On the Choice of Books

"Chelsea, 16th June, 1868.

"DEAR STIRLING,—

"You well know how reluctant I have been to interfere at all in the election now close on us, and that in stating, as bound, what my own clear knowledge of your qualities was, I have strictly held by that, and abstained from more. But the news I now have from Edinburgh is of such a complexion, so dubious, and so surprising to me; and I now find I shall privately have so much regret in a certain event—which seems to be reckoned possible, and to depend on one gentleman of the seven—that, to secure my own conscience in the matter, a few plainer words seem needful. To whatever I have said of you already, therefore, I now volunteer to add, that I think you not only the one man in Britain capable of bringing Metaphysical Philosophy, in the ultimate, German or European, and highest actual form of it, distinctly home to the understanding of British men who wish to understand it, but that I notice in you farther, on the moral side, a sound strength of intellectual discernment, a noble valour and reverence of mind, which seems to me to mark you out as the man capable of doing us the highest service in Ethical science too: that of restoring, or decisively beginning to restore, the doctrine of morals to what I must ever reckon its one true and everlasting basis (namely, the divine or supra-sensual one), and thus of victoriously reconciling and rendering identical the latest dictates of modern science with the earliest dawnings of wisdom among the race of men.

"This is truly my opinion, and how important to me, not for the sake of Edinburgh University alone, but of the whole world for ages to come, I need not say to you! I have not the honour of any personal acquaintance with Mr. Adam Black, late member for Edinburgh, but for fifty years back have known him, in the distance, and by current and credible report, as a man of solid sense, independence, probity, and public spirit; and if, in your better knowledge of the circumstances, you judge it suitable to read this note to him—to him, or indeed to any other person—you are perfectly at liberty to do so.

"Yours sincerely always,

"T. CARLYLE."

FAREWELL LETTER TO THE STUDENTS

Mr. Carlyle, ex-Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh, being asked before the expiration of his term of office, to deliver a valedictory address to the students, he sent the following letter to Mr. Robertson, Vice-President of the Committee for his election:—

"Chelsea, December 6, 1868.

"DEAR SIR,—

"I much regret that a valedictory speech from me, in present circumstances, is a thing I must not think of. Be pleased to advise the young gentlemen who were so friendly towards me that I have already sent them, in silence, but with emotions deep enough, perhaps too deep, my loving farewell, and that ingratitude or want of regard is by no means among the causes that keep me absent. With a fine youthful enthusiasm, beautiful to look upon, they bestowed on me that bit of honour, loyally all they had; and it has now, for reasons one and another, become touchingly memorable to me—touchingly, and even grandly and tragically—never to be forgotten for the remainder of my life. Bid them, in my name, if they still love me, fight the good fight, and quit themselves like men in the warfare to which they are as if conscript and consecrated, and which lies ahead. Tell them to consult the eternal oracles (not yet inaudible, nor ever to become so, when worthily inquired of); and to disregard, nearly altogether, in comparison, the temporary noises, menacings, and deliriums. May they love wisdom, as wisdom, if she is to yield her treasures, must be loved, piously, valiantly, humbly, beyond life itself, or the prizes of life, with all one's heart and all one's soul. In that case (I will say again), and not in any other case, it shall be well with them.

"Adieu, my young friends, a long adieu, yours with great sincerity,

"T. CARLYLE"

BEQUEST BY MR. CARLYLE

At a meeting of the Senatus Academicus of Edinburgh University, a few weeks after his decease, a deed of mortification by Thomas Carlyle in favour of that body, for the foundation of ten Bursaries in the Faculty of Arts, was read. The document opens as follows:—

"I, Thomas Carlyle, residing at Chelsea, presently Rector in the University of Edinburgh, from the love, favour and affection which I bear to that University, and from my interest in the advancement of education in my native Scotland, as elsewhere, for these and for other more peculiar reasons, which also I wish to record, do intend, and am now in the act of making to the said University, a bequest, as underwritten, of the estate of Craigenputtoch, which is now my property. Craigenputtoch lies at the head of the parish of Dunscore, in Nithsdale, Dumfriesshire. The extent is of about 1,800 acres; rental at present, on lease of nineteen years, is £250; the annual worth, with the improvements now in progress, is probably £300. Craigenputtoch was for many generations the patrimony of a family named Welsh, the eldest son usually a 'John Welsh,' in series going back, think some, to the famous John Welsh, son-in-law of the reformer Knox. The last male heir of the family was John Welsh, Esq., surgeon, Haddington. His one child and heiress was my late dear, magnanimous, much-loving, and, to me, inestimable wife, in memory of whom, and of her constant nobleness and piety towards him and towards me, I am now—she having been the last of her kindred—about to bequeath to Edinburgh University with whatever piety is in me this Craigenputtoch, which was theirs and hers, on the terms, and for the purposes, and under the conditions underwritten. Therefore I do mortify and dispose to and in favour of the said University of Edinburgh, for the foundation and endowment of ten equal Bursaries, to be called the 'John Welsh Bursaries,' in the said University, heritably and irredeemably, all and whole the lands of Upper Craigenputtoch. The said estate is not to be sold, but to be kept and administered as land, the net annual revenue of it to be divided into ten equal Bursaries, to be called, as aforesaid, the 'John Welsh Bursaries.' The Senatus Academicus shall bestow them on the ten applicants entering the University who, on strict and thorough examination and open competitive trial by examiners whom the Senatus will appoint for that end, are judged to show the best attainment of actual proficiency and the best likelihood of more in the department or faculty called of arts, as taught there. Examiners to be actual professors in said faculty, the fittest whom the Senatus can select, with fit assessors or coadjutors and witnesses, if the Senatus see good, and always the report of the said examiners to be minuted and signed, and to govern the appointments made, and to be recorded therewith. More specially I appoint that five of the 'John Welsh Bursaries' shall be given for the best proficiency in mathematics—I would rather say 'in mathesis,' if that were a thing to be judged of from competition—but practically above all in pure geometry, such being perennial, the symptom not only of steady application, but of a clear, methodic intellect, and offering in all epochs good promise for all manner of arts and pursuits. The other five Bursaries I appoint to depend (for the present and indefinitely onwards) on proficiency in classical learning, that is to say, in knowledge of Latin, Greek, and English, all of these, or any two of them. This also gives good promise of a young mind, but as I do not feel certain that it gives perennially or will perennially be thought in universities to give the best promise, I am willing that the Senatus of the University, in case of a change of its opinion on this point hereafter in the course of generations, shall bestow these latter five Bursaries on what it does then consider the most excellent proficiency in matters classical, or the best proof of a classical mind, which directs its own highest effort towards teaching and diffusing in the new generations that will come. The Bursaries to be open to free competition of all who come to study in Edinburgh University, and who have never been of any other University, the competition to be held on or directly before or after their first matriculation there. Bursaries to be always given on solemnly strict and faithful trial to the worthiest, or if (what in justice can never happen, though it illustrates my intention) the claims of two were absolutely equal, and could not be settled by further trial, preference is to fall in favour of the more unrecommended and unfriended under penalties graver than I, or any highest mortal, can pretend to impose, but which I can never doubt—as the law of eternal justice, inexorably valid, whether noticed or unnoticed, pervades all corners of space and of time—are very sure to be punctually exacted if incurred. This is to be the perpetual rule for the Senatus in deciding."

