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

of my Swedenborgian druggist,* of whom I told you. And if, which is hardly to be hoped, any good book should be thrown out of our vortex of trade and politics, I shall not fail to give it the same direction.
-------------- * _Observations on the Growth of the Mind,_ by Sampson Reed, first published in 1825. A fifth edition of this thoughtful little treatise was published in 1865. Mr. Reed was a graduate of Harvard College in 1818; he died in 1880, at the age of eighty. ---------------
I need not tell you, my dear sir, what pleasure a letter from you would give me when you have a few moments to spare to so remote a friend. If any word in my letter should provoke you to a reply, I shall rejoice in my sauciness. I am spending the summer in the country, but my address is Boston, care of Barnard, Adams, & Co. Care of O. Rich, London. Please do make my affectionate respects to Mrs. Carlyle, whose kindness I shall always gratefully remember. I depend upon her intercession to insure your writing to me. May God grant you both his best blessing.
Your friend, R. Waldo Emerson

II. Carlyle to Emerson
5 Great Cheyne Row, Chelsea, London 12 August, 1834
My Dear Sir,--Some two weeks ago I received your kind gift from Fraser. To say that it was welcome would be saying little: is it not as a voice of affectionate remembrance, coming from beyond the Ocean waters, first decisively announcing for me that a whole New Continent _exists,_--that I too have part and lot there! "Not till we can think that here and there one is thinking of us, one is loving us, does this waste Earth become a peopled Garden." Among the figures I can recollect as visiting our Nithsdale hermitage,--all like Apparitions now, bringing with them airs from Heaven or else blasts from the other region,--there is perhaps not one of a more undoubtedly supernal character than yourself: so pure and still, with intents so charitable; and then vanishing too so soon into the azure Inane, as an Apparition should! Never has your Address in my Notebook met my eye but with a friendly influence. Judge if I am glad to know that there, in Infinite Space, you still hold by me.
I have read in both your books at leisure times, and now nearly finished the smaller one. He is a faithful thinker, that Swedenborgian Druggist of yours, with really deep ideas, who makes me too pause and think, were it only to consider what manner of man he must be, and what manner of thing, after all, Swedenborgianism must be. "Through the smallest window look well, and you can look out into the Infinite." Webster also I can recognize a sufficient, effectual man, whom one must wish well to, and prophesy well of. The sound of him is nowise poetic-rhythmic; it is clear, one-toned, you might say metallic, yet distinct, significant, not without melody. In his face, above all, I discern that "indignation" which, if it do not make "verses," makes useful way in the world. The higher such a man rises, the better pleased I shall be. And so here, looking over the water, let me repeat once more what I believe is already dimly the sentiment of all Englishmen, Cisoceanic and Transoceanic, that we and you are not two countries, and cannot for the life of us be; but only two parishes of one country, with such wholesome parish hospitalities, and dirty temporary parish feuds, as we see; both of which brave parishes _Vivant! vivant!_ And among the glories of both be Yankee-doodle-doo, and the Felling of the Western Forest, proudly remembered; and for the rest, by way of parish constable, let each cheerfully take such George Washington or George Guelph as it can get, and bless Heaven! I am weary of hearing it said, "We love the Americans," "We wish well," &c., &c. What in God's name should we do else?
You thank me for _Teufelsdrockh;_ how much more ought I to thank you for your hearty, genuine, though extravagant acknowledgment of it! Blessed is the voice that amid dispiritment, stupidity, and contradiction proclaims to us, _Euge!_ Nothing ever was more ungenial than the soil this poor Teufelsdrockhish seed-corn has been thrown on here; none cries, Good speed to it; the sorriest nettle or hemlock seed, one would think, had been more welcome. For indeed our British periodical critics, and especially the public of _Fraser's_ Magazine (which I believe I have now done with), exceed all speech; require not even contempt, only oblivion. Poor Teufelsdrockh!--Creature of mischance, miscalculation, and thousand-fold obstruction! Here nevertheless he is, as you see; has struggled across the Stygian marshes, and now, as a stitched pamphlet "for Friends," cannot be burnt or