On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History | Page 8

Earth by merely giving them
scientific names, but had to gaze direct at them there, with awe and
wonder: they felt better what of divinity is in man and Nature; they,
without being mad, could worship Nature, and man more than anything
else in Nature. Worship, that is, as I said above, admire without limit:
this, in the full use of their faculties, with all sincerity of heart, they

could do. I consider Hero-worship to be the grand modifying element
in that ancient system of thought. What I called the perplexed jungle of
Paganism sprang, we may say, out of many roots: every admiration,
adoration of a star or natural object, was a root or fibre of a root; but
Hero-worship is the deepest root of all; the tap-root, from which in a
great degree all the rest were nourished and grown.
And now if worship even of a star had some meaning in it, how much
more might that of a Hero! Worship of a Hero is transcendent
admiration of a Great Man. I say great men are still admirable; I say
there is, at bottom, nothing else admirable! No nobler feeling than this
of admiration for one higher than himself dwells in the breast of man. It
is to this hour, and at all hours, the vivifying influence in man's life.
Religion I find stand upon it; not Paganism only, but far higher and
truer religions,--all religion hitherto known. Hero-worship, heartfelt
prostrate admiration, submission, burning, boundless, for a noblest
godlike Form of Man,--is not that the germ of Christianity itself? The
greatest of all Heroes is One--whom we do not name here! Let sacred
silence meditate that sacred matter; you will find it the ultimate
perfection of a principle extant throughout man's whole history on
earth.
Or coming into lower, less unspeakable provinces, is not all Loyalty
akin to religious Faith also? Faith is loyalty to some inspired Teacher,
some spiritual Hero. And what therefore is loyalty proper, the
life-breath of all society, but an effluence of Hero-worship, submissive
admiration for the truly great? Society is founded on Hero-worship. All
dignities of rank, on which human association rests, are what we may
call a Heroarchy (Government of Heroes),--or a Hierarchy, for it is
"sacred" enough withal! The Duke means Dux, Leader; King is
Kon-ning, Kan-ning, Man that knows or cans. Society everywhere is
some representation, not insupportably inaccurate, of a graduated
Worship of Heroes--reverence and obedience done to men really great
and wise. Not insupportably inaccurate, I say! They are all as
bank-notes, these social dignitaries, all representing gold;--and several
of them, alas, always are forged notes. We can do with some forged
false notes; with a good many even; but not with all, or the most of

them forged! No: there have to come revolutions then; cries of
Democracy, Liberty and Equality, and I know not what:--the notes
being all false, and no gold to be had for them, people take to crying in
their despair that there is no gold, that there never was any! "Gold,"
Hero-worship, is nevertheless, as it was always and everywhere, and
cannot cease till man himself ceases.
I am well aware that in these days Hero-worship, the thing I call
Hero-worship, professes to have gone out, and finally ceased. This, for
reasons which it will be worth while some time to inquire into, is an
age that as it were denies the existence of great men; denies the
desirableness of great men. Show our critics a great man, a Luther for
example, they begin to what they call "account" for him; not to worship
him, but take the dimensions of him,--and bring him out to be a little
kind of man! He was the "creature of the Time," they say; the Time
called him forth, the Time did everything, he nothing--but what we the
little critic could have done too! This seems to me but melancholy work.
The Time call forth? Alas, we have known Times call loudly enough
for their great man; but not find him when they called! He was not
there; Providence had not sent him; the Time, calling its loudest, had to
go down to confusion and wreck because he would not come when
called.
For if we will think of it, no Time need have gone to ruin, could it have
found a man great enough, a man wise and good enough: wisdom to
discern truly what the Time wanted, valor to lead it on the right road
thither; these are the salvation of any Time. But I liken common
languid Times, with their unbelief, distress, perplexity, with their
languid doubting characters and embarrassed circumstances, impotently
crumbling down into ever worse distress towards final ruin;--all this I
liken to dry dead fuel, waiting for the lightning out of