"We English pay, even now, the bitter smart of long centuries of
injustice to Ireland." "It is the feeling of _injustice_ that is
insupportable to all men. The brutalest black African feels it, and
cannot bear that he should be used unjustly. No man can bear it, or
ought to bear it."
This seems like the "rose-water philanthropy" which he subsequently so
much disliked. In this book also he speaks of a "seven years' Silesian
robber-war,"--we trust not intending to call his beloved Frederick a
robber! And again he proposes, as one of the best things to be done
in England, to have all the people taught by government to read and
write,--the same thing which this American democracy, in which he could
see not one good thing, has so long been doing. That was the plan by
which England was to be saved,--a plan first suggested in England in
1840,--adopted and acted on in America for two hundred years.
But just as love separated from truth becomes cruelty, so _truth_
by itself--truth _not_ tempered and fulfilled by love--runs sooner
or later into falsehood. _Truth_, after a while, becomes dogmatism,
overbearing assertion, willful refusal to see and hear other than one's
own belief; that is to say, it becomes falsehood. Such has been the
case with our author. On all the subjects to which he has committed
himself he closes his eyes, and refuses to see the other side. Like his
own symbol, the mighty Bull, he makes his charge _with his eyes shut_.
Determined, for example, to rehabilitate such men as Mirabeau,
Cromwell, Frederick, and Frederick's father, he does thorough work, and
defends or excuses all their enormities, palliating whenever he cannot
justify.
What can we call this which he says[27] concerning the execution of
Lieutenant Katte, by order of old King Friedrich Wilhelm? Tired of
the tyranny of his father, tired of being kicked and caned, the young
prince tried to escape. He was caught and held as a deserter from the
army, and his father tried to run him through the body. Lieutenant
Katte, who had aided him in getting away, having been kicked and caned,
was sent to a court-martial to be tried. The court-martial found him
guilty not of deserting, but of intending to desert, and sentenced
him to two years' imprisonment. Whereupon the king went into a rage,
declared that Katte had committed high treason, and ordered him to be
executed. Whereupon Carlyle thus writes:--
"'Never was such a transaction before or since in modern history,'
cries the angry reader; 'cruel, like the grinding of human hearts under
millstones; like----' Or, indeed, like the doings of the gods, which
are cruel, but not that alone."
In other words, Carlyle cannot make up his mind frankly to condemn
this atrocious murder, and call it by its right name. He must needs
try to sophisticate us by talking about "the doings of the gods."
Because Divine Providence takes men out of the world in various ways,
it is therefore allowable to a king, provided he be a hero grim enough
and "earnest" enough, to kick men, cane them, and run them through
the body when he pleases; and, after having sent a man to be tried by
court-martial, if the court acquits him, to order him to be executed by
his own despotic will. A truth-telling Carlyle ought to have said, "I
admit this is murder; but I like the old fellow, and so I will call it
right." A Carlyle grown sophistical mumbles something about its being
like "the doings of the gods," and leaves off with that small attempt
at humbug. Be brave, my men, and defend my Lord Jeffreys next for
bullying juries into hanging prisoners. Was not Jeffreys "grim" too?
In fact, are not most murderers "grim"?
We have had occasion formerly, in this journal, to examine the writings
of another very positive and clear-headed thinker,--Mr. Henry James.
Mr. James is, in his philosophy, the very antithesis of Carlyle.
With equal fervor of thought, with a like vehemence of style, with a
somewhat similar contempt for his opponents, Mr. James takes exactly
the opposite view of religion and duty. As Carlyle preaches the law,
and the law alone, maintaining justice as the sole Divine attribute, so
Mr. James preaches the Gospel only, denying totally that to the Divine
Mind any distinction exists between saint and sinner, unless that the
sinner is somewhat more of a favorite than the saint. We did not, do
not, agree with Mr. James in his anti-nomianism; as between him and
Carlyle, we think his doctrine far the truer and nobler. He stands on
a higher plane, and sees much the farther. A course of reading in Mr.
James's books might, we think, help our English cynic not a little.
God is the perfect harmony of justice and love. His justice is warmed
through and through with love, his love is sanctified and made strong
by justice. And so, in Christ, perfect justice was fulfilled in perfect
love. But in him first was fully revealed, in this world, the Divine
fatherly tenderness to the lost, to the sinner, to those lowest down
and farthest away. In him was taught that our own redemption from
evil does not lie in despising and hating men worse than ourselves,
but in saving them. The hard Pharisaic justice of Carlyle may call
this "rose-water philanthropy," but till he accepts it from his heart,
and repents of his contempt for his fallen fellowmen, till he learns
to love "scoundrels," there is no hope for him. He lived once in the
heaven of reverence, faith, and love; he has gone from it into the hell
of Pharisaic scorn and contempt. Till he comes back out of that, there
is no hope for him.
But such a noble nature cannot be thus lost. He will one day, let us
trust, worship the divine love which he now abhors. Cromwell asked, on
his death-bed, "if those once in a state of grace could fall," and,
being assured not, said, "I am safe then, for I am sure I was once in a
state of grace." There is a truth in this doctrine of the perseverance
of saints. Some truths once fully seen, even though afterward rejected
by the mind and will, stick like a barbed arrow in the conscience,
tormenting the soul till they are again accepted and obeyed. Such a
truth Carlyle once saw, in the great doctrine of reverence for the
fallen and the sinful. He will see it again, if not in this world, then
in some other world.
The first Carlyle was an enthusiast, the last Carlyle is a cynic. From
enthusiasm to cynicism, from the spirit of reverence to the spirit
of contempt, the way seems long, but the condition of arriving is
simple. Discard LOVE, and the whole road is passed over. Divorce love
from truth, and truth ceases to be open and receptive,--ceases to be a
positive function, turns into acrid criticism, bitter disdain, cruel
and hollow laughter, empty of all inward peace. Such is the road which
Carlyle has passed over, from his earnest, hopeful youth to his bitter
old age.
Carlyle fulfilled for many, during these years, the noble work of a
mediator. By reverence and love he saw what was divine in nature, in
man, and in life. By the profound sincerity of his heart, his worship
of reality, his hatred of falsehood, he escaped from the commonplaces
of literature to a better land of insight and knowledge. So he was
enabled to lead many others out of their entanglements, into his own
luminous insight. It was a great and blessed work. Would that it had
been sufficient for him!