Last words of Thomas Carlyle - Warburg Institute

WOTTON REINFRED 29loved by it was no less delightful to the other, for ifhe, as it were, protected Wotton, he also admired, nay,almost feared, him ; and, feeling his own superiorityin strength and good fortune, he often felt that innobleness and merit theother side.balance might sway on theThus their friendship rested on the surest basis,that of mutual satisfaction and sympathy ; on theone hand and on the other good offices or good wishes,pleasure given and received. In their intellectualdiscussions, widely as they differed, they by no chancequarrelled ; indeed, except in private they almostnever argued. In society, where, except in the companyand by the persuasion of his friend, Wottonscarcely ever ventured, you generally found them ona side :Bernard supporting the good and beautiful invehement, flowing, rhetorical pleadings ; Wotton, inbitter sarcasms and with keenest intellect, demolishingthe false and despicable, and this,often in the dialectof his hearers, if no better might be, to whom hejustly enough apprehended his own would manytimes have been a stone of stumbling. By suchhjjf displays of his inward nature, poor Wotton'spopularity was seldom increased.Bernard was confessedlya man of parts,' by whom it might seem lessdisgraceful to be tutored ;but who was this Wotton,this sharp, scornful stripling, whom no one meddledwith unpunished ? By degrees, indeed, lie establishedfor himself a character of talent, the more wondered