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At length, after infinite effort, the two parties come into actual juxtaposition; and Thirty stands fronting Thirty, each with a gun in his hand. Straightway the word “Fire!” is given: and they blow the souls out of one another; and in place of sixty brisk useful craftsmen, the world has sixty dead carcasses, which it must bury, and anew shed tears for. Had these men any quarrel? Busy as the Devil is, not the smallest! They lived far enough apart; were the entirest strangers; nay, in so wide a Universe, there was even, unconsciously, by Commerce, some mutual helpfulness between them. How then? Simpleton! their Governors had fallen-out; and, instead of shooting one another, had the cunning to make these poor blockheads shoot.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Sartor Resartus, Book 2, ch. 8 (1834)

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-07-02 · 21:31 UTC

A quotation from Carlyle

“Genius” (which means transcendent capacity of taking trouble, first of all).

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
History of Friedrich II of Prussia, called Frederick the Great, Book 4, ch. 3 (1858–1865)

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-06-25 · 23:00 UTC

A quotation from Carlyle

So here hath been dawning
Another blue Day:
Think wilt thou let it
Slip useless away.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Poem (1837-08), “Today,” st. 1

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-06-04 · 19:34 UTC

A quotation from Thomas Carlyle

The Public is an old woman. Let her maunder and mumble.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Letter (1837-06-09) to John Sterling

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-05-22 · 14:38 UTC

A quotation from Carlyle

Beware of speaking. Speech is human, Silence is divine: yet also brutish and dead; therefore we must learn both arts, they are both difficult.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Notebook (1830-10)

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-05-14 · 16:25 UTC

A quotation from Thomas Carlyle

The weakest living creature, by concentrating his powers on a single object, can accomplish something: the strongest, by dispensing his over many, may fail to accomplish anything. The drop, by continually falling, bores its passage through the hardest rock; the hasty torrent rushes over it with hideous uproar, and leaves no trace behind.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
The Life of Friedrich Schiller, Part 2 (1825)

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-05-07 · 20:50 UTC

A quotation from Thomas Carlyle

If Jesus Christ were to come today, people would not even crucify Him. They would ask Him to dinner, and hear what He had to say, and make fun of it.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Remark (1850-01-12)

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-04-30 · 18:46 UTC

A quotation from Carlyle

The last quality, perseverance, I particularly respect: it is the very hinge of all virtues. — On looking over the world, the cause of nine parts in ten of the lamentable failures which occur in men’s undertakings & darken and degrade so much of their history, lies not in the want of talents or the will to use them, but in the vacillating and desultory mode of using them — in flying from object to object, in starting away at each little disgust, and thus applying the force which might conquer any one difficulty to a series of difficulties so large that no human force can conquer them.
The smallest brook on earth, by continual running, has hollowed out for itself a considerable valley to flow in: the wildest tempest, by its occasional raging, over-turns a few cottages, uproots a few trees, and leaves after a short space no mark behind it. Commend me therefore to the Dutch virtue of perseverance! Without it all the rest are little better than fairy gold, which glitters in your purse, but when taken to the market proves to be — slate or cinders.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Letter (1822-03-15) to John Carlyle

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WIST Quotations @[email protected] · 2026-02-26 · 19:13 UTC

A quotation from Thomas Carlyle

Is not every true Reformer, by the nature of him, a Priest first of all? He appeals to Heaven’s invisible justice against Earth’s visible force; knows that it, the invisible, is strong and alone strong. He is a believer in the divine truth of things; a seer, seeing through the shows of things; a worshiper, in one way or the other, of the divine truth of things; a Priest, that is. If he be not first a Priest, he will never be good for much as a Reformer.

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) Scottish essayist and historian
Lecture (1840-05-15), “The Hero as Priest,” Home House, Portman Square, London

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