Sartor Resartus (Oxford World's Classics) (40 page)

J
OHN
S
TERLING
(1806–44) was a member of the Apostles during his undergraduate years at Cambridge and subsequently came under the spell of Coleridge, who influenced his decision to become an Anglican clergyman. At the time he first met Carlyle in February 1835, Sterling was in the process of withdrawing from his clerical commitment as a curate because of ill health and religious misgivings. His intimate friendship with Carlyle was cut short by his premature death. In his
Life of John Sterling
, published in 1851, Carlyle argued that his friend’s religious beliefs had been less orthodox and less certain than others had claimed.

On 29 May 1835 Sterling wrote Carlyle a voluminous letter criticising
Sartor Resartus;
this was subsequently printed, with omissions, in Carlyle’s
Life
. The letter printed here, with the omission of a concluding paragraph on other matters, is Carlyle’s defence against two of Sterling’s charges: that the style of
Sartor
is inaccurate, and that the work does not uphold the Christian faith. Several days before receiving Carlyle’s reply Sterling renewed his criticisms of the style of
Sartor
, in a letter which Carlyle ‘made into matches’ (
Collected Letters
, viii. 134 n. 1).

I said to Mill
*
the other day that your Name was
HOPEFUL
; of which truth surely this copious refreshing shower of really kind and genial criticism you have bestowed on the hardened, kiln-burnt, altogether contradictory Professor Teufelsdröckh, is new proof. Greater faith I have not found in Israel! Neither here shall faith and hope wholly fail: know, my Friend that your shower does not fall as on mere barren bricks, like water spilt on the ground; that I take it hopefully in, with great desire (knowing what spirit it is of) to
assimilate
such portion of it as the nature of things will allow. So much, on this sheet, I must announce to you, were it at full gallop, and in the most imperfect words.

Your objections as to phraseology and style have good grounds to stand on; many of them indeed are considerations to which I myself was not blind; which there (unluckily) were no means of doing more than nodding to as one passed. A man has but a certain strength; imperfections cling to him, which if he wait till he have brushed off entirely, he will spin forever on his axis, advancing nowhither. Know thy thought,
believe
it; front Heaven and Earth with it,—in whatsoever
words
Nature and Art have made readiest for thee! If one has
thoughts not hitherto uttered in English Books, I see nothing for it but that you must use words not found there, must
make
words,—with moderation and discretion, of course. That I have not always done it
so
, proves only that I was not strong enough; an accusation to which I for one will never plead not guilty. For the rest, pray that I may have more and more strength! Surely too, as I said, all these
coal-marks
*
of yours shall be duly considered, for the first and even for the second time, and help me on my way. With unspeakable cheerfulness I give up
“Talented”:
*
indeed, but for the plain statement you make, I could have sworn such word had never, excepted for parodistic ironical purposes, risen from my inkhorn, or passed my lips. Too much evil can hardly be said of
it
: while speech of it at all is necessary.—But finally do you reckon this really a time for Purism of Style; or that Style (mere dictionary style) has much to do with the worth or unworth of a Book? I do not: with whole ragged battallions of Scott’s-Novel Scotch, with Irish, German, French and even Newspaper Cockney (when “Literature” is little other than a Newspaper) storming in on us, and the whole structure of our Johnsonian English breaking up from its foundations,—revolution
there
as visible as anywhere else!

You ask, How it comes that none of the “leading minds” of this country (if one knew where to find them) have given the Clothes-Philosophy any response? Why, my good friend, not one of them has had the happiness of seeing it! It issued thro’ one of the main
cloacas
of Periodical Literature, where no leading mind, I fancy, looks, if he can help it: the poor Book cannot be destroyed by fire or other violence now, but solely by the
general
law of Destiny; and
I
have nothing more to do with it henceforth. How it chanced that no Bookseller would print it (in an epoch when Satan Montgomery runs or seems to run thro’ thirteen editions),
*
and the Morning Papers (on its issuing thro’ the
cloaca)
sang together in mere discord over such a Creation: this truly is a question, but a different one. Meanwhile, do not suppose the poor Book has
not
been responded to; for the historical fact is, I could show very curious response to it here; not ungratifying, and fully three times as much as I counted on, as the wretched farrago itself deserved.

You say finally, as the Key to the whole mystery, that Teufelsdröckh does not believe in a “personal God.” It is frankly said, with a friendly honesty for which I love you. A grave charge nevertheless, an
awful
charge: to which, if I mistake not, the Professor laying his hand on his heart will reply with some gesture expressing the solemnest
denial
. In gesture, rather than in speech; for “the Highest
cannot
be spoken of in words.” “
Personal
,” “impersonal.” One, Three,
what
meaning can any mortal (after all) attach to them in reference to
such
an object?
Wer darf ihn
NENNEN
[Who dares name him]? I dare not, and do not. That you dare and do (to some greater extent) is a matter I am far from taking offence at: nay, with all sincerity, I can rejoice that you have a creed of that kind, which gives you happy thoughts, nerves you for good actions, brings you into readier communion with many good men; my true wish is that such creed may long hold compactly together in you, and be “a covert from the heat, a shelter from the storm, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.” Well is it if we have a printed Litany to pray from; and yet not ill if we
can
pray even in
Silence
, for Silence too is audible
there
. Finally assure yourself I am neither Pagan nor Turk, nor circumcised Jew, but an unfortunate Christian individual resident at Chelsea in
this
year of Grace; neither Pantheist nor Pottheist, nor any Theist or
ist
whatsoever; having the most decided contem[pt] for all manner of System-builders and Sectfounders—as far as contempt may be com[patible] with so mild a nature; feeling well beforehand (taught by long experience) that all such are and even must be
wrong
. By God’s blessing, one has got two eyes to look with; also a mind capable of knowing, of believing: that is all the creed I will at this time insist on. And now may I beg one thing: that wherever in my thoughts or your own you fall on any dogma that tends to estrange you from me, pray believe
that
to be
false;
—false as Beelzebub, till you get clearer evidence.

