238 A SUNDAY IN CHEYNE ROW. 



as in the fragment called " Spiritual Optics," which 

 Froude gives, he is far from satisfactory. His math- 

 ematical proficiency seemed to avail him but little 

 in the region of pure ideality. His mind is precipi- 

 tated at once upon the concrete, upon actual persons 

 and events. This makes him the artist he is, as dis- 

 tinguished from the mystic and philosopher, and is 

 perhaps the basis of Emerson's remark, that there 

 is " more character than intellect in every sentence ; " 

 that is, more motive, more will power, more stress 

 of conscience, more that appeals to one as a living 

 personal identity, wrestling with facts and events, 

 than there is that appeals to him as a contemplative 

 philosopher. 



Carlyle owed everything to his power of will and 

 to his unflinching adherence to principle. He was 

 in no sense a lucky man, had no good fortune, was 

 borne by no current, was favored and helped by no 

 circumstance whatever. His life from the first was 

 a steady pull against both wind and tide. He con- 

 fronted all the cherished thoughts, beliefs, tenden- 

 cies, of his time ; he spurned and insulted his age 

 and country. No man ever before poured out such 

 withering scorn upon his contemporaries. Many of 

 his political tracts are as blasting as the Satires of 

 Juvenal. The opinions and practices of his times in 

 politics, religion, and literature, were as a stubbly, 

 brambly field, to which he would fain apply the 

 match and clean the ground for a nobler crop. He 

 would purge and fertilize the soil by fire. His atti 



