, Charles F. New Haven, Studies in Jackson, Holbrook. Dreamers of Dreams. London, Faber & Faber, 1948.

Lammond, D. Carlyle. London, D;ckworth, 1934. Lehman, B. H. Carlyle's Theory of the Hero. Durham, N.C., Duke University Press, 1928. Lippincott, BenjaminE. Victorien Critics of Democracy. Minneapolis, University of Mlnnesoea Press, 1938. Mazzini, Joseph. On the Genius and Tendenct of the Writings of Thomas Carlyle. (In The Socia ism and Unsociâiism of T. Carlyle;- a Collection of Carlyle's Social Writings. New York, Humboldt Publishing Co., 1891, p. 533-572.)

Moore, Carlisle. Thomas Carlyle and Fiction: 1822-34. Ithaca, N.Y., Cornell Univ. Press, 1940. (Princeton University thesis) Neff, Emery. Carlyle. London, Geo. Allen & Unwin, 1932. Carlyle and Mill; an Introduction to Victorien Thought. New York, Columbia University Press, 1926. Nichol, John. Thomas Carlyle. London, Macmillan, 1926. Perry, Bliss. Thomas Carlyle± How to Know Him. Indian- apolis, Bobbs-Merrl 1, 1915. Ralli, Augustus. Guide to Carlyle. London, Geo. Allen & Unwin, 1920. (2 volumes) Roe, Frederick W. The Social Philosophy of Carlyle and Ruskin. New York, Harcourt, Brace, 1921. Storrs, Margaret. The Relation of Carlyle to Kant and Fichte. Bryn Mawr, Penna., Bryn Mawr College, 1929. ( thesis) - 161 -

Tinker, Chauncey. Nature's Simple Plan. Princeton, N.J., Princeton Universlt~ Press, 1922. Willey, Basil. Eighteenth Centurt Background; Studies in the Idea of Nature in t e Thought of the Period. London, Chatto & Windus, 1946. Nineteenth Century Studiesi Coleridge to Matthew Arnold. London, Chatte & Windus, 1949.

IV. Criticis.m (in Article for.m). Bentley, Eric Russell. Modern Hero-Worshipj Notes on Carlyle, Nietzsche and Stefan ieorge. In Sewanee Review, Summer, 1944, p. 441456. Chamberlin, Benjamin D. Carlyle as a Portrait Painter. In Sewanee Review, July-Sep., 1928, p. 328-341. Dunn, Waldo H. Wilson's Carlyle. In Sewanee Review, Oct.­ Dec., 1932, p. 460-475. Harrold, Charles F. Carlyle's Calvinis.m. In Studies in Philology, July, 1936, p. 475-486. Carlyle and Kant. In Philologipal 2aarterly, Gct., 1928, p. 345-357. Carlyle's General Method in The French Revolution. In P.M.L.A., 1928, Vol. 43, p. 1150-69. Lovejoy, A. O. "Nature" as Aesthetic Nor.m. In Modern Language Notes, Vol. 42, Nov., 1927, p. 444-451. Moore, Carlisle. Carlyle's Diamond Necklace. In P.M.L.A., June, 1943, Vol. 58, p. 537-557.

Paine, Gregory. Litera~ Relations of Whitman and Carllle with Special eference to their Contrasting V~ews on Democracy. In Studies in Philo~, July, 1939, p. 550-563. Schapiro, J.S. Thomas Carlyle - Prophet of Fascism. In Journal of Modern History, June, 1945, Vol. 17, p. 97-115. Shine, Bill. Carlyle on Poetry and Bistory to 1832. In Studies in Philology, July, 1936, p. 487-506.

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Carlyle on Religion and Poetry to 1832. In Studies in Philology, Jan., 1936, p. 57-92. Carlyle and the German Philosophy Problem during the year 1826-27. In P.M.L.A., Sep., 1935, Vol. 50, p. 807-827~ Smith, Fred Manning. Whitman's Poet-Prophet and Carlyle's ~· In P.M.L.A., Dec., 1940, Vol. 55, p. 1146-1164. Wellek, Rene.~ Carlyle and the Philosophy of History. In Philologicâl ~uarterly, Jan., 1944,=p. 55-76.