Chapter LXXVI: Section VII: The Dangers of Enthusiasm.--Comparison of Carlyle and

Macaulay

Nowadays, doubtless, in the whole civilized world, democracy is swelling or overflowing, and all the channels in which it flows are fragile or temporary. But it is a strange offer to present for its issue the fanaticism and tyranny of the Puritans. The society and spirit which Carlyle proposes, as models for human nature, lasted but an hour, and could not last longer. The asceticism of the Republic produced the debauchery of the Restoration; Harrison preceded Rochester, men like Bunyan raised up men like Hobbes; and the sectaries, in instituting the despotism of enthusiasm, established by reaction the authority of the positive mind, and the worship of gross pleasure. Exaltation is not stable, and it cannot be exacted from man without injustice and danger. The sympathetic generosity of the French Revolution ended in the cynicism of the Directory and the slaughters of the empire. The chivalric and poetic piety of the great Spanish monarchy emptied Spain of men and of thought. The primacy of genius, taste, and intellect in Italy, reduced her at the end of a century to voluptuous sloth and political slavery. "What makes the angel makes the beast;" and perfect heroism, like all excesses, ends in stupor. Human nature has its explosions, but with intervals: mysticism is serviceable but when it is short. Violent circumstances produce extreme conditions; great evils are necessary in order to raise great men, and you are obliged to look for shipwrecks when you wish to behold rescuers. If enthusiasm is beautiful, its results and its originating circumstances are sad; it is but a crisis, and a healthy state is better. In this respect, Carlyle himself may serve for a proof. There is, perhaps, less genius in Macaulay than in Carlyle; but when we have fed for some time on this exaggerated and demoniacal style, this marvellous and sickly philosophy, this contorted and prophetic history, these sinister and furious politics, we gladly return to the continuous eloquence, to the vigorous reasoning, to the moderate prognostications, to the demonstrated theories, of the generous and solid mind which Europe has just lost, who brought honor to England, and whose place none can fill.

[Footnote 326: Because the Kalmucks put written prayers into a calabash turned by the wind, which in their opinion produces a perpetual adoration. In the same way are the prayer-mills of Thibet used.]

[Footnote 327: The "Life of John Sterling," ch. V; "A Profession."]

[Footnote 328: "Sartor Resartus," 1868, bk. II. ch. VIII; Centre of Indifference.]

[Footnote 329: "History of the French Révolution," bk. I. ch. II; Realised Ideals.]

[Footnote 330: In the "Adoration of the Magi."]

[Footnote 331: "Latter-Day Pamphlets," 1850; Stump Orator, 35.]

[Footnote 332: "The French Revolution," I. bk. III. ch. VII; Internecine.]

[Footnote 333: "Cromwell's Letters and Speeches," III. X; the end.]

[Footnote 334: "Life of Sterling."]

[Footnote 335: "Sartor Resartus," bk. I. ch. X; Pure Reason.]

[Footnote 336: Ibid.]

[Footnote 337: Ibid. bk. III. ch. I; Incident in Modern History.]

[Footnote 338: "Sailor Resartus," bk. III. ch. X; The Dandiacal Body.]

[Footnote 339: "Sartor Resartus," bk. III. ch. X; The Dandiacal Body.]

[Footnote 340: Ibid.]

[Footnote 341: Ibid.]

[Footnote 342: "Latter-Day Pamphlets," 1850; Jesuitism, 28.]

[Footnote 343: In "Past and Present," bk. II.]

[Footnote 344: Ibid. ch. I; Jocelin of Brakelond.]

[Footnote 345: Ibid. ch. II; St. Edmondsbury.]

[Footnote 346: "Lectures on Heroes," 1868.]

[Footnote 347: "Lectures on Heroes," I: The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 348: "Sartor Resartus," bk. I, ch, VIII; The World out of Clothes.]

[Footnote 349: Goethe, the greatest of them all.]

[Footnote 350: M. Renan.]

[Footnote 351: In particular, Stanley and Jowett.]

[Footnote 352: "Sartor Resartus," bk. I. ch. XI; Prospective.]

[Footnote 353: Ibid. bk. I. ch. X; Pure Reason.]

[Footnote 354: Ibid.]

[Footnote 355: Ibid. bk. I. ch. XI; Prospective.]

