Last words of Thomas Carlyle - Warburg Institute

;92 WOTTON REINFREDobserved Maurice.*Lord Byron was the loudestharper, but not the first or the bestschool.of this arsenicalThe keynote was struck in Goethe's Werther,and Europe has rung ever since with the tune and itsvariations.'' It is the want of the age,' said Wotton. *Thousandson thousands feel as Byron felt ; and hispassionate voicing of emotions hithertoshapeless andcrushing with a force vague and invisible was a reliefto the heart that could not speak them. He was aspirit of Heaven, though cast down into the abyssand hissong, like that singing of the fallen seraphs,was partial, but the harmony(What could it less when Spirits immortal sing ?)Suspended Hell, and took with ravishmentThe thronging audience.''An apt enough allusion,' said Maurice, * for the unbeliefof men, their sickly sensitiveness and vociferouscraving for enjoyment, have made the world a sort ofhell for every noble nature that is not delivered from thebaleful greed of the day. Our longing is towards theInfinite and Invisible : but for these our time has nosymbol ; nay, rather it denies their existence ; substitutingin their stead the shadows and reflections of amerely sensual and mechanic philosophy ; and thusthe highest faculties of the spirit are shut up in painfuldurance, or directed into false activity ; thoughtcannot be converted into deed ; what should havebeen worship and blessing becomes idolatry and