Carlyle's impressions of Margaret have now been
given to the world in the published correspondence of
Carlyle and Emerson. She had, long before, drawn
her portrait of him in one of her letters descriptive of
London and its worthies. The candid criticism of
both is full of interest, and may here be contrasted.
Margaret says:—
“I approached him with more reverence after a little experience of England and Scotland had taught me to appreciate the strength and height of that wall of shams and conventions which he, more than any other man, or thousand men,—indeed, he almost alone, —has begun to throw down. He has torn off the veils from hideous facts; he has burnt away foolish illusions; he has touched the rocks, and they have given forth musical answer. Little more was wanting to begin to construct the city; but that little was wanting, and the work of construction is left to those that come after him. Nay, all attempts of the kind he is the readiest to deride, fearing new shams worse than the old, unable to trust the general action of a thought, and finding no heroic man, no natural king, to represent it and challenge his confidence."
How significant is this phrase,—"unable to trust the general action of a thought." This saving faith in the power of just thought Carlyle, the thinker, had not.
With a reverence, then, not blind, but discriminating, Margaret approached this luminous mind, and saw and heard its possessor thus:—
"Accustomed to the infinite wit and exuberant richness of his writings, his talk is still an amazement and a splendour scarcely to be faced with steady eyes. He does not converse, only harangues. It is the usual