[Footnote 356: "Sartor Resartus," bk. III. ch. III; Symbols.]

[Footnote 357: Ibid. bk. III. ch. VIII; Natural Supernaturalism.]

[Footnote 358: Ibid.]

[Footnote 359: Ibid.]

[Footnote 360: "Sartor Resartus," bk. I. ch. X; Pure Reason.]

[Footnote 361: Ibid. bk. III. ch. VIII; Natural Supernaturalism.]

[Footnote 362: Ibid.]

[Footnote 363: "Sartor Resartus," bk. I. ch. X; Pre Reason.]

[Footnote 364: Ibid. bk. III. ch. VIII; Natural Supernaturalism.]

[Footnote 365: Ibid.]

[Footnote 366: "Sartor Resartus," bk. II. ch. VII; The Everlasting No.]

[Footnote 367: "Only this I know: If what thou namest Happiness be our true aim, then are we all astray. With Stupidity and sound Digestion man may front much. But what, in these dull, unimaginative days, are the terrors of Conscience to the diseases of the Liver! Not on Morality, but on Cookery, let us build our stronghold: there brandishing our frying-pan, as censer, let us offer sweet incense to the Devil, and live at ease on the fat things he has provided for his Elect!"--"Sartor Resartus," bk. II. ch. VII.]

[Footnote 368: "Lectures on Heroes."]

[Footnote 369: "Sartor Resartus," bk. II. ch. IX; The Everlasting Yea.]

[Footnote 370: Ibid. bk. III. ch. II; Church Clothes.]

[Footnote 371: "Lectures on Heroes," I; The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 372: "Lectures on Heroes," I; The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 373: Ibid, IV; The Hero as Priest.]

[Footnote 374: Ibid.]

[Footnote 375: "Past and Present," bk. III. ch. XV; Morrison Again.]

[Footnote 376: Ibid. bk. III. ch. XII; Reward.]

[Footnote 377: "Lectures on Heroes;" Miscellanies, passim.]

[Footnote 378: "Life of Sterling."]

[Footnote 379: "Critical and Miscellaneous Essays," 4 vols.; II. Voltaire.]

[Footnote 380: See this double praise in "Wilhelm Meister."]

[Footnote 381: "Lectures on Heroes," I; The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 382: Ibid. II; The Hero as Prophet.]

[Footnote 383: "Cromwell's Letters and Speeches," III. part X; Death of the Protector.]

[Footnote 384: "Lectures on Heroes," I; The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 385: Ibid.]

[Footnote 386: "Lectures on Heroes," I; The Hero as Divinity.]

[Footnote 387: Ibid. IV; The Hero as Priest.]

[Footnote 388: "Lectures on Heroes," VI; The Hero as King.]

[Footnote 389: Ibid.]

[Footnote 390: "The French Revolution," I. bk. VI. ch. I; Make the Constitution.]

[Footnote 391: Ibid.]

[Footnote 392: "Past and Present," bk. III. ch. I; Phenomena.]

[Footnote 393: "It is his effort and desire to teach this and the other thinking British man that said finale, the advent namely of actual open Anarchy, cannot be distant, now when virtual disguised Anarchy, long-continued, and waxing daily, has got to such a height; and that the one method of staving off the fatal consummation, and steering towards the Continents of the Future, lies not in the direction of reforming Parliament, but of what he calls reforming Downing Street; a thing infinitely urgent to be begun, and to be strenuously carried on. To find a Parliament more and more the express image of the People, could, unless the people chanced to be wise as well as miserable, give him no satisfaction. Not this at all; but to find some sort of King, made in the image of God, who could a little achieve for the People, if not their spoken wishes, yet their dumb wants, and what they would at last find to have been their instinctive will--which is a far different matter usually, in this babbling world of ours."--Parliaments, in "Latter-Day Pamphlets."

"A king or leader, then, in all bodies of men, there must be; be their work what it may, there is one man here who by character, faculty, position, is fittest of all to do it.

"He who is to be my ruler, whose will is to be higher than my will, was chosen for me in Heaven. Neither, except in such obedience to the Heaven-chosen, is freedom so much as conceivable."]

[Footnote 394: Official Report, 1842.]

[Footnote 395: "Latter-Day Pamphlets;" Parliaments.]

CHAPTER FIFTH

PHILOSOPHY--STUART MILL