lysis, it was forgotten that
there is a great difference between the description and the explanation
of phenomena. In _Sartor Resartus_ Carlyle rescues science from the grip
of the pedant and restores it to the poet. 'Wonder, is the basis of
Worship; the reign of wonder is perennial, indestructible in Man; only
at certain stages (as the present), it is, for some short season, a
reign _in partibus infidelium_.' That progress of Science, which is to
destroy Wonder, and in its stead substitute Mensuration and Numeration,
finds small favour with Teufelsdroeckh, much as he otherwise venerates
these two latter processes.

'Shall your Science,' exclaims he, 'proceed in the small chink-lighted,
or even oil-lighted, underground workshop of Logic alone; and man's mind
become an Arithmetical Mill, whereof Memory is the Hopper, and mere
Tables of Sines and Tangents, Codification, and Treatises of what you
call Political Economy, are the Meal? And what is that Science, which
the scientific head alone, were it screwed off, and (like the Doctor's
in the Arabian Tale) set in a basin to keep it alive, could prosecute
without shadow of a heart,--but one other of the mechanical and menial
handicrafts, for which the Scientific Head (having a Soul in it) is too
noble an organ? I mean that Thought without Reverence is barren, perhaps
poisonous; at best, dies like Cookery with the day that called it forth;
does not live, like sowing, in successive tilths and wider-spreading
harvests, bringing food and plenteous increase to all Time.'

* * * * *

'The man who cannot wonder, who does not habitually wonder (and
worship), were he President of innumerable Royal Societies, and carried
the whole _Mecanique Celeste_ and _Hegel's Philosophy_, and the epitome
of all Laboratories and Observatories with their results, in his single
head,--is but a pair of Spectacles behind which there is no Eye. Let
those who have Eyes look through him, then he may be useful.'

In the sphere of ethics, Carlyle's influence has been inspirational in
the highest sense. To a generation which had to choose between the
ethics of a conventional theology and the ethics of a cold, prosaic
utilitarianism, Carlyle's treatment of the whole subject of duty came as
a revelation. If in the sphere of social relationships he did not
contribute to the settlement of the theoretic side of complex problems,
he did what was equally important--he roused earnes