After stating some other conditions, the document thus concludes:

"And so may a little trace of help to the young heroic soul struggling for what is highest spring from this poor arrangement and bequest. May it run for ever, if it can, as a thread of pure water from the Scottish rocks, trickling into its little basin by the thirsty wayside for those to whom it veritably belongs. Amen. Such is my bequest to Edinburgh University. In witness whereof these presents, written upon this and the two preceding pages by James Steven Burns, clerk to John Cook, writer to the signet, are subscribed by me at Chelsea, the 20th day of June, 1867, before these witnesses: John Forster, barrister-at-law, man of letters, etc., residing at Palace-gate House, Kensington, London; and James Anthony Froude, man of letters, residing at No. 5, Onslow Gardens, Brompton, London.

"(Signed) T. CARLYLE.

"JOHN FORSTER,}

"J.A. FROUDE, } Witnesses.

notes

1

James Carlyle was born in August, 1758, and died January 23, 1832. His second wife (whose maiden name was Margaret Aitken), was born in September, 1771, and died on Christmas Day, 1853. There were nine children of this marriage, "whereof four sons and three daughters," says the inscription en the tombstone in the burial-ground at Ecclefechan, "survived, gratefully reverent of such a father and such a mother."

2

Vols. XIV. to XVI. The fourteenth volume bears at the end the imprint, "Edinburgh, printed by Balfour and Clarke, 1820;" and the sixteenth volume, "Printed by A. Balfour and Co., Edinburgh, 1823." Most of these articles are distinguished by the initials "T.C."; but they are all attributed to Carlyle in the List of the Authors of the Principal Articles, prefixed to the work on its completion.

3

"In the earliest authorship of Mr. Carlyle," says Mr. James Russell Lowell, alluding to these papers, "we find some not obscure hints of the future man. The outward fashion of them is that of the period; but they are distinguished by a certain security of judgment, remarkable at any time, remarkable especially in one so young. Carlyle, in these first essays, already shows the influence of his master Goethe, the most widely receptive of critics. In a compact notice of Montaigne there is not a word as to his religious scepticism. The character is looked at purely from its human and literary sides."

4

"Elements of Geometry and Trigonometry," with Notes. Translated from the French of A.M. Legendre. Edited by David Brewster, LL.D. With Notes and Additions, and an Introductory Chapter on Proportion. Edinburgh: published by Oliver and Boyd; and G. and W.B. Whittaker, London. 1824, pp. xvi., 367. Sir David Brewster's Preface, in which he speaks of "an Introduction on Proportion, by the Translator," is dated Edinburgh, August 1, 1822.

5

Reminiscences by Thomas Carlyle, Edited by James Anthony Froude. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1881, Vol. 1., pp. 198-199.

6

Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship. 3 Vols., Edinburgh, 1824.

7

Curiously enough in the very numbers of the "London Magazine" containing the later instalments of Carlyle's Life of Schiller.

8

Her father had been dead some seven years when Carlyle and she were married, and the life interest of her inheritance in the farm of Craigenputtoch had been made over to her mother, who survived until 1842, when it reverted to Carlyle.

9

"English Traits," by R.W. Emerson. First Visit to England.

10

From "The Correspondence of Leigh Hunt," edited by his eldest son. London: Smith, Elder and Co. 1862. Vol. 1., p. 321.

11

"A New Spirit of the Age," by R.H. Home. London, 1844. Vol. . p. 278.

12

July, 1862.

13

"Autobiography of Leigh Hunt, with Reminiscences of friends and Contemporaries." (Lond. 1850.)

14

"Two Hundred and Fifty Years Ago. From a waste paper bag of T. Carlyle." Reprinted in Carlyle's Miscellanies, Ed. 1857.