However, descending from the Empyrean to London pavements, let me tell you that I am actually bestirring myself to try whether the people will give me any employment in this matter of National Education. Mill and some others undertake to help me, but have not reported yet. It is a confused business; out of which darkness is rayed forth on me hitherto. If we fail in it, there is some likelihood I may cross the Atlantic soon.
*
The Book-Trade seems to me
done
here: a man must go where his work lies, where they will keep him in existence for his work.

F
OUR
items were appended to the 1869 edition of
Sartor Resartus
, volume one of the collected Library Edition of Carlyle’s works, of which three are printed here. The first, an ‘Author’s Note’, points out that the second item, ‘Testimonies of Authors’, had previously been included in the first English edition of 1838. They provide, Carlyle wrote to his brother John on 14 July 1838, ‘covertly a history of the poor Manuscript & publication’, embracing ‘the wisest and stupidest, the worst and best, that can be said of it’ (
Collected Letters
, x. 122). The ‘Bookseller’s Taster’, whose note to the publisher John Murray is given verbatim, is the Rev. Henry Hart Milman. ‘Bookseller to Editor’ is a revised version of a letter from Murray to Carlyle, dated by Carlyle 17 September 1831 but apparently written on 6 October (see
Collected Letters
, vi. 6 n. 1). The excerpts from reviews in the
Sun
, a London newspaper, and the
North American Review
, a Boston magazine, are correctly dated; both were published anonymously, but the latter has been attributed to the review’s editor, Alexander H. Everett. The last, and much the most important, of the four ‘Testimonies’ is by Emerson, the ‘New-England Editor’, originally prefaced to the first and second American editions of
Sartor Resartus
, 1836 and 1837.

The third item added by Carlyle to the 1869 edition is a ‘Summary’ of
Sartor Resartus
. Many later editions insert these abstracts at the head of each chapter, making the work less of a prose fiction and more of an argumentative treatise. Carlyle’s index, not included here, is also designed to present
Sartor
as prose of thought and to conceal its fictitiousness.

This questionable little Book was undoubtedly written among the mountain solitudes, in 1831; but, owing to impediments natural and accidental, could not, for seven years more, appear as a Volume in England;—and had at last to clip itself in pieces, and be content to struggle out, bit by bit, in some courageous
Magazine
that offered. Whereby now, to certain idly curious readers, and even to myself till I make study, the insignificant but at last irritating question, What its real history and chronology are, is, if not insoluble, considerably involved in haze.

To the first English Edition, 1838, which an American, or two American had now opened the way for, there was slightingly prefixed, under the title ‘
Testimonies of Authors
,’ some straggle of real documents, which, now that I find it again, sets the matter into clear
light and sequence;—and shall here, for removal of idle stumbling-blocks and nugatory guessings from the path of every reader, be reprinted as it stood. (
Author’s Note, of
1868.)

Taster to Bookseller
.—“The Author of
Teufelsdröckh
is a person of talent; his work displays here and there some felicity of thought and expression, considerable fancy and knowledge: but whether or not it would take with the public seems doubtful. For a
jeu d’esprit
of that kind it is too long; it would have suited better as an essay or article than as a volume. The Author has no great tact; his wit is frequently heavy; and reminds one of the German Baron who took to leaping on tables, and answered that he was learning to be lively.
Is
the work a translation?”

Bookseller to Editor
.—“Allow me to say that such a writer requires only a little more tact to produce a popular as well as an able work. Directly on receiving your permission, I sent your
Ms
. to a gentleman in the highest class of men of letters, and an accomplished German scholar: I now enclose you his opinion, which, you may rely upon it, is a just one; and I have too high an opinion of your good sense to” &
c
. &
c
.—
Ms
. (
penes nos
)
*
London, 17th September
1831.

“Fraser’s Magazine
exhibits the usual brilliancy, and also the” &c.
*
“
Sartor Resartus
is what old Dennis used to call ‘a heap of clotted nonsense,’
*
mixed however, here and there, with passages marked by thought and striking poetic vigour. But what does the writer mean by ‘Baphometic fire-baptism’? Why cannot he lay aside his pedantry, and write so as to make himself generally intelligible? We quote by way of curiosity a sentence from the
Sartor Resartus
; which may be read either backwards or forwards, for it is equally intelligible either way: indeed, by beginning at the tail, and so working up to the head, we think the reader will stand the fairest chance of getting at its meaning: ‘The fire-baptised soul, long so scathed and thunder-riven, here feels its own freedom; which feeling is its Baphometic baptism: the citadel of its whole kingdom it has thus gained by assault, and will keep inexpugnable; outwards from which the remaining dominions, not indeed
without hard battering, will doubtless by degrees be conquered and pacificated.’ Here is a”—
*
…—
Sun Newspaper
, 1
st April
1834.

… “After
*
a careful survey of the whole ground, our belief is that no such persons as Professor Teufelsdröckh or Counsellor Heuschrecke ever existed; that the six paper-bags, with their China-ink inscriptions and multifarious contents, are a mere figment of the brain; that the ‘present Editor’ is the only person who has ever written upon the Philosophy of Clothes; and that the
Sartor Resartus
is the only treatise that has yet appeared upon that subject;—in short, that the whole account of the origin of the work before us, which the supposed Editor relates with so much gravity, and of which we have given a brief abstract, is, in plain English, a
hum
.
*