# The Works of Thomas Carlyle/Volume 6

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CENTENARY EDITION
THE WORKS OF
THOMAS CARLYLE
IN THIRTY VOLUMES
VOL. VI
CROMWELL’S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
I
THOMAS CARLYLE
OLIVER CROMWELL’S
LETTERS AND SPEECHES
WITH ELUCIDATIONS
IN FOUR VOLUMES VOLUME 1
LONDON
CHAPMAN AND HALL
LIMITED
Originally published 1845
Printed in Great Britain by T. and A. Constable Ltd. at the University Press, Edinburgh
The First Edition of this Work having, contrary to expectation, spread itself abroad with some degree of impetus, has, as in that case was partly natural, brought me into correspondence with various possessors and collectors of Cromwell Letters; has brought obliging contributions, and indications true and fallacious, from far sources and from near; and, on the whole, has disinterred from their widespread slumber a variety of Letters not before known to me, or not before remembered by me. With which new Letters it became a rather complex question what was now to be done.
They were not, in general, of much, or almost of any intrinsic importance; might here and there have saved some ugly labour and research, had they been known in time; but did not now, as it turned out, tend to modify, in any essential particular, what had already been set down, and sent forth to the world as a kind of continuous connected Book. It is true, all clearly authentic Letters of Cromwell, never so unimportant, do claim to be preserved; and in this Book, by the title of it, are naturally to be looked for. But, on the other hand, how introduce them now? To unhoop your cask again, and try to insert new staves, when the old staves, better or worse, do already hang together, is what no cooper will recommend! Not to say, that your Set of Cromwell Letters can never, in this Second or in any other Edition, be considered as complete: an uncounted handful of needles to be picked from an unmeasured continent of hay,—how can you ever assure yourself that you have them all?
After deliberation, the law of the case seemed to be somewhat as follows: First, that whatever Letters would easily fit ​themselves into the Book as it stood,—easily, or even with labour if that were all,—should be duly admitted. Secondly, that for such Letters as tended to bring into better relief any feature of the Man or his Work,—much more, had they tended to correct or alter in any respect any feature I had assigned to him or to it: that for these an effort should be made, if needful; even a considerable effort; effort, in fact, to be limited only by this consideration. Not to damage by it to a still greater degree the already extant, and so by one’s effort accomplish only loss. Thirdly, that for such Cromwell Letters as did not fall under either of these descriptions, but were nevertheless clearly of his composition, there should be an Appendix provided. In which, without pretension to commentary, and not needing to be read along with the Text, but only apart from it if at all, they might at least stand correctly printed:—they, and certain other Pieces of more doubtful claim; for most part Letters too, but of half, or in some cases of wholly, official character;—if by chance they were elucidative, brief, and not easily attainable elsewhere. Into which Appendix also, as into a loose back-room or lumber-room, not bound to be organic or habitable, bound only to be maintained in a reasonably swept condition, any still new Letters of Cromwell might without ceremony be disposed.
T. CARLYLE.
London, 11th May 1846.
TO THE THIRD EDITION
The small leakage of new Cromwell matter that has oozed in upon me from the whole world, since the date of that Second Edition, has been disposed of according to the principles there laid down. Some small half-dozen of Authentic new Letters, pleasantly enough testifying (once they were cleared into legibility) how every new fact fits into perfect preëstablished correspondence with all old facts, but not otherwise either pleasant or important, have come to me; one or two of these, claiming more favour, or offering more facility, have been inserted into the Text; the rest, as was my bargain in regard to all of them, have been sent to the Appendix. In Text or Appendix there they stand, duly in their places; they, and what other smallest of authentic glimmerings of additional light (few in number, infinitesimally small in moment) came to me from any quarter: all new acquisitions have been punctually inserted;—generally indicated as new, where they occur; too insignificant for enumerating here, or indeed almost for indicating at all.
On the whole, I have to say that the new Contributions to this Third Edition are altogether slight and insignificant, properly of no real moment whatever. Nay, on looking back, it may be said that the new Contributions to any Edition have been slight; that, for learning intelligibly what the Life of Cromwell was, the First Edition is still perhaps as recommendable a Book as either of its followers. Exposed, since that, to the influx of new Cromwell matter from all the world, one finds it worth observing how little of the smallest real importance has come in; what of effort has had to expend itself not in ​improving the Book as a practical Representation of Cromwell’s Existence in this world, but in hindering it from being injured as such,—from being swollen out of shape by superfluous details, defaced with dilettante antiquarianisms, nugatory tagrags; and, in short, turned away from its real uses, instead of furthered towards them. An ungrateful kind of effort, and growing ever more so, the longer it lasts;—but one to which the Biographer of Cromwell by this method has to submit, as to a clear law of nature, with what cheerfulness he can.
Certain Dictionary Lists, not immediately connected with Oliver, but useful for students of this Historical Period, a List of the Long Parliament, and Lists of the Association Committees; farther a certain Contribution called The Squire Papers, which is for the present, and must for a long time remain, of doubtful authenticity to the world: these I have subjoined to the Second Volume, which offered space for such a purpose; but have been careful, in Text, Appendix, Index, to make no reference to them, to maintain a perfect separation between all parts of the Book and them, and to signify that these are not even an Appendix, or thing hooked-on, but rather a mere Adjacency, or thing in some kind of contact,—kind of contact which can at any moment be completely dissolved, by the very Bookbinder if he so please.
And in general, for the reader’s sake, let me again say plainly that all these Appendixes and Adjuncts are insignificant; that the Life of Cromwell lies in the Text; and that a serious reader, if he take advice of mine, will not readily stir from that on any call of the Appendixes etc., which can only be a call towards things unessential, intrinsically superfluous, if extrinsically necessary here, and worthy only of a later and more cursory attention, if of any whatever, from him.
T. C.
London, 16th October 1849.
* ↑ December 1845.
* ↑ The Lists will be given at the end of the Third Volume in the present Edition; the Squire Papers are adjoined to the Second Volume.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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