This passage should be considered in the light of Emerson's attitude toward Goethe's art and philosophy. He could not understand how Goethe "even in the arms of his mistress at Rome" could study "sculpture and poetry." Nor could he reconcile Goethe's high ideals of "Self-renouncement, Invisible Leader, Powers of Sorrow" with his immorality.25 So in regard to Sartor, Emerson could not understand why Carlyle chose to present the same high ideals in "so defying a diction."

In the midst of his comparison of Goethe and Carlyle, and while he was still debating the value of Sartor Resartus and wrestling with its ideas, Emerson received the reply to his first letter. He could not but be pleased with Carlyle's friendly spirit and rejoice that the memory of their meeting also lingered in his mind. Interested as he might have been in hearing of Carlyle's new life Emerson could not, however, but regret that the Carlyle he was still endeavoring to understand was the Carlyle of London rather than the Carlyle of Craigenputtock. What follows will show how far apart were their thoughts:

I brought a manuscript with me of another curious sort, entitled The Diamond Necklace. Perhaps it will be printed soon as an Article, or even as a separate Booklet,—a queer production, which you shall see. Finally, I am busy, constantly studying with my whole might for a book on the French Revolution. It is part of my creed that the only poetry is History, could we tell it right. This truth (if it prove one) I have not yet got to the limitations of; and shall in no way except by trying it in practice. The story of the Necklace was the first attempt at an experiment.26

We have here an outlook upon life vastly different from that of Richter, and Schiller, and Goethe, and Teufelsdröckh. Carlyle could not know how deeply his American admirer was immersed in all things German and how little his thoughts were turned toward France. It is hard to realize how little Carlyle seemed to care for the enthusiasm of his youth:

From Germany I get letters, messages, and even visits; but now no tidings, no influences, of moment. Goethe's Posthumous Works are all published; and Radicalism (poor hungry, yet inevitable Radicalism) is the order of the day."7

25 Loc. cit.

20 Correspondence, p. 25.

27 Ibid., p. 25.

There was nothing of moment coming from Germany, said Carlyle. Yet had he chosen, with his wide knowledge of German literature and philosophy, he could have interpreted the new Germany of Hegel to Emerson and the Transcendentalists. But he was weary of the subject, and besides had come to see that England was weary of trying to understand German thought. Hegel was for a later day. Not till Darwin had startled England, did men really feel the need of a philosophy that would unify, or reconcile, their conflicting conception of life. So, too, could he have interpreted the French Romantic movement, had he not considered it even worse than Radicalism; for the French movement, beginning with Hugo's Hernani in 1830, was fashioned after the German and early English movements. Nay more, as we shall presently see, Carlyle could have directed personally the growth of the Transcendental movement in America. But all this ferment over Transcendentalism really struck him as "moonshine." His mind was following in the direction of Schiller's devotion to history, and could not resist the appeal of the French Revolution.

Carlyle's antipathy to the things which were of vital interest to Emerson is shown nowhere better than in his criticism of Coleridge in a postscript. "Coleridge," says Carlyle, "as you doubtless hear, is gone. How great a Possibility, how small a realized result! They are delivering Orations about him, and emitting other kinds of froth, ut mos est. What hurt can it do?" He could not have known how dear to Emerson was becoming the "Realized Result" of Coleridge's philosophy and theory of literary criticism.

But Emerson was not to be side-tracked in his effort to master the Transcendental philosophy of Germany and to determine the spirit of German Romance. In his reply to Carlyle's letter, though he evinced interest in his friend's new field of work, he dealt almost entirely with Sartor and Goethe. This brief passage shows how closely he followed the train of thought that appeared in his journal:

Far, far better seems to me the unpopularity of this Philosophical Poem (shall I call it?) than the adulation that followed your eminent friend Goethe. With him I am becoming better acquainted, but mine must be a qualified admiration. It is a singular piece of good-nature in you to apotheosize him. I cannot but regard it as his misfortune, with conspicuous bad influence on his genius,-that velvet life he led. . . . Then the Puritan in me accepts no apology for bad morals in such as he.28

28 Correspondence, p. 29.

Emerson's dislike of Goethe's morals was easily dismissed by Carlyle.29 His advice to study the man was later followed by Emerson, who learned German that he might read Goethe in the original.

But in the same letter Carlyle again wrote at length about his work and his inability to gain recognition in England. He was looking with favor upon Emerson's desire that he come to America. Without any loss of time Emerson dispatched a letter to London. He reviewed Carlyle's work in German literature, and made it clear that the men most worth while in New England were equally as desirous as he that Carlyle seek his fortune in America. With the prospect of finding friends and the assurance of financial independence, especially since these things were so slow in coming to him in England, Carlyle might well have accepted the invitation of the New England Transcendentalists. Had the opportunity come while he was deeply immersed in his work in German literature, surely he could not have refused the cali. It would be interesting to speculate on what he would have meant to America had he come at either time. After all, however, his heart was not now with the Transcendentalists, and an unforseen accident made such a course impossible: the first book of the French Revolution, which he had lent to Mill, had been accidentally burned.

