will see one, or one more strongly than another,
whatever it may be; and therefore, do what I will, a large body of
people will blame me. Nay, if I threw it up, a great many would
blame me. What have I done that I should be in such a strait? But I
am sixty-four years old, and I shall soon be beyond it all."

The first two volumes of the biography, covering the earlier half of
Carlyle's life, when his home was in Scotland, from 1795 to 1835,
appeared in 1882 and added to the hubbub. The public had got on a
false scent, and gossip had found a congenial theme. Carlyle was in
truth one of the noblest men that ever lived. His faults were all on
the surface. His virtues were those which lie at the foundation of
our being. For the common objects of vulgar ambition he had a scorn
too deep for words. He never sought, and he did not greatly value,
the praise of men. He had a message to deliver, in which he
profoundly believed, and he could no more go beyond it, or fall short
of it, than Balaam when he was tempted by Balak. Contemporaries
without a hundredth part of his talent, even for practical business,
attained high positions, or positions which the world thought high.
Carlyle did not envy them, was not dazzled by them, but held to his
own steadfast purpose of preaching truth and denouncing shams. His
generosity to his own family was boundless, and he never expected
thanks. He was tender-hearted, forgiving, kind, in all great matters,
whenever he had time to think. Courage and truth made him indifferent
to fashion and popularity. Popularity was not his aim. His aim was to
tell people what was for their good, whether they would hear or
whether they would forbear. Froude had so much confidence in the
essential greatness of the man that he did not hesitate to show him
as he was, not a prodigy of impossible perfection, but a sterling
character and a lofty genius. Therefore his portrait lives, and will
live, when biographies written for flattery or for edification have
been consigned to boxes or to lumber-rooms.

Froude was only following the principles laid down by Carlyle
himself. In reviewing Lockhart's Life of Scott, Carlyle emptied the
vials of his scorn, which were ample and capacious, upon "English
biography, bless its mealy mouth." The censure of Lockhart for
"personalities, indiscretion," violating the "sanctities of private
life," was, he said, better than a good many praises. A biographer
should speak the truth, having