The Present Time

Studies in Reaction

by Thomas Carlyle

In The Present Time, Carlyle takes aim at modernity. This essay was, even in its time, seen as so blistering that the Southern Literary Messenger described its contents as "purely monstrous, and the most elaborate argument would not place their monstrosity more clearly before the reader, than the simple enunciation of them." We present it here with another of Carlyle's essays.

Carlyle influenced not only fascism but socialism, and in The Modern Worker he grants the worker his essential nobility and savagely critiques laissez-faire economics. He folds his anti-capitalism into the critique of modernity given in The Present Time
As Carlyle is known for coinages and obscure references, this volume offers a comprehensive glossary of terms. For many readers, this will be the first time they have fully grasped this titanic intellect.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, History, Politics

153 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 1, 1850

About the author

Thomas Carlyle, Scottish historian, critic, and sociological writer. was born in the village of Ecclefechan, Dumfriesshire, eldest child of James Carlyle, stonemason, and Margaret (Aitken) Carlyle. The father was stern, irascible, a puritan of the puritans, but withal a man of rigid probity and strength of character. The mother, too, was of the Scottish earth, and Thomas' education was begun at home by both the parents. From the age of five to nine he was at the village school; from nine to fourteen at Annan Grammar School. where he showed proficiency in mathematics and was well grounded in French and Latin. In November 1809 he walked to Edinburgh, and attended courses at the University till 1814, with the ultimate aim of becoming a minister. He left without a degree, became a mathematical tutor at Annan Academy in 1814, and three years later abandoned all thoughts of entering the Kirk, having reached a theological position incompatible with its teachings. He had begun to learn German in Edinburgh, and had done much independent reading outside the regular curriculum. Late in 1816 he moved to a school in Kirkcaldy, where he became the intimate associate of Edward Irving, an old boy of Annan School, and now also a schoolmaster. This contact was Carlyle's first experience of true intellectual companionship, and the two men became lifelong friends. He remained there two years, was attracted by Margaret Gordon, a lady of good family (whose friends vetoed an engagement), and in October 1818 gave up schoolmastering and went to Edinburgh, where he took mathematical pupils and made some show of reading law.

During this period in the Scottish capital he began to suffer agonies from a gastric complaint which continued to torment him all his life, and may well have played a large part in shaping the rugged, rude fabric of his philosophy. In literature he had at first little success, a series of articles for the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia bringing in little money and no special credit. In 1820 and 1821 he visited Irving in Glasgow and made long stays at his father's new farm, Mainhill; and in June 1821, in Leith Walk, Edinburgh, he experienced a striking spiritual rebirth which is related in Sartor Resartus. Put briefly and prosaically, it consisted in a sudden clearing away of doubts as to the beneficent organization of the universe; a semi-mystical conviction that he was free to think and work, and that honest effort and striving would not be thwarted by what he called the "Everlasting No."

For about a year, from the spring of 1823, Carlyle was tutor to Charles and Arthur Buller, young men of substance, first in Edinburgh and later at Dunkeld. Now likewise appeared the first fruits of his deep studies in German, the Life of Schiller, which was published serially in the London Magazine in 1823-24 and issued as a separate volume in 1825. A second garner from the same field was his version of Goethe's Wilhelm Meister which earned the praise of Blackwood's and was at once recognized as a very masterly rendering.

In 1821 Irving had gone to London, and in June 1821 Carlyle followed, in the train of his employers, the Bullers. But he soon resigned his tutorship, and, after a few weeks at Birmingham, trying a dyspepsia cure, he lived with Irving at Pentonville, London, and paid a short visit to Paris. March 1825 saw him back; in Scotland, on his brother's farm, Hoddam Hill, near the Solway. Here for a year he worked hard at German translations, perhaps more serenely than before or after and free from that noise which was always a curse to his sensitive ear and which later caused him to build a sound-proof room in his Chelsea home.

Before leaving for London Irving had introduced Carlyle to Jane Baillie Welsh daughter of the surgeon, John Welsh, and descended from John Knox. She was beautiful, precociously learned, talented, and a brilliant mistress of cynical satire. Among her numerous suitors, the rough, uncouth

Reviews

[Rudyard L. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t know how to rate this book. Carlyle was writing in the 1820s and the things he got right were staggeringly impressive for that early. It’s easy to forget the 19th century was not all at once so calling this stuff in 1820 is much harder than 1880 when Niestzche was writing.

