From this point of view the Carlylians appeared to enter into
life maimed. That, indeed, we all must do, as Christ told us; but they
seemed to do it like the beggars of Colombo, with a deliberate and
somewhat indecent exhibition of their wounds.
Carlyle found many men around him pagan, worshipping the earth without
any spiritual light in them. He feared that many others were about to go
in the same direction, so he cried aloud that the earth was too small,
and that they must find a larger object of worship. For the earth he
substituted the universe, and led men's eyes out among the immensities
and eternities. Professor James tells a story of Margaret Fuller, the
American transcendentalist, having said with folded hands, "I accept the
universe," and how Carlyle, hearing this, had answered, "Gad, she'd
better!" It was this insistence upon the universe, as distinguished from
the earth, which was the note of _Sartor Resartus_.
The reactionaries took Carlyle at his word. They said, "Yes, we shall
worship the universe"; but they went on to add that Carlyle's universe
is not universal. It is at once too vague and too austere.
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