Sartor Resartus (Oxford World's Classics)
Page 5
S. Helming, ‘“The Thaumaturgic Art of Thought”: Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus’, in his The Esoteric Comedies of Carlyle, Newman, and Yeats (Cambridge, 1988).
J. H. Miller, ‘“Hieroglyphical Truth” in Sartor Resartus: Carlyle and the Language of Parable’, in Victorian Perspectives: Six Essays, ed. John Clubb and Jerome Meckier (Newark, Delaware, 1989).
D. Riede, ‘Transgression, Authority, and the Church of Literature in Carlyle’, in Victorian Connections, ed. Jerome J. McGann (Charlottesville, 1989).
D. F. Felluga, ‘The Critic’s New Clothes: Sartor Resartus as “Cold Carnival”’, Criticism, xxxvii (1995), 583–99.
W. Iser, ‘The Emergence of a Cross-Cultural Discourse: Thomas Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus’, in The Translatability of Cultures: Figurations of the Space Between, ed. Sanford Budick and Wolfgang Iser (Stanford, 1996).
J. Treadwell, ‘Sartor Resartus and the Work of Writing’, Essays in Criticism, xlviii (1998), 224–43.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. W. Dyer, A Bibliography of Thomas Carlyle’s Writings and Ana (Portland, Maine, 1928).
G. B. Tennyson, ‘Thomas Carlyle’, in Victorian Prose: A Guide to Research, ed. D.J. DeLaura (New York, 1973), 33–104.
R. L. Tarr, Thomas Carlyle: A Bibliography of English Language Criticism 1824–1974 (Charlottesville, 1976).
A CHRONOLOGY OF THOMAS CARLYLE
1795
Born 4 December in Ecclefechan, a small market village in Dumfriesshire in south-western Scotland; the first of nine children of James Carlyle, a stonemason, and Margaret Aitken, the daughter of a farmer and like her husband a strict Calvinist in religion.
1806
Sent to Annan Academy, 6 miles from Ecclefechan, to continue his schooling.
1809
Walks to Edinburgh in November to begin his University studies.
1813
Returns for a fifth session at the University of Edinburgh, enrolling in the Divinity Hall of the National Church.
1814
Preaches a sermon in March; in May leaves to teach mathematics at Annan Academy. Makes his first appearance in print with letter on mathematics in the Dumfries and Galloway Courier.
1816
Begins teaching at a school in Kirkcaldy, a town on the north shore of the Firth of Forth. Friendship deepens with Edward Irving, who becomes his closest friend.
1817
Breaks off his connection with Divinity Hall and renounces his intention of entering the ministry.
1818
Reads Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, which weakens his faith in Christianity. Meets Margaret Gordon of Kirkcaldy, with whom he falls in love.
1819
Begins to study German. Moves to Edinburgh, enrols in Scots Law classes, but soon loses interest. Earns money by translating and tutoring.
1820
Romance with Margaret Gordon ends. Writes biographies and articles for Brewster’s Edinburgh Encyclopaedia.
1821
Meets Jane Baillie Welsh, six years his junior, at her family’s home in Haddington, East Lothian; publishes his first original article.
1822
His first article on German literature published, in the New Edinburgh Review; completes translation of Legendre’s Elements of Geometry; writes his first attempt at fiction, ‘Cruthers and Johnson’. After a three-year period of intense inner turmoil, undergoes a conversion experience in Leith Walk, Edinburgh.
1824
‘Life of Schiller’ published in London Magazine. Meets Coleridge during his first visit to London. Translation of Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship published in three volumes; Goethe writes to thank Carlyle for a presentation copy.
1825
Life of Friedrich Schiller, Comprehending an Examination of his Works published in book form. Begins work on a story, ‘Illudo Chartis’, abandoned within a year.
1826
Marries Jane Welsh; they move to Edinburgh.
