Interesting shift in tone in this section. He seems to be saying that despite the fact that society has recently become preoccupied machines, sciences etc, it will nevertheless continue to grow and improve - faith in human nature?

several mythological references throughout - contrast between the old world and the new.

Sacramental Test Act 1828. The Sacramental Test Act 1828 (9 Geo. IV, c. 17) was an Act passed by the British Parliament. It repealed the requirement that government officials take communion in the Church of England. The laws discriminated against Catholics and Protestants of other denominations, preventing the Irish and members of the Church of Scotland from working in England.

Birmingham fire-king: Birmingham as a 'king' - was known as "the workshop of the world", a national hub for commercial trade of goods.

Mentioning of fire - alludes to industrialism but also the process of a danger spreading quickly.

From this Carlyle introduces his fear of the the growing mechanized culture in Britain spreading to other nations with references to 'the fabulous East' countries that were not yet exposed to industrialisation and therefore not morally corrupt

Mentioning of Lancashire twice - became known as the center of the cotton industry which grew to be one of the most central exports of the British economy.

Carlyle asserts that the Victorians pursued education through mechanical instruction (monitors, maps and emblems) - discounting 'the old natural methods' of the human mind as a source of knowledge in itself. Society has become controlled by the industrial age losing all sense of individual human spirit.