Last words of Thomas Carlyle - Warburg Institute

WOTTON EEINFRED 119I bear it, and darkness and desolation are my lot forever.'In this humour, little would have tempted him toturn his horse suddenly ;to snap asunder these newformedties, and, without leave-taking, hurry back tohis native solitudes with blank despondency for hisguide.But shame and a little remnant of hope stillurged him forward :' After all,' said he, ' what have Ito lose ? My integrity is mine, and nothing more.Who fears not death, him no shadow can maketremble ; ' and reciting this latter sentence with astrong low tone in the original words of Euripides,its author, he rode along as if composing his soulby this antique spell into forced and painful rest.In a short while his attention was called outwardsfrom these meditations, for the vaUey he had been ascendingclosed in abruptly on a broad, rugged mountain,stretching like a wall across the whole breadthof the hollow, the high sides of which it irregularlyintersected, forming on both hands a rude course forthe winter torrents, and on the right a path, which suddenlybecame so steepand stony that Wotton judgedit prudent to dismount while climbing it. Arrivedwith some labour at the top, he again found himselfin the western sunlight, which had been hid below,and he paused with the bridle in his hand to wonderover a scene which, whether by its natural character,or from the present temper of his own mind, surpassedin impressiveness all that he had ever looked on.