Hector Macpherson

“ He approaches history like a dramatist. Give him, as in the French Revolution, a weird, tragic, awe-inspiring theme, and he will utilise his characters, scenes, and circumstances in artistic subordination to the central idea. Carlyle might be called a subjective dramatist—that is to say, his own spirit, thoughts, and reflections get so mixed up with the history that it is difficult to imagine the one without the other. Every now and then the dramatist interrupts the tragedy to interject his own reflections; in the history the Carlylean philosophy plays the part of a Greek chorus. ”

“ In the midst of her deep sorrow she had made over to Dieterich—shiftless and impecunious as ever—her little capital sum of £500; in her own words, "I gave myself, with all I was worth, up to my brother Dieterich and his family". No sooner had she arrived in Hanover, in October, 1822, than she realised her great mistake. She found herself among uncongenial company. "In the last hope of finding in Dieterich a brother to whom I might communicate all my thoughts of past, present and future," she wrote to her nephew in 1827, "I saw myself disappointed the very first day of our travelling on land. ”

“ Men are grown mechanical in head and heart, as well as in hand. They have lost faith in individual endeavour, and in natural force of any kind.... We may trace this tendency in all the great manifestations of our time: in its intellectual aspect, the studies it most favours, and its manner of conducting them; in its practical aspects, its politics, art, religious work; in the whole sources, and throughout the whole current of its spiritual, no less than its material, activity.' With Carlyle the secrets of Nature and Life were discoverable, not so much by the intellect as by the heart. ”

“ When Past and Present appeared, many earnest-minded men, captivated by the style and spirit of the book, hailed Carlyle as a social reformer. As an attempt to solve the social problem, Past and Present is not a success. Carlyle could do no more than tell the modern to return to the spirit of the feudal period, when the people were led by the aristocracy. It showed considerable audacity on Carlyle's part to come to the interpretation of history with no theory of progress, no message to the world beyond the vaguely declamatory one that those nations will be turned into hell which forget God. ”

“ The young spirit has awakened out of Eternity, and knows not what we mean by Time; as yet Time is no fast-hurrying stream, but a sportful sunlit ocean; years to the child are as ages; ah! the secret of Vicissitude, of that slower or quicker decay and ceaseless down-rushing of the universal World-fabric, from the granite mountain to the man or day-moth, is yet unknown; and in a motionless Universe, we taste, what afterwards in this quick-whirling Universe is forever denied us, the balm of Rest. ”

“ Herschel gave it as his view that "there is not, in strictness of speaking, one fixed star in the heavens". "Now, if the proper motion of the stars in general be once admitted, who can refuse to allow that our Sun, with all its planets and comets, that is, the Solar System, is no less liable to such a general agitation as we find to obtain among all the rest of the celestial bodies?" ”

“ His face had not yet lost the country bronze which he brought up with him from Dumfriesshire as a student, fifty-six years ago. His long residence in London had not touched his Annandale look, nor had it—as we soon learned—touched his Annandale accent. His countenance was striking, homely, sincere, truthful—the countenance of a man on whom "the burden of the unintelligible world" had weighed more heavily than on most. His hair was yet almost dark; his moustache and short beard were iron-grey. His eyes were wide, melancholy, sorrowful; and seemed as if they had been at times a-weary of the sun. ”

“ When humanity will not listen to the voice of the prophets, it must be treated to whip and scorpion. It never dawned upon Carlyle that the highest life, individual and collective, has roots in physical laws, that politico-economic forces must be reckoned with before social harmony can be reached.
Just as Carlyle's Idealism drove him into opposition to the utilitarian theory of morals, so it drove him into opposition to the utilitarian theory of society. ”

“ By metaphysics we are enabled to prove the existence of a First Cause, the Infinite Author of all dependent beings. By mathematics we come to have a just idea of the superlative perfection of His works. By logic we can prove them to others. By ethics we are made sensible of our duty towards the Author of our existence and to our fellow-creatures."
This full-orbed conception of the world seems to have saved Herschel from falling under the influence of the spirit of scepticism then prevalent among men of science. ”

“ But science is as anthropomorphic as theology. We have no guarantee that the great facts of Nature are as we think them. We talk of Force, but our idea of Force is taken from experiences which may have no counterpart in Nature. It is well known, for example, that the secondary qualities of objects, colour, &c., do not exist in Nature. Our personality is so inextricably mixed with the material universe that it is impossible to formulate a philosophy like Naturalism, which makes mind a product of Nature, and which sharply defines the provinces of the two. ”

“ The completion of the 40-foot was the climax of Herschel's career as a maker of telescopes. The fame of the great instrument spread over the world. Princes, dukes, and courtiers visited Slough in order to view one of the wonders of the age. Astronomers, too, came from all parts of the world—Lalande, Méchain, Legendre, Cassini from Paris, Oriani from Milan, Piazzi from Palermo, Sniadecki from Cracow. Slough became a place of pilgrimage, not only for astronomers, but also for large numbers who had only a slight interest in, or curiosity about, the science. ”

“ To readers wearied with the facile criticism of conventional reviewers, it was a revelation to come into contact with a writer like Carlyle, who not only gave to the mind{63} great inspirational impetus, but also a larger critical outlook; it was like stepping out of a museum, or a dissecting-room into the free, fresh, breezy air of Nature. ”

“ Herschel said, "appears to be nothing else than a very eminent, large and lucid planet, evidently the first, or in strictness of speaking, the only primary one of our systems; all others being truly secondary to it." This solid body, he believed to be protected from the great heat of the elastic fluid of its own atmosphere by dense planetary clouds; it was diversified by mountains and valleys, and was in every way analagous to the Earth and the other planets. "We need not hesitate to admit," he said in 1794, "that the Sun is richly stored with inhabitants." ”

“ There was surely something pathetically absurd in the spectacle of a great teacher endeavouring to cure social and political diseases by preaching the resuscitation of Puritanism at a time when the intellect of the day was parting company with theocratic conceptions. Equally absurd was it to offer as a remedy for social anarchy the despotism of ambitious rulers at a time when society was suffering from the effects of previous despotism. ”

“ Honorary degrees were conferred upon him and learned societies enrolled his name among their members. He accepted these recognitions of his genius, but put little stress upon them. Miss Burney, who along with her father visited him on numerous occasions, described Herschel as "perfectly unassuming, yet openly happy, and happy in the success of those studies which would render a mind less excellently formed presumptuous and arrogant. The King has not a happier subject than this man. . . . He seems a man without a wish that has its object in the terrestrial globe." ”

“ Men like James Carlyle were essentially stern, self-centred, unemotional. Fighting like the Jews, with sword in one hand and trowel in the other, they had no time for cultivating the softer side of human nature. ”

“ A great personality is a creative force; he gives more to his age and to posterity than he receives from his age or the ages before him.
The history of astronomical science has been dominated in a remarkable degree by great creative personalities pioneers of astronomical discovery. In the front rank of these distinguished men, posterity has placed the name of William Herschel. ”