The courage with which Carlyle immediately began to rewrite this book won Emerson's enduring admiration. How vitally Carlyle's energy and hopes were bound up in his work on the French Revolution may be seen when he exclaims in June of 1836:

It is impossible for you to figure what mood I am in. One sole thought, That Book! that weary Book! occupies me continually; wreck and confusion of all kinds go tumbling and falling around me, within me; but to wreck and growth, to confusion and order, to the world at large, I turn a deaf ear; and have life only for this one thing,-which also in general I feel to be one of the pitifulest that ever man set about possessed with. Have compassion for me.30

29

20 Ibid., p. 39. "Your objections to Goethe are very natural, and even bring you nearer to me: nevertheless, I am by no means sure that it were not your wisdom, at this moment, to set about learning the German Language, with a view towards studying him mainly."

3o Correspondence, p. 90.

In spite of the fact that Carlyle had turned "a deaf ear" to the desires of the Transcendentalists for two years, and had shown clearly that his "one sole thought" was his book on the French Revolution, Emerson did not weary of tempting him to come to America. Thinking that Carlyle was sincere in his cry for compassion, Emerson in his letter of September seventeenth once more extended an invitation with the added inducement of giving to his friend "sound eyes, round cheeks, and joyful spirits."

The significance of Emerson's optimism comes out quite forcibly when we consider that with the same letter he sent a copy of Nature. Three days later the Transcendental Club was organized, and at the second meeting in October it was Emerson himselt rather than Carlyle that became the leader and spokesman of the New England Transcendentalists. Yet Emerson, realizing that his friends still yearned to have Carlyle among their number, did not lose hope until the French Revolution was published and he could plainly see that Carlyle had lost all contact with the Transcendental movement.

In dealing with the enthusiasm with which Emerson and his New England friends endeavored to bring Carlyle to America, we have temporarily lost sight of Sartor Resartus. We found that Emerson first encountered the clothes philosophy while reading Jean Paul Friedrich Richter in the fall of 1832. In the fall of 1833 he began reading Sartor in Fraser's Magazine, and in the spring of the following year he wrote to Carlyle primarily to tell him what he thought of the book. By the fall of 1834 he had decided that it was a "philosophical poem." It would be difficult, however, to find in Nature any trace of Carlyle's peculiar method of presenting his philosophy. We must admit that in so far as the book expresses Transcendental philosophy, it does so in the terminology of Kant as interpreted by Coleridge. Emerson's final criticism of Sartor, virtually repeated in the introduction to Dr. Le Baron Russell's American edition in 1836, may be found in Emerson's letter of October 7, 1835. He cannot relinquish "a salutary horror at the German style," even though Doctors of Divinity and the "solemn Review are loud in its praise." Emerson wrote this letter in the same period when he was warmly praising Coleridge as a philosopher and psychologist. and two months later in his journal he leaves no room for doubt as to his attitude toward Carlyle's work as a whole: "Carlyle's

talent, I think, lies more in his beautiful criticism, in seizing the idea of the man or the time, than in original speculation." 31

The conviction that Carlyle was not essentially original, or creative, remained with Emerson. Even in 1850 he exclaims that Carlyle forever repeats the same thing. Emerson on his part was looking for a final book from Carlyle that never came. And Carlyle was forever urging Emerson to come down to earth, to leave the Transcendental "moonshine." The clash was more fundamental than Carlyle was willing to admit even though he once said that essentially there was no clash. The intellectuality that Carlyle disliked in Emerson, or the attempt to be philosophical, was the quality that Emerson wished Carlyle to acquire. The clash was virtually the same that existed between Carlyle and Coleridge, and is an illuminating explanation of the fact that Emerson turned to Coleridge rather than to Carlyle as an interpreter of Transcendental philosophy.

If it be true that it was Carlyle's criticism, rather than his philosophy, which influenced Emerson most, then it must follow that not in the years 1833-36, nor even in the years 1837-47 when he was Carlyle's American editor, but in the years 1830-33 must we look for his real inspiration for Emerson. It was in those years that Emerson needed the sort of inspiration that Carlyle could give him by reason of his earnest work in the lives of the men who were swept along with the tide of Storm and Stress that dominated Germany for ten years. That Emerson gave two years of constant thought to Sartor Resartus and that in those same years he recognized in Carlyle the greatest living force in England cannot be ignored. Still the friendship begun in 1833 and established in 1834 by Emerson's criticism of Sartor had little value in strengthening his Transcendentalism, and we almost come to the conclusion that from this time Carlyle is debtor to Emerson.

Woman's College of Alabama.

31 Journals, Vol. 3, p. 573, December 7, 1835.