86 INDOOR STUDIES 



of his countrymen, that they lack intelligence, or 

 Geist, ability to deal with ideas, and that they are 

 great only in deeds, in works, or are Hebraic 

 rather than Hellenic. 



Carlyle himself was terribly given to Hebraizing, 

 to praising work, energy, force, and to spurning 

 ideas, except when embodied in a man or hero. 

 With him the man of theory, or of ideas, cuts a 

 sorry figure beside the man of practice or of deeds. 



"How one loves to see the burly figure of him, 

 — this thick-skinned, seemingly opaque, perhaps 

 sulky, almost stupid Man of Practice, pitted against 

 some light, adroit Man of Theory, all equipped with 

 clear logic, and able everywhere to give you Why 

 for Wherefore. The adroit Man of Theory, so light 

 of movement, clear of utterance, with his bow full- 

 bent, and his quiver full of arrow arguments — surely 

 he will strike down the game, transfix everywhere 

 the heart of the matter, triumph everywhere, as he 

 proves that he shall and must do ? To your aston- 

 ishment it turns out oftenest No. The cloudy- 

 browed, thick-soled, opaque Practicality, with no 

 logic utterance, in silence mainly, with here and 

 there a low grunt or growl, has in him what tran- 

 scends all logic utterance; a Congruity with the 

 Unuttered, the Speakable, which lies atop, as a 

 superficial film, or outer skin, is his or is not his; 

 but the Doable, which reaches down to the world's 

 centre, you find him there." 



Here is the voice of Hebraism, strong and trium- 

 phant, as in Arnold we have the voice of Hellenism, 



