ight his inspirations. Even more
obviously was the genius of Keats dependent upon his culture. He did not
read Greek, but from translations of Greek literature and from the
direct study of Greek art he got the sort of material that he needed.
And in our own day Morris has been evidently a very diligent student of
many literatures. What I insist upon is, that we could not have had the
real Keats, the real Morris, unless they had prepared themselves by
culture. We see immediately that the work they have done is _their_
work, specially, that they were specially adapted for it--inspired for
it, if you will. But how evident it is that the inspiration could never
have produced the work, or anything like it, without labor in the
accumulation of material!

Now, although men of genius cannot be regularly progressive in actual
production, cannot write so many verses a day, regularly, as you may
spin yarn, they can be very regular as students, and some of the best of
them have been quite remarkable for unflinching steadiness of
application in that way. The great principle recommended by Mr. Galton,
of not looking forward eagerly to the end of your journey, but
interesting yourself chiefly in the progress of it, is as applicable to
the studies of men of genius as to those of more ordinary persons.

LETTER VI.

TO AN ARDENT FRIEND WHO TOOK NO REST.

On some verses of Goethe--Man not constituted like a planet--Matthew
Arnold's poem, "Self-dependence"--Poetry and prose--The wind more
imitable than the stars--The stone in Glen Croe--Rest and be thankful.

"Rambling over the wild moors, with thoughts oftentimes as wild and
dreary as those moors, the young Carlyle, who had been cheered through
his struggling sadness, and strengthened for the part he was to play in
life, by the beauty and the wisdom which Goethe had revealed to him,
suddenly conceived the idea that it would be a pleasant and a fitting
thing if some of the few admirers in England forwarded to Weimar a
trifling token of their admiration. On reaching home Mr. Carlyle at once
sketched the design of a seal to be engraved, the serpent of eternity
encircling a star, with the words _ohne Hast, ohne Rast_ (unhasting,
unresting), in allusion to the well-known verses--

'Wie das Gestirn,
Ohne Hast
Aber ohne Rast
Drehe sich jeder
Um die eigne Last.'

(Like a star, unhasting, unresting, be each one fulfilling his God-given
'hest.')"[10]

This is said