From Thomas Archer Hirst   Jan 20th 1850¹

Halifax, Jan. 20^th 1850

My dear Tyndall –

Judging from my long silence, few could credit the esteem in which I hold your long dear letter:² or the number of times it was read & lingered on by syllables, nor yet the number of times that the walls of my room echoed my half unconscious ejaculations of ‘Bravo’ ‘God bless you’ & the like; nor do I care to press the