1827
German Romance: Specimens of its Chief Authors with Biographical and Critical Notices published in four volumes. ‘Jean Paul Friedrich Richter’ published, his first contribution to Edinburgh Review. Begins work on an autobiographical novel, Wotton Reinfred (never completed).
1828
Carlyles move to Craigenputtock, a small, remote farming property in Dumfriesshire. ‘Burns’ published in Edinburgh Review.
1829
‘German Playwrights’, ‘Voltaire’, and ‘Novalis’ published in Foreign Review; ‘Signs of the Times’ in Edinburgh Review. Correspondence with Goethe continues.
1830
‘Thoughts on History’ published in Fraser’s Magazine; begins Sartor Resartus.
1831
Feels he has ‘almost done’ with German literature. Sartor Resartus finished in July. Arrives in London in August to arrange for its publication, but negotiations with John Murray are unsuccessful. First meets John Stuart Mill. ‘Characteristics’ published in Edinburgh Review.
1832
Death of Carlyle’s father; death of Goethe. ‘Biography’ and ‘Boswell’s Life of Johnson’ published in Fraser’s Magazine, ‘Corn-Law Rhymes’ in Edinburgh Review.
1833
‘Diderot’ published in the Foreign Quarterly Review. Emerson visits Carlyle at Craigenputtock. Serialization of Sartor Resartus begins in Fraser’s Magazine.
1834
The Carlyles move to London and settle at 5 Cheyne Row, Chelsea. Begins work on French Revolution. Reception of Sartor Resartus is generally poor; arranges for a small edition of fifty-eight copies, sewn together from the magazine parts, to distribute to friends. Death of Edward Irving.
1835
First acquaintance with John Sterling. Manuscript of the first volume of French Revolution inadvertently destroyed by a servant of John Stuart Mill.
1836
Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh published in book form in Boston with preface by Emerson.
1837
‘Diamond Necklace’ published in Fraser’s Magazine. Second edition of Sartor Resartus published in Boston. French Revolution: A History published in three volumes; becomes critical and popular success.
1838
First English edition in book form of Sartor Resartus.
1839
Critical and Miscellaneous Essays published in four volumes; Chartism published.
1841
On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History published.
1843
Past and Present published.
1844
Death of Sterling.
1845
Oliver Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches: with Elucidations published in two volumes.
1850
Latter-Day Pamphlets published.
1851
Life of John Sterling published.
1852
Begins work on a history of Frederick the Great.
1853
Death of Carlyle’s mother.
1856—8
First collected edition of his works published.
1858—65
The six volumes of History of Friedrich II of Prussia, called Frederick the Great published.
1866
Inaugural address as Rector of the University of Edinburgh. Death of Jane Welsh Carlyle, who is buried at Haddington. Begins writing Reminiscences (posthumously published in 1881).
1867
‘Shooting Niagara: and After?’ published in Macmillan’s.
1875
Early Kings of Norway and Essay on the Portraits of John Knox published.
1881
Dies 5 February at Cheyne Row; burial in Ecclefechan churchyard next to his parents.
Sartor Resartus
IN THREE BOOKS
Mein Vermächtniss, wie herrlich weit und breit!
Die Zeit ist mein Vermächtniss, mein Acker ist die Zeit.*
BOOK I
CHAPTER 1
PRELIMINARY
Our Theory of Gravitation is as good as perfect: Lagrange, it is well known, has proved that the Planetary System, on this scheme, will endure for ever; Laplace, still more cunningly, even guesses that it could not have been made on any other scheme. Whereby, at least, our nautical Logbooks can be better kept; and water-transport of all kinds has grown more commodious. Of Geology and Geognosy we know enough: what with the labours of our Werners and Huttons, what with the ardent genius of their disciples, it has come about that now, to many a Royal Society, the Creation of a World is little more mysterious than the cooking of a Dumpling; concerning which last, indeed, there have been minds to whom the question, How the apples were got in,* presented difficulties. Why mention our disquisitions on the Social Contract, on the Standard of Taste,* on the Migrations of the Herring? Then, have we not a Doctrine of Rent, a Theory of Value; Philosophies of Language, of History, of Pottery, of Apparitions, of Intoxicating Liquors? Man’s whole life and environment have been laid open and elucidated; scarcely a fragment or fibre of his Soul, Body, and Possessions, but has been probed, dissected, distilled, desiccated, and scientifically decomposed: our spiritual Faculties, of which it appears there are not a few, have their Stewarts, Cousins, Royer Collards: every cellular, vascular, muscular Tissue glories in its Lawrences, Majendies, Bichâts.
