to
it, and altogether extraneous and hopeless. "Systems!" It is living,
truthful men we want; these will make their own systems; and let those
who doubt the truth humbly watch and wait until it is manifest to
them, or go on their own arid and sorrowful ways in what peace they
can find there.

The catholic spirit of Carlyle's works cannot be better illustrated
than by the fact that he has received letters from all sorts and
conditions of men, Methodists and Shakers, Churchmen and Romanists,
Deists and Infidels, all claiming his fellowship, and thinking they
find their peculiarities of thought in him. This is owing partly,
perhaps, to the fact that in his earlier writings he masked his
sentiments both in Hebraic and Christian phraseology; and partly to
the lack of vision in his admirers, who could not distinguish a new
thought in an old garment. His "Cromwell" deceived not a few in this
respect; and we were once asked in earnest, by a man who should have
been better informed, if Carlyle was a Puritan. Whatever he may be
called, or believed to be, one thing is certain concerning him: that
he is a true and valiant man,--all out a man!--and that literature and
the world are deeply indebted to him. His mission, like that of Jeremy
Collier in a still baser age, was to purge our literature of its
falsehood, to recreate it, and to make men once more believe in the
divine, and live in it. So earnest a man has not appeared since the
days of Luther, nor any one whose thoughts are so suggestive,
germinal, and propagative. All our later writers are tinged with his
thought, and he has to answer for such men as Kingsley, Newman,
Froude, and others who will not answer for him, nor acknowledge him.

In private life Carlyle is amiable, and often high and beautiful in
his demeanor. He talks much, and, as we have said, well; impatient,
at times, of interruption, and at other times readily listening to
those who have anything to say. But he hates babblers, and cant, and
sham, and has no mercy for them, but sweeps them away in the whirlwind
and terror of his wrath. He receives distinguished men, in the
evening, at his house in Chelsea; but he rarely visits. He used
occasionally to grace the saloons of Lady Blessington, in the palmy
days of her life, when she attracted around her all noble and
beautiful persons, who were distinguished by their attainments in
literature, science, or art; but he rarely leaves his home now for
such a purpose.