Quotessence
Home / Authors / Thomas Carlyle
Thomas Carlyle

Thomas Carlyle Quotes

Philosopher

Filter quotes by topic

AllMenWorldIfsSoulInspirationalLyingHistoryKindBookWorkHeartWholeLittlesMayKnowsDoeEyeLifePersonsWells

Famous Thomas Carlyle Quotes

“The errors of a wise man are literally more instructive than the truths of a fool. The wise man travels in lofty, far-seeing regions; the fool in low-lying, high-fenced lanes; retracing the footsteps of the former, to discover where he diviated, whole provinces of the universe are laid open to us; in the path of the latter, granting even that he has not deviated at all, little is laid open to us but two wheel-ruts and two hedges.”

MenLittlesTwoWholeScienceLyingUniversePathWiseSeeingFoolLowsErrorsFormerWheelsLatterRegionsLanesFootstepsLoftyProvincesRutsTwo Wheels
Book:The Works of Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“A man with a half volition goes backwards and forwards, and makes no way on the smoothest road; a man with a whole volition advances on the roughest, and will reach his purpose, if there be even a little worthiness in it. The man without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder - a waif, a nothing, a no man. Have a purpose in life and having it, throw such strength of mind and muscle into your work as God has given you.”

IfsMenWayMindLittlesWholePurposeGivenHalfAttitudeAchieveHe ManShipsMusclesPurpose Of LifeBackwardsWorthinessStrength Of MindVolitionRudders
Author:Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“With respect to duels, indeed, I have my own ideas. Few things in this so surprising world strike me with more surprise. Two little visual spectra of men, hovering with insecure enough cohesion in the midst of the unfathomable, and to dissolve therein, at any rate, very soon, make pause at the distance of twelve paces asunder; whirl around, and simultaneously by the cunningest mechanism, explode one another into dissolution; and, offhand, become air, and non-extant--the little spitfires!”

MenWorldLittlesTwoIdeasEnoughMy OwnAirDistanceSurpriseRateStrikesVisualsMidstPaceMechanismSurprisingTwelvePausesInsecureDissolutionUnfathomableCohesionHoveringDueling
Book:Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh
Create image

“When I gaze into the stars, they look down upon me with pity from their serene and silent spaces, like eyes glistening with tears over the little lot of man. Thousands of generations, all as noisy as our own, have been swallowed up by time, and there remains no record of them any more. Yet Arcturus and Orion, Sirius and Pleiades, are still shining in their courses, clear and young, as when the shepherd first noted them in the plain of Shinar!”

MenFirstsLooksLittlesHas BeensStillsEyeYoungCoursesStarsSpaceClearRecordsGenerationsTearsRemainsShiningSilentPitySereneShepherdsNoisySiriusOrion
Author:Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“Superstition! that horrid incubus which dwelt in darkness, shunning the light, with all its racks, and poison chalices, and foul sleeping draughts, is passing away without return. Religion cannot pass away. The burning of a little straw may hide the stars of the sky; but the stars are there and will reappear.”

MayLittlesLightStarsSleepDarknessSkyReturnPassingPassingsBurningPoisonSuperstitionsFoulPassing AwayStrawsRacksDraughtChaliceIncubusShunning
Book:The Carlyle Anthology
Create image

“If you will believe me, you who are young, yours is the golden season of life. As you have heard it called, so it verily is, the seed-time of life; in which, if you do not sow, or if you sow tares instead of wheat, you cannot expect to reap well afterwards, and you will arrive at little. And in the course of years when you come to look back, if you have not done what you have heard from your advisers,-and among many counsellors there is wisdom,-you will bitterly repent when it is too late.”

IfsYearsBelieveWellsLooksLittlesDoneYoungCoursesHeardLateTrainingSeasonsSeedsGoldenToo LateBelieve In MeRepentReapWheatAdviserSeasons Of LifeCounsellors
Book:Autobiography of J.S. Mill & on Liberty; Characteristics, Inaugural Address at Edinburgh & Sir Walter Scott
Create image

“But the whim we have of happiness is somewhat thus. By certain valuations, and averages, of our own striking, we come upon some sort of average terrestrial lot; this we fancy belongs to us by nature, and of indefeasible rights. It is simple payment of our wages, of our deserts; requires neither thanks nor complaint. Foolish soul! What act of legislature was there that thou shouldst be happy? A little while ago thou hadst no right to be at all.”

LittlesSoulHappinessCertainSimpleRightsAverageFoolishThanksDesertFancyComplaintsWagesPaymentLegislatureWhimValuation
Author:Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“No sooner does a great man depart, and leave his character as public property, than a crowd of little men rushes towards it. There they are gathered together, blinking up to it with such vision as they have, scanning it from afar, hovering round it this way and that, each cunningly endeavoring, by all arts, to catch some reflex of it in the little mirror of himself.”

MenWayLittlesDoeArtCharacterTogetherVisionMirrorsPropertyRoundsCrowdsGreat MenBiographiesAfarReflexesLittle ManHoveringScanning
Book:Critical and Miscellaneous Essays
Create image

“Except by name, Jean Paul Friedrich Richter is little known out of Germany. The only thing connected with him, we think, that has reached this country is his saying,-imported by Madame de Staël, and thankfully pocketed by most newspaper critics,-"Providence has given to the French the empire of the land; to the English that of the sea; to the Germans that of-the air!" Richter: German humorist & prose writer.”

ThinkingLittlesCountryNamesGivenKnownAirSeaLandCriticsConnectedNewspapersGermanyProseEmpiresProvidenceHumorists
Book:Works
Create image

“We have our little theory on all human and divine things. Poetry, the workings of genius itself, which, in all times, with one or another meaning, has been called Inspiration, and held to be mysterious and inscrutable, is no longer without its scientific exposition. The building of the lofty rhyme is like any other masonry or bricklaying: we have theories of its rise, height, decline and fall -- which latter, it would seem, is now near, among all people.”

PeopleHumansLittlesHas BeensInspirationSeemsFallBuildingDivineTheoryGeniusCriticismMysteriousAll TimeHeightLatterDeclineRhymeLoftyLiterary CriticismMasonryInscrutableBricklaying
Book:The Works of Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“We were wise indeed, could we discern truly the signs of our own time; and by knowledge of its wants and advantages, wisely adjust our own position in it. Let us, instead of gazing idly into the obscure distance, look calmly around us, for a little, on the perplexed scene where we stand. Perhaps, on a more serious inspection, something of its perplexity will disappear, some of its distinctive characters and deeper tendencies more clearly reveal themselves; whereby our own relations to it, our own true aims and endeavors in it, may also become clearer.”

WantLooksMayLittlesCharacterWisePositionSeriousSceneAdvantageRelationAimDistanceDeeperDisappearTendenciesEndeavorObscureDistinctiveGazingInspectionPerplexedPerplexity
Book:The Selected Works of Thomas Carlyle
Create image

“Cherish what is dearest while you have it near you, and wait not till it is far away. Blind and deaf that we are; oh, think, if thou yet love anybody living, wait not till death sweep down the paltry little dust clouds and dissonances of the moment, and all be made at last so mournfully clear and beautiful, when it is too late.”

IfsThinkingLittlesMadeMomentsLastsBeautifulWaitingClearLateBlindCloudsDustToo LateCherishFar AwayDeafDissonance
Author:Thomas Carlyle
Create image