He predicted that the Industrial Revolution would create a soulless hyper mechanized society and he was one of the first authors to really grasp the scope of the death of God. He saw it as a totalizing social force which went through every element of a person’s daily life. It’s also interesting to read authors from 200 years ago to see how little changes. Leftists were by and large the same back then as now. When he talks about socialists they could be today. The underlying nihilism we see today was still there back then, although it had eroded less organic social institutions by that point. You see that even at the time the crisis of meaning was always modernity’s core failing. He accurately predicted that the rise of mass democracy would destroy complex ambitious multi generational political projects. Also that the rise of socialism and democracy was a holistic cultural process that would affect everything. Carlyle and authors of his era are interesting in that they lived through the preindustrial world so they had a frame of reference how genuinely destabilizing it was.

At the same time as I read this i keep getting the sense that Carlyle’s views are actually horrifying if applied. I had a mental ledger in my mind of “would the Chinese communist party say this.” Carlyle supposedly had the exact opposite aims of them but as I read their prescriptions are the exact same. Carlyle and other 19th century thinkers didn’t really get how much residual Christianity and social structures were holding back the horrors of the 20th century. When Carlyle talks about shoving the Irish peasants into work camps I was thinking “the 20th century tried this and it was the worst thing ever.” His idea of “real religion is hard work” would be used to justify a life of endless toil while his worship of social hierarchy is waiting to get abused. There’s also practically no self awareness that the reason that Britain in his era was so successful was due to things he keeps attacking like freedom, the culture of compromise or laissez faire economics. As I read this I kept getting the sense that this book is a rationalization for a horrifying dystopia which is ironic since he’s imitating the jacobins who he writes so negatively of elsewhere.

Again, the early 19th century is early enough where this was all such uncharted territory that you can give a degree of clemency that you can afford to thinkers in the 20th or 21st centuries

[Ethan Berman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Certainly, many inaugural readers of Carlyle will quickly realize that they don't know English (the language or the People) as well as they supposed. The stirring polemics contained in this edition, first in The Present Time and next in The Modern Worker defy the systemized approach that many other writers take. Take this as a warning before attempting to categorize Carlyle's points before properly parsing out the humor and hyperbole. It is worth reading a first time to appreciate his style and the context in which he is writing, and then a second to extrapolate his more prescient and evergreen points. Be sure to digest his thoughts on heroes, eternity, and the spirit of man, and then question what the teleology of your own beliefs/political anchors really are.

A massive boon to the effort is the glossary in the back of this Imperium Press edition. Much praise for this print is warranted. It was much more pleasant to read this petite copy than squinting at the scanned pages on Google Books.

[Nick John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yet another excellent book in The Reaction Studies being put out by Imperium Press. I have to say above all I love Carlyles writing style. He's funny, he's sarcastic but he also very intelligent and to the point. His critiques of democracy and liberalism as a whole are unmatched in there accuracy.

I am glad I decided to grab this book, I was hesitant for a while because (and this may seem petty) I heard Curtis Yarvin talking Carlyle up on an interview and because if my views on Yarvin I assumed Carlyle wouldn't be worth a study. But as it figures I sure am glad I didn't let Moldbug ruin him for me. Carlyle is a great resource for fully understanding the earliest and most deadly critiques of Classical and by extension modern and neo liberalism. All Third Positionists should read. You won't be disappointed.

[Victor Van Brandt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Carlyle was one of the greatest writers of the 19th century. In this short book, he takes apart the ideals of liberty and democracy with his biting rhetoric and incisive argumentation.

[Iegfb · Rating 4 out of 5]

As another reviewer noted, reading Carlyle makes one realize that they don't really properly speak English..

Even though this is a short book containing a collection of several short essays, it actually took me quite a while to go through as I often needed many rereads of sentences, passages and pages(though maybe that is just me being an ESL). Still, the language I encountered here was nothing like what I've read from other anglo authors(be it Bong or Yankee) and even more so, I'd go as far as saying that I'll probably need a complete reread of the whole thing sometime in the future to actually assimilate, understand and appreciate Carlyle.(No, I definitely am going to reread this even for its pure aesthetic value but I'll need to reread it to actually understand the man.)

Anyways, IP's edition here contains 3 short works by Carlyle - The Modern Worker, Shooting Niagara, and, obviously, The Present Time. Each one completely different in style and theme from the others, so far as to have almost nothing in common with one another and yet all of them having that signature Carlylean tone and 'vibe'(for a lack of a better term).

All of the works deal with different problems.. or rather aspects of the problem of Mammonism, or Nihilism, which seems to be the dominating theology of the liberal (dis)order from its very inception. Carlyle goes through its historical, sociological, philosophical, political and aesthetic meaning and its manifestations in different phenomena within society, through workers, labor unions, trade, statecraft, democracy, slavery and so much more..

All that I could say about this book is that it's genuinely beautiful and I would very, very heavily encourage anyone who finds themselves disillusioned and dissociated with the current state of affairs in the West to give this little thing a read.