nd since his death it has been reprinted in a
sixpenny form; it has penetrated far and wide through all classes, and
it is now, I suppose, one of the most popular and most influential of
the books that were published in England in the second quarter of the
century.

Such a contrast between the first reception and the later judgment of
a book is very remarkable, and it applies more or less to all
Carlyle's earlier writings. It is a memorable fact in the literary
history of the nineteenth century that one of the greatest and most
industrious writers in England lived for many years in such poverty
that he often thought of abandoning literature and emigrating to the
colonies, and he would probably have done so if he had not found in
public lecturing a means of supplying his frugal wants. The cause of
this long-continued neglect is partly, no doubt, to be found in his
style, for, like Browning, Carlyle wrote an English which was so
contorted and sometimes so obscure that his readers had to be slowly
educated into understanding, or at least enjoying, it. But there are
other and deeper causes which I propose to devote the short time at my
disposal to indicating.

It has been truly said that there are two great classes among writers.
There are those who are echoes and there are those who are voices.
There are some writers who represent faithfully and express strongly
the dominant tendencies, opinions, habits, characteristics of their
age, collecting as in a focus the half-formed thoughts that are
prevailing around them, giving them an articulate voice, and by the
force of their advocacy greatly strengthening them. There are others
who either start new ways of thinking for which the public around
them are still unprepared, or who throw themselves in opposition to
the dominant tendencies of their times, pointing out the evils and
dangers connected with them, and dwelling specially on neglected
truths. It is not surprising that the first class are by far the most
popular. The public is much like Narcissus in the fable, who fell in
love with his own reflection in the water. All men like to find their
own opinions expressed with a power and eloquence they cannot
themselves attain, and most men dislike a writer who, in the first
flush of a great enthusiasm, points out all that can be said on the
other side. But when the first enthusiasm is over--when the prevailing
tendency has fully triumphed and the evils and defects connected wi