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Quote by Thomas Carlyle

“The nobleness of silence. The highest melody dwells only in silence,--the sphere melody, the melody of health.”

Quote by Thomas Carlyle

Author

Thomas Carlyle, born on December 4, 1795, and died on February 5, 1881, was a prominent Scottish philosopher, historian, and writer. His works are known for their profound social criticism and unique literary style, which had a significant impact on 19th-century British literature and thought. more

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“Well might the ancients make silence a god; for it is the element of all godhood, infinitude, or transcendental greatness,--at once the source and the ocean wherein all such begins and ends.”

Wells Ends Might Silence Greatness Source Elements Ocean Transcendental

Book:Works

Source: Works

“Alas! while the body stands so broad and brawny, must the soul lie blinded, dwarfed, stupefied, almost annihilated? Alas! this was, too, a breath of God, bestowed in heaven, but on earth never to be unfolded!”

Soul Body Earth Lying Heaven Breaths Broads Alas Blinded

Book:Sartor Resartus

Source: Sartor Resartus

“Wise man was he who counselled that speculation should have free course, and look fearlessly towards all the thirty-two points of the compass, whithersoever and howsoever it listed.”

Men Should Looks Two Courses Wise Should Have Thirty Speculation Compass

Book:The Works of Thomas Carlyle

Source: The Works of Thomas Carlyle

“Speech that leads not to action, still more that hinders it, is a nuisance on the earth.”

Stills Action Earth Speech Hinder Nuisance

Book:The Love Letters of Thomas Carlyle and Jane Welsh

Source: The Love Letters of Thomas Carlyle and Jane Welsh

“A star is beautiful; it affords pleasure, not from what it is to do, or to give, but simply by being what it is. It befits the heavens; it has congruity with the mighty space in which it dwells. It has repose; no force disturbs its eternal peace. It has freedom; no obstruction lies between it and infinity.”

Giving Beautiful Lying Force Heaven Stars Space Pleasure Eternal Infinity Repose Obstruction Eternal Peace

Author:Thomas Carlyle

“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!”

Men Firsts Looks Littles Has Beens Stills Eye Young Courses Stars Space Clear Records Generations Tears Remains Shining Silent Pity Serene Shepherds Noisy Sirius Orion

Author:Thomas Carlyle

“In our wide world there is but one altogether fatal personage, the dunce,--he that speaks irrationally, that sees not, and yet thinks he sees.”

Thinking World Speak Stupidity Wide Dunces

Book:Works

Source: Works

“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.”

May Littles Light Stars Sleep Darkness Sky Return Passing Passings Burning Poison Superstitions Foul Passing Away Straws Racks Draught Chalice Incubus Shunning

Book:The Carlyle Anthology

Source: The Carlyle Anthology

“The true eye for talent presupposes the true reverence for it.”

Eye Talent Reverence

Book:Chartism: Past and Present. By Thomas Carlyle

Source: Chartism: Past and Present. By Thomas Carlyle

“Taste, if it mean anything but a paltry connoisseurship, must mean a general susceptibility to truth and nobleness, a sense to discern, and a heart to love and reverence all beauty, order, goodness, wheresoever, or in whatsoever forms and accompaniments they are to be seen. This surely implies, as its chief condition, not any given external rank or situation, but a finely-gifted mind, purified into harmony with itself, into keenness and justness of vision; above all, kindled into love and generous admiration.”

Source: Critical and miscellaneous essays, collected and republ