became tutor in a private family, with whom he travelled, not returning to Edinburgh until 1825. During these years of indecision as to what should be his life pursuit he had been occupied with German literature, and had published his translation of Wilhelm Meister and his Life of Schiller. For these works he received grateful acknowledgment from Goethe, and by them established a reputation as a writer. In 1827 he met Jeffrey, and made a contract with him to write for the Edinburgh Review.

Meanwhile, in 1826, Carlyle had married Jane Baillie Welsh. Two years later, through the failure of some literary plans, he decided to remove, for the sake of economy, to his wife's farm of Craigenputtock, in southwest Dumfriesshire, in the wild moorland country, fifteen miles from any town. There he resolved, in spite of poverty, to publish no work that did not satisfy his ideal. Carlyle's impressions of his hermit life vary with his changing moods, now he praises his home as a rural paradise; again he writes in his diary, "Finished a paper on Burns September 16, 1828, at this Devil's Den, Craigenputtock." 1

This last phrase shows us that the Essay on Burns was one of the first products of Carlyle's self-imposed exile. Of all his essays, this is on the topic nearest to the author's life. Carlyle was drawn to his subject by every bond of race, language, and association. His birthplace, Annandale, is only ten miles from Dumfries, Burns's last home. He had talked with many who had known Burns in life, among them Gilbert Burns, the poet's brother. Though an estimate of the merits of the essay will be more appropriate later, some circumstances connected with its publication must here be noted, for the light which they throw on Carlyle's character. The account of them is quoted, with some small changes, from Froude.

Jeffrey "found the article long and diffuse, though he

1 Froude Thomas Carlyle, a History of the First Forty Years of his Life, ii. 26.

did not deny that 'it contained much beauty and felicity of diction.' He insisted that it must be cut down," and received permission from Carlyle to make some alterations.1 "When

, 2

the proof-sheets came, Carlyle found the first part cut all into shreds, the body of a quadruped with the head of a bird, a man shortened by cutting out the thighs and fixing the knee-caps on the hips.' He refused to let it appear in such a horrid shape.' He replaced the most important passages, and returned the sheets with an intimation that the paper might be cancelled, but should not be mutilated. Few editors would have been so forbearing as Jeffrey when so audaciously defied. He complained, but he acquiesced. He admitted that the article would do the Review credit, though it would be called tedious and sprawling by people of weight whose mouths he could have stopped. He had wished to be of use to Carlyle by keeping out of sight in the Review his mannerism and affectation; but if Carlyle persisted he might have his way.

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Carlyle was touched; such kindness was more than he had looked for. The proud self-assertion was followed by humility and almost penitence, and the gentle tone in which he wrote conquered Jeffrey in turn. Jeffrey said that he admired and approved of Carlyle's letter to him in all respects. The candour and sweet blood' which was shown in it deserved the highest praise. Your virtues are your own,' said Jeffrey, and you shall have anything you like.'"' During Carlyle's residence at Craigenputtock, which lasted, with slight interruption, for six years, were produced most of the miscellaneous essays, and his first great original work, Sartor Resartus. This is the formative period of his literary life, from which he came forth, to quote Mr. 1 Letters of Thomas Carlyle, 1826-1836, p. 123.

6

2 Quoted from a letter from Carlyle to his brother, October 10, 1828. There is here a reminiscence of the opening lines of Horace's Ars Poetica.

8 Froude: Thomas Carlyle, a History of the First Forty Years of his Life, ii. 31-35.

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Stephen, a master of his craft." In 1834 he moved to London, where he resided until his death, in 1881. To this later period belong his greatest works, on which his fame depends: Heroes and Hero-Worship, The French Revolution, Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, and The History of Frederick the Great. But the earlier works have the same tonic quality as the later, and are free from many of their defects. As a teacher, especially if we take an American point of view, Carlyle grows less trustworthy with advancing years. His cynicism becomes more bitter, his hero-worship leads him to sympathize with autocracy, while his contempt for the stupidity of the masses leads him to distrust all popular government. In Lowell's words, quoting Carlyle's contemptuous phrase, “he saw only the burning of a dirty chimney' in the war which a great people was waging under his very eyes for the idea of nationality and orderly magistrature."

