The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II | Page 8

the hard times. I have got a good
friend of yours, a banking man, to promise that he will sift all the
account and see if the booksellers have kept their promises. But I have
never yet got all the papers in readiness for him. I am looking to see if I
have matter for new lectures, having left behind me last spring some
half-promises in New York. If you can remember it, tell me who writes
about Loyola and Xavier in the _Edinburgh._ Sterling's papers--if he is
near you--are all in Mr. Russell's hands.* I played my part of Fadladeen
with great rigor, and sent my results to Russell, but have not now
written to J. S.
Yours, R.W.E.
---------- * Mr. A.L. Russell, who had been instrumental in procuring
the American edition of Sterling's _Poetical Works._ ---------

LXXX. Carlyle to Emerson
Chelsea, London, 19 November, 1842

My Dear Emerson,--Your Letter finds me here today; busied with many
things, but not likely to be soon more at leisure; wherefore I may as
well give myself the pleasure of answering it on the spot. The Fraser
Bill by Brown and Little has come all right; the Dumfries Banker
apprises me lately that he has got the cash into his hands. Pray do not
pester yourself with these Bookseller unintelligibilities: I suppose their
accounts are all reasonably correct, the cheating, such as it is, done
according to rule: what signifies it at any rate? I am no longer in any
vital want of money; alas, the want that presses far heavier on me is a
want of faculty, a want of _sense;_ and the feeling of that renders one
comparatively very indifferent to money! I reflect many times that the
wealth of the Indies, the fame of ten Shakespeares or ten Mahomets,
would at bottom do me no good at all. Let us leave these poor slaves of
the Ingot and slaves of the Lamp to their own courses,--within a certain
extent of halter!
What you say of Alcott seems to me altogether just. He is a man who
has got into the Highest intellectual region,--if that be the Highest
(though in that too there are many stages) wherein a man can believe
and discern for himself, without need of help from any other, and even
in opposition to all others: but I consider him entirely unlikely to
accomplish anything considerable, except some kind of crabbed,
semi-perverse, though still manful existence of his own; which indeed
is no despicable thing. His "more than prophetic egoism,"--alas, yes! It
is of such material that Thebaid Eremites, Sect-founders, and all
manner of cross-grained fanatical monstrosities have fashioned
themselves, --in very _high,_ and in the highest regions, for that matter.
Sect-founders withal are a class I do not like. No truly great man, from
Jesus Christ downwards, as I often say, ever founded a Sect,--I mean
wilfully intended founding one. What a view must a man have of this
Universe, who thinks "he can swallow it all," who is not doubly and
trebly happy that he can keep it from swallowing him! On the whole, I
sometimes hope we have now done with Fanatics and Agonistic
Posture-makers in this poor world: it will be an immense improvement
on the Past; and the "New Ideas," as Alcott calls them, will prosper
greatly the better on that account! The old gloomy Gothic Cathedrals
were good; but the great blue Dome that hangs over all is better than
any Cologne one.--On the whole, do not tell the good Alcott a word of

all this; but let him love me as he can, and live on vegetables in peace;
as I, living partly on vegetables, will continue to love him!
The best thing Alcott did while he staid among us was to circulate
some copies of your _Man the Reformer._* I did not get a copy; I
applied for one, so soon as I knew the right fountain; but Alcott, I think,
was already gone. And now mark,--for this I think is a novelty, if you
do not already know it: Certain Radicals have reprinted your Essay in
Lancashire, and it is freely circulating there, and here, as a cheap
pamphlet, with excellent acceptance so far as I discern. Various
Newspaper reviews of it have come athwart me: all favorable, but all
too shallow for sending to you. I myself consider it a truly excellent
utterance; one of the best words you have ever spoken. Speak many
more such. And whosoever will distort them into any "vegetable" or
other crotchet,--let it be at his own peril; for the word itself is _true;_
and will have to make itself a fact therefore; though not a distracted
abortive fact, I hope! Words of that kind are not born into Facts in the