Such was the substance of Carlyle’s message. Remarkable as is its range, profound as is its import, it required for its consummation the unique powers of utterance which Carlyle possessed. Among the masters of British prose he holds a position similar to that of Michael Angelo among the masters of painting. Power, elemental, titanic, rushing forth from an inexhaustible moral nature, yet guided by art, is the quality in both which first startles our wonder. The great passages in Carlyle’s works, like the Prophets and Sibyls of the Sixtine Chapel, have no peers: they form a new species, of which they are the only examples. They seem to defy the ordinary canons of criticism; but if they break the rules it is because whoever made the rules did not foresee the possibility of such works. Transcendent Power, let it take whatever shape it will,--volcano, torrent, Cæsar, Buonarotti, Carlyle,--proclaims: “Here I am,--a fact: make of me what you can! You shall not ignore me!” Of Carlyle’s style we may say that, whether one likes it or not, one can as little ignore it as fail to perceive that he makes it serve, with equal success, whatever purpose he requires. It can explain, it can laugh, it can draw tears; it can inveigh, argue, exhort; it can tell a story or preach a sermon. Carlyle has, it is computed, the largest vocabulary in English prose. His endowment of imagination and of humor beggars all his competitors. None of them has invented so many new images, or given to old images such fresh pertinence. Your first impression, on turning to other writings after his, is that they are pale, and dim, and cold: such is the fascination inalienable from power. Excess there may be in so vehement a genius; repetition there must be in utterances poured out during sixty years; an individuality so intense must have an equally individual manner; but there is, rightly speaking, no mannerism, for mannerism implies affectation, and Carlyle’s primal instinct was sincerity. His expression is an organic part of himself, and shares his merits and defects. Carlyle won his first reputation as a historian; singularly enough, his achievements in history have temporarily suffered a partial eclipse. Teachers in our colleges refer to them dubiously or not at all. Does the fault lie with these same teachers, or with Carlyle? A glance at the methods of the school of historical students which has sprung up during the last generation will explain the disagreement.