How, then, comes it, may the reflective mind repeat, that the grand Tissue of all Tissues, the only real Tissue, should have been quite overlooked by Science—the vestural Tissue, namely, of woollen or other Cloth; which Man’s Soul wears as its outmost wrappage and overall; wherein his whole other Tissues are included and screened, his whole Faculties work, his whole Self lives, moves, and has its being? For if, now and then, some straggling broken-winged thinker has cast an owl’sglance into this obscure region, the most have soared over it altogether heedless; regarding Clothes as a property, not an accident, as quite natural and spontaneous, like the leaves of trees, like the plumage of birds. In all speculations they have tacitly figured man as a Clothed Animal; whereas he is by nature a Naked Animal; and only in certain circumstances, by purpose and device, masks himself in Clothes. Shakespeare says,* we are creatures that look before and after: the more surprising that we do not look round a little, and see what is passing under our very eyes.
But here, as in so many other cases, Germany, learned, indefatigable, deep-thinking Germany comes to our aid. It is, after all, a blessing that, in these revolutionary times, there should be one country where abstract Thought can still take shelter; that while the din and frenzy of Catholic Emancipations, and Rotten Boroughs, and Revolts of Paris,* deafen every French and every English ear, the German can stand peaceful on his scientific watch-tower; and, to the raging, struggling multitude here and elsewhere, solemnly, from hour to hour, with preparatory blast of cowhorn, emit his Höret ihr Herren und lasset’s Euch sagen;* in other words, tell the Universe, which so often forgets that fact, what o’clock it really is. Not unfrequently the Germans have been blamed for an unprofitable diligence; as if they struck into devious courses, where nothing was to be had but the toil of a rough journey; as if, forsaking the gold-mines of Finance, and that political slaughter of fat oxen whereby a man himself grows fat, they were apt to run goose-hunting into regions of bilberries and crowberries, and be swallowed up at last in remote peat-bogs. Of that unwise science, which, as our Humorist expresses it,
By geometric scale
Doth take the size of pots of ale,*
still more, of that altogether misdirected industry, which is seen vigorously enough* thrashing mere straw, there can nothing defensive be said. In so far as the Germans are chargeable with such, let them take the consequence. Nevertheless be it remarked, that even a Russian Steppe has Tumuli and gold ornaments; also many a scene that looks desert and rock-bound from the distance, will unfold itself, when visited, into rare valleys. Nay, in any case, would Criticism erect not only fingerposts and turnpikes, but spiked gates and impassable barriers, for the mind of man? It is written, “Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”* Surely the plain rule is, Let each considerate person have his way, and see what it will lead to. For not this man and that man, but all men make up mankind, and their united tasks the task of mankind. How often have we seen some such adventurous, and perhaps muchcensured wanderer light on some outlying, neglected, yet vitally momentous province; the hidden treasures of which he first discovered, and kept proclaiming till the general eye and effort were directed thither, and the conquest was completed;—thereby, in these his seemingly so aimless rambles, planting new standards, founding new habitable colonies, in the immeasurable circumambient realm of Nothingness and Night! Wise man was he who counselled that Speculation should have free course, and look fearlessly towards all the thirty-two points of the compass, whithersoever and howsoever it listed.
