Rawdon, Near Leeds, Yorkshire
31 August, 1847
Dear Emerson,--Almost ever since your last Letter reached me, I
have been wandering over the country, enveloped either in a
restless whirl of locomotives, view-hunting, &c., or sunk in the
deepest torpor of total idleness and laziness, forgetting, and
striving to forget, that there was any world but that of dreams;
--and though at intervals the reproachful remembrance has arisen
sharply enough on me, that I ought, on all accounts high and low,
to have written you an answer, never till today have I been able
to take pen in hand, and actually begin that operation! Such is
the naked fact. My Wife is with me; we leave no household
behind us but a servant; the face of England, with its mad
electioneerings, vacant tourist dilettantings, with its shady
woods, green yellow harvest-fields and dingy mill-chimneys, so
new and old, so beautiful and ugly, every way so _abstruse_ and
_un_speakable, invites to silence; the whole world, fruitful yet
disgusting to this human soul of mine, invites me to silence; to
sleep, and dreams, and stagnant indifference, as if for the time
one had _got_ into the country of the Lotos-Eaters, and it made
no matter what became of anything and all things. In good truth,
it is a wearied man, at least a dreadfully slothful and
slumberous man, eager for _sleep_ in any quantity, that now
addresses you! Be thankful for a few half-dreaming words, till
we awake again.
As to your visit to us, there is but one thing to be said and
repeated: That a prophet's chamber is ready for you in Chelsea,
and a brotherly and sisterly welcome, on whatever day at whatever
hour you arrive: this, which is all of the Practical that I can
properly take charge of, is to be considered a given quantity
always. With regard to Lecturing, &c., Ireland, with whom I
suppose you to be in correspondence, seems to have awakened all
this North Country into the fixed hope of hearing you,--and God
knows they have need enough to hear a man with sense in his
head;--it was but the other day I read in one of their
Newspapers, "We understand that Mr. Emerson the distinguished &c.
is certainly &c. this winter," all in due Newspaper phrase, and I
think they settled your arrival for "October" next. May it prove
so! But on the whole there _is_ no doubt of your coming; that
is a great fact. And if so, I should say, Why not come at once,
even as the Editor surmises? You will evidently do no other
considerable enterprise till this voyage to England is achieved.
Come therefore;--and we shall see; we shall hear and speak! I
do not know another man in all the world to whom I can _speak_
with clear hope of getting adequate response from him: if I
speak to you, it will be a breaking of my silence for the last
time perhaps,--perhaps for the first time, on some points!
_Allons._ I shall not always be so roadweary, lifeweary, sleepy,
and stony as at present. I even think there is yet another Book
in me; "Exodus from Houndsditch" (I think it might be called),
a peeling off of fetid _Jewhood_ in every sense from myself and
my poor bewildered brethren: one other Book; and, if it were a
right one, rest after that, the deeper the better, forevermore.
_Ach Gott!_--
Hedge is one of the sturdiest little fellows I have come across
for many a day. A face like a rock; a voice like a howitzer;
only his honest kind gray eyes reassure you a little. We have
met only once; but hope (mutually, I flatter myself) it may be
often by and by. That hardy little fellow too, what has he to do
with "Semitic tradition" and the "dust-hole of extinct
Socinianism," George-Sandism, and the Twaddle of a thousand
Magazines? Thor and his Hammer, even, seem to me a little more
respectable; at least, "My dear Sir, endeavor to clear your mind
of Cant." Oh, we are all sunk, much deeper than any of us
imagines. And our worship of "beautiful sentiments," &c., &c. is
as contemptible a form of long-ears as any other, perhaps the
most so of any. It is in fact damnable.--We will say no more of
it at present. Hedge came to me with tall lank Chapman at his
side,--an innocent flail of a creature, with considerable impetus
in him: the two when they stood up together looked like a circle
and tangent,--in more senses than one.
Jacobson, the Oxford Doctor, who welcomed your Concord Senator in
that City, writes to me that he has received (with blushes, &c.)
some grand "Gift for his Child" from that Traveler; whom I am
accordingly to thank, and blush to,--Jacobson not knowing his
address at present. The "address" of course is still more
unknown to _me_ at present: but we shall know it, and the man it
indicates, I hope, again before long. So, much for that.
And now, dear Emerson, Adieu. Will your next Letter tell us the
_when?_ O my Friend! We are here with Quakers, or Ex-Quakers
rather; a very curious people, "like water from the crystal
well"; in a very curious country too, most beautiful and very
ugly: but why write of it, or of anything more, while half
asleep and lotos-eating! Adieu, my Friend; come soon, and let
us meet again under this Sun.
Yours,
T. Carlyle