226 FRESH FIELDS 



but the endless dialectical hair-splitting of the Greek 

 philosopher, — " how does all this concern me at 

 all 1 " he said. But when he discovered that Plato 

 hated the Athenian democracy most cordially, and 

 poured out his scorn upon it, he thought much bet- 

 ter of him. History swiftly resolves itself into 

 biography to him; the tide in the affairs of men 

 ebbed and flowed in obedience to the few potent 

 wills. We do not find him exploiting or elucidating 

 ideas and principles, but moral qualities, — always 

 on the scent, on the search of the heroic. 



He raises aloft the standard of the individual 

 will, the supremacy of man over events. He sees 

 the reign of law; none see it clearer. "Eternal 

 Law is silently present everywhere and everywhen. 

 By Law the Planets gyrate in their orbits; by 

 some approach to Law the street-cabs ply in their 

 thoroughfares." But law is still personal will with 

 him, the will of God. He can see nothing but 

 individuality, but conscious will and force, in the 

 universe. He believed in a personal God. He 

 had an inward ground of assurance of it in his own 

 intense personality and vivid apprehension of per- 

 sonal force and genius. He seems to have believed 

 in a personal devil. At least he abuses "Auld 

 Nickie-Ben '^ as one would hardly think of abusing 

 an abstraction. However impractical we may re- 

 gard Carlyle, he was entirely occupied with practi- 

 cal questions; an idealist turned loose, in the actual 

 affairs of this world, and intent only on bettering 

 them. That which so drew reformers and all ardent 