6

In the Essay on Burns, then, we have a work of Carlyle's early prime. We might infer this from the style alone, which shows a transition from his early clearness and simplicity to the "piebald, entangled, hyper-metaphorical style of writing" characteristic of his later works, and always associated with his name.

In the Essay on Burns it is not the author's intention to give a connected sketch of Burns's life,1 or to pass a cool, critical judgment on his poetry as a whole. Carlyle has himself, on page 6 of this essay, given us his idea of the true purpose of biography. The following words from his second essay on Richter make his meaning still clearer :

"If the acted life of a pius Vates is so high a matter, the written life, which, if properly written, would be a translation and interpretation thereof, must also have great value. It has been said that no Poet is equal to his Poem, which saying is partially true; but in a deeper sense, it

1 For this reason, a brief sketch of the poet's life is given the reader after this Introduction. See pp. xiv.-xvii.

may also be asserted, and with still greater truth, that no Poem is equal to its Poet. Now, it is Biography which first gives us both Poet and Poem; by the significance of the one, elucidating and completing that of the other. That ideal outline of himself, which a man unconsciously shadows forth in his writings, and which, rightly deciphered, will be truer than any other representation of him, it is the task of the Biographer to fill up into an actual coherent figure, and bring home to our experience, or at least clear, undoubting admiration, thereby to instruct and edify us in many ways. Conducted on such principles, the Biography of great men, especially of great poets, that is, of men in the highest degree noble minded and wise, might become one of the most dignified and valuable species of composition. As matters stand, indeed, there are few Biographies that accomplish anything of this kind; the most are mere Indexes of a Biography, which each reader is to write out for himself, as he peruses them; not the living body, but the dry bones of a body, which should have been alive. To expect any such Promethean virtue in a common Life-writer were unreasonable enough. How shall that unhappy Biographic brotherhood, instead of writing like Index-makers and Government-clerks, suddenly become enkindled with some sparks of intellect, or even of genial fire; and not only collecting dates and facts, but making use of them, look beyond the surface and economical form of a man's life, into its substance and spirit?'

In pursuit of this great aim, Carlyle has to adapt his method to his subject. In writing of Richter, a man unknown to the British public of his time, he has to give us himself the "dry bones" of fact, before he can give the "living body." But in the case of Burns, as he can assume that his readers are familiar with Burns's chief poems, and know the main events of his life, he brushes aside all detail, and treats at once the inner meaning and value of the poet's life and work. To appreciate Carlyle's essay, we must

fulfil his expectation of us, and know Burns at first hand before we start to read about him.

We must now ask how far Carlyle corresponds to his own ideal biographer. No one can read this essay without admitting that we have in it a powerful and sympathetic conception of Burns. To decide whether this conception is just and impartial we must take into account the writer's general temperament and leading ideas.

Carlyle is a hero-worshipper in all his work, as a quotation from Sartor Resartus will best explain:

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"Meanwhile, observe with joy, so cunningly has Nature ordered it, that whatsoever man ought to obey, he cannot but obey. Before no faintest revelation of the Godlike did he ever stand irreverent; least of all, when the Godlike showed itself revealed in his fellow-man. Thus there is a true religious Loyalty forever rooted in his heart; nay in all ages, even in ours, it manifests itself as a more or less orthodox Hero-worship. In which fact, that Hero-worship exists, has existed, and will forever exist, universally among Mankind, mayest thou discern the corner-stone of livingrock, whereon all Politics for the remotest time may stand

secure.

"Hast thou forgotten Paris and Voltaire? How the aged, withered man, though but a skeptic, mocker, and millinery Court-poet, yet because even he seemed the Wisest, Best, could drag mankind at his chariot - wheels, so that princes coveted a smile from him, and the loveliest of France would have laid their hair beneath his feet. All Paris was one vast Temple of Hero-worship; though their Divinity, moreover, was of feature too apish."

As Carlyle is fallible, like other men, the practical effect of his doctrine is that he exalts those whom he likes, and throws contempt on those whom he dislikes. Since he is attracted by Burns's noble qualities, above all by his sincerity, he forms a grand ideal conception of him. Indeed,

1 Sartor Resartus, III. vii.