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Heroes and Hero Worship-Part27_Thomas Carlyle(1795-1881)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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loud-shrieking days, to remind ourselves of that. A man who cannot _hold

his peace_, till the time come for speaking and acting, is no right man.



Poor Rousseau's face is to me expressive of him. A high but narrow

contracted intensity in it: bony brows; deep, strait-set eyes, in which



there is something bewildered-looking,--bewildered, peering with

lynx-eagerness. A face full of misery, even ignoblemisery, and also of



the antagonism against that; something mean, plebeian there, redeemed only

by _intensity_: the face of what is called a Fanatic,--a sadly



_contracted_ Hero! We name him here because, with all his drawbacks, and

they are many, he has the first and chief characteristic of a Hero: he is



heartily _in earnest_. In earnest, if ever man was; as none of these

French Philosophers were. Nay, one would say, of an earnestness too great



for his otherwisesensitive, rather feeble nature; and which indeed in the

end drove him into the strangest incoherences, almost delirations. There



had come, at last, to be a kind of madness in him: his Ideas _possessed_

him like demons; hurried him so about, drove him over steep places!--



The fault and misery of Rousseau was what we easily name by a single word,

_Egoism_; which is indeed the source and summary of all faults and miseries



whatsoever. He had not perfected himself into victory over mere Desire; a

mean Hunger, in many sorts, was still the motive principle of him. I am



afraid he was a very vain man; hungry for the praises of men. You remember

Genlis's experience of him. She took Jean Jacques to the Theatre; he



bargaining for a strict incognito,--"He would not be seen there for the

world!" The curtain did happen nevertheless to be drawn aside: the Pit



recognized Jean Jacques, but took no great notice of him! He expressed the

bitterest indignation; gloomed all evening, spake no other than surly



words. The glib Countess remained entirely convinced that his anger was

not at being seen, but at not being applauded when seen. How the whole



nature of the man is poisoned; nothing but suspicion, self-isolation,

fierce moody ways! He could not live with anybody. A man of some rank



from the country, who visited him often, and used to sit with him,

expressing all reverence and affection for him, comes one day; finds Jean



Jacques full of the sourest unintelligible humor. "Monsieur," said Jean

Jacques, with flaming eyes, "I know why you come here. You come to see



what a poor life I lead; how little is in my poor pot that is boiling

there. Well, look into the pot! There is half a pound of meat, one carrot



and three onions; that is all: go and tell the whole world that, if you

like, Monsieur!"--A man of this sort was far gone. The whole world got



itself supplied with anecdotes, for light laughter, for a certain

theatrical interest, from these perversions and contortions of poor Jean



Jacques. Alas, to him they were not laughing or theatrical; too real to

him! The contortions of a dying gladiator: the crowded amphitheatre looks



on with entertainment; but the gladiator is in agonies and dying.

And yet this Rousseau, as we say, with his passionate appeals to Mothers,



with his _contrat-social_, with his celebrations of Nature, even of savage

life in Nature, did once more touch upon Reality, struggle towards Reality;



was doing the function of a Prophet to his Time. As he could, and as the

Time could! Strangely through all that defacement, degradation and almost



madness, there is in the inmost heart of poor Rousseau a spark of real

heavenly fire. Once more, out of the element of that withered mocking



Philosophism, Scepticism and Persiflage, there has arisen in this man the

ineradicable feeling and knowledge that this Life of ours is true: not a



Scepticism, Theorem, or Persiflage, but a Fact, an awful Reality. Nature

had made that revelation to him; had ordered him to speak it out. He got



it spoken out; if not well and clearly, then ill and dimly,--as clearly as

he could. Nay what are all errors and perversities of his, even those



stealings of ribbons, aimless confused miseries and vagabondisms, if we

will interpret them kindly, but the blinkard dazzlement and staggerings to



and fro of a man sent on an errand he is too weak for, by a path he cannot

yet find? Men are led by strange ways. One should have tolerance for a






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