And content with all this, let detractors repeat—
As with angry persistence they do—
That my claim to the homage I p’r’aps might complete
Were I only an Englishman too.
Let them rave—I am great; let them sneer—I am good;
And they vex not the happy condition
Of statesmen who, taking to chopping of wood,
Have abandoned the paths of ambition.
Carlyle as a Masquerader
He was a masquerader of great ability and still greater erudition. If we read his works with careful scrutiny we find nothing new in them except his odd and barbarous way of expressing his ideas. His originality is in his language, which is a miserable model, affording the reader no improved forms of expression. He assumed the character of a censor; but he told the public no new truths, and sought to keep alive the public interest in his writings by his savage personalities. He seems to have masqueraded in the character of Dr. Johnson; but he could not come up to his original except in what was offensive. If he was a smasher of idols, he immediately set them up again for men’s worship after he had cemented the pieces together in ridiculous shapes.