The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1866-05-09
Thomas Carlyle in a New Sphere
The Eloquenoe Of Silence.


has been elected Lord Rector of the Uni
versity of Edinburgh; like all good Lord
Rectos, Mr.. Thomas Carlyle on his inau-
guration made speech 'and like every
thing that emanates from that remarkable
man Mr.. Thomas Carlyle's speech has ere
ated quite a sensation
We know no more appropriate place for
a man Of letters to- spend the evening fof
his days than within the classic walls of
the literary institution where he first re-
ceived his mental training. After a bril-
liant career as jurist, statesman, crater and
Aterateur Lord Macaulay accepted the
Lord Rectorship of the University Of Glas-
gov, and reflected upon that time-honored
institution the brilliant efulgence of his
setting genius. So now Mr.. Carlyle is
called to the head of the Sister University
of Edinburgh, ffty-six years after he enter
ed its walls as an ambitious young student
near the close of life whose literary
achievements alone would immortalize any
institution to which he should owe his in
tellectual culture.
The difference between the train of
thought which these two great men follow
ed in their inaugural addresses is somewhat
remarkable. lord Macaulay, as we remem-
Der his eloquent address, entered into a
history of universities, and discussed upon
the value of those seninaries where young
men arc taught ito get themselves under
stood by means of articulate speech" Mr.
Carlyle, ON the contrary, comes before the
rising generation with eulogy on silence,
and bids them, for the sake Of all things
sacred, to refrain from "going away into
wind and tongue" This worshipper at
the shrine of silence, with the ink scarcely
dry on the pen which so forcibly denounc-
ed "ParliamentS D and the "Stump Ora
tor" actually makes a speech and, more
than all, with his excavations of the
"ready writer and "extempore speaker
fresh in the memory Of all, he makes an
extempore speech. We very much fear
that our silent philosopher is about to go
away into wind and tongue" and that he
is OIL the eve of joining "grand palavcr of
all nations" along with Anacharses Clootz,
{ orator of the human race and others Of
the most approved derotees Of wind and
tongue, and loquacity.
Mr.. Carlyle is as fond Of his hobby horse
as most men. Now it happens that, not
withstanding the sensation this speech has
produced, as if its sentiments were abso-
lutely new, the ideas contained in it are
simply those which its author has time and
again hammered out aud scattered through
his yoluminous productions. The praise
of Silence is his fayorite hobby. Many
years ago he wrote, "witness the strong
oak ia the forest; silently was its seed
waited On the wings Of the wind and it
was planted in silence; it has grown in
silence for a thousand years, it uttered no
poicesuntili ii FELL" He has ever labored
to prove that all force, all power, every
thing that is great and glorious in this
world, is the offspring Of silence; while
articulate speech was given to man only
to herald his ruin and downfall. Hence
his contempt of oratory, of parliaments,
and las he processes now Of literature in
general, which keep men from doing any
thing, and run them away into wind and
tongue.
And here we must admit that there is
much plausibihty in Mr.. Carlyle's theory,
if we pay attention to the examples which
he lays before us to prove the banefulness
Of too much speaking. He says that I" the
finest nations in the world-the English
and the American-are going all away into
wind and tongue" If Mr.. Carlyle has
discovered that the English and the Amer
lean are the finest nations in the world, we
must set this opinion down as one of his
/" changes" Of which eur contemporary, the
New Orleans Times, speaks. Not many
years ago he spoke Of the Americans as "a
nation of the greatest bores on Earth" and
said that Great Britain contained twenty
seven millions mostly fools" We should
like to know the precise time when the
English and the Americans changed their
nature, and the causes which brought about
such change. Was it the barbarsm Of
the English in India, and the exploits Of
/" the best government in the world in the
late war against legitimate government p
If We were anti Carlylian, which we are not,
we might be spiteful enough to suggest
that these two nations became the finest in
the world, simply because they went of
into wind and tongue; or because they
have been accustomed of late to shoot the
biggest kind of guns at their brethren a
species of amusement which Mr.. Carlyle
has condemned us decidedly as he condemns
the consumption of life in windand tongue.
But we presume that no one at this day
will question the truth of his remark that
the English aud the Americans are going