what cannot be investigated and understood mechanically, cannot be investigated and understood at all.
With our reliance upon the mechanical and mechanisms of of society and philosophical thinking we permanently destroy our ability to think for ourselves.
Science and Art have, from first to last, been the free gift of Nature; an unsolicited, unexpected gift; often even a fatal one
Science and Art tied up with ideas of nature and divine inspiration; the opposite of mechanical.
Our English Revolution too originated in Religion.
Reference to movement from Catholic monarchy to brief republic to Protestant monarchy.He argues that this move was devoid of capitalistic interest. One of the last instances of morality over money.
How did Christianity arise and spread abroad among men? Was it by institutions, and establishments and well-arranged systems of mechanism?
Carlyle believes religion to be wholly personal and self-perpetuating. As stated by the others, this whole statement is a bit of a stretch.
Preachers and Teachers who should give a voice to Poetry, Religion and Morality,
Literature should have a moral, didactic element. Possibly another resistance to Gothic literature.
a wise prudential feeling grounded on mere calculation; a matter, as all others now are, of Expediency and Utilit
Capitalism and Utilitarianism taking over religion.
Self-denial, the parent of all virtue,
Very Calvinist.
We praise a work, not as "true," but as "strong"; our highest praise is that it has "affected" us, has "terrified" us.
A comment on Gothic fiction, Carlyle thinks it is sensationalist and superficial.To carry on in this vein would be to become uncivilized.
Men are to be guided only by their self-interests.
Carlyle doubting the validity of a government influenced by its citizens as with burgeoning commodification/capitalism these citizens are more likely to make changes that benefit themselves and forget the bigger picture, whether that is morality, Christianity or patriotism.
we are but fettered by chains of our own forging, and which ourselves also can rend asunder.
Lee Yoon Sun tells us that this line is Carlyle refuting the legitimacy of governing bodies, what he calls 'radical scrutiny'. Could this also have a more conservative message about free will and agency over one's own fortune?