Perhaps it is proof of the stinted* condition in which pure Science, especially pure moral Science, languishes among us English; and how our mercantile greatness, and invaluable Constitution, impressing a political or other immediately practical tendency on all English culture and endeavour, cramps the free flight of Thought,—that this, not Philosophy of Clothes, but recognition even that we have no such Philosophy, stands here for the first time published in our language. What English intellect could have chosen such a topic, or by chance stumbled on it? But for that same unshackled, and even sequestered condition of the German Learned, which permits and induces them to fish in all manner of waters, with all manner of nets, it seems probable enough, this abstruse Inquiry might, in spite of the results it leads to, have continued dormant for indefinite periods. The Editor of these sheets, though otherwise boasting himself a man of confirmed speculative habits, and perhaps discursive enough, is free to confess, that never, till these last months, did the above very plain considerations, on our total want of a Philosophy of Clothes, occur to him; and then, by quite foreign suggestion. By the arrival, namely, of a new Book from Professor Teufelsdröckh of Weissnichtwo;* treating expressly of this subject; and in a style which, whether understood or not, could not even by the blindest be overlooked. In the present Editor’s way of thought, this remarkable Treatise, with its Doctrines, whether as judicially acceded to, or judicially denied, has not remained without effect.
“Die Kleider ihr Werden und Wirken (Clothes, their Origin and Influence): von Diog. Teufelsdröckh, J. U. D. etc. Stillschweigen und Cognie: Weissnichtwo, 1833:*
“Here,” says the Weissnichtwo’sche Anzeiger,* “comes a Volume of that extensive, close-printed, close-meditated sort, which, be it spoken with pride, is seen only in Germany, perhaps only in Weissnichtwo: issuing from the hitherto irreproachable Firm of Stillschweigen and Company, with every external furtherance, it is of such internal quality as to set Neglect at defiance.” … “A work,” concludes the well nigh enthusiastic Reviewer, “interesting alike to the antiquary, the historian, and the philosophic thinker; a masterpiece of boldness, lynx-eyed acuteness, and rugged independent Germanism and Philanthropy (derber Kerndeutschheit und Menschenliebe); which will not, assuredly, pass current without opposition in high places; but must and will exalt the almost new name of Teufelsdröckh to the first ranks of Philosophy, in our German Temple-of-Honour.”
Mindful of old friendship, the distinguished Professor, in this the first blaze of his fame, which however does not dazzle him, sends hither a P
resentation Copy of his Book; with compliments and encomiums which modesty forbids the present Editor to rehearse; yet without indicated wish or hope of any kind, except what may be implied in the concluding phrase: Möchte es (this remarkable Treatise) auch im Brittischen Boden gedeihen!*
CHAPTER 2
EDITORIAL DIFFICULTIES
IF for a speculative man, “whose seedfield,” in the sublime words of the Poet, “is Time,”* no conquest is important but that of new Ideas, then might the arrival of Professor Teufelsdröckh’s Book be marked with chalk in the Editor’s Calendar. It is indeed an “extensive Volume,” of boundless, almost formless contents, a very Sea of Thought; neither calm nor clear, if you will; yet wherein the toughest pearl-diver may dive to his utmost depth, and return not only with sea-wreck but with true orients.
Directly on the first perusal, almost on the first deliberate inspection, it became apparent that here a quite new Branch of Philosophy, leading to as yet undescried ulterior results, was disclosed; farther, what seemed scarcely less interesting, a quite new human Individuality, an almost unexampled personal Character, that, namely, of Professor Teufelsdröckh the Discloser. Of both which novelties, as far as might be possible, we resolved to master the significance. But as man is emphatically a Proselytising creature, no sooner was such mastery even fairly attempted, than the new question arose: How might this acquired good be imparted to others, perhaps in equal need thereof; how could the Philosophy of Clothes and the Author of such Philosophy be brought home, in any measure, to the business and bosoms of our own English nation? For if new-got gold is said to burn the pockets till it be cast forth into circulation, much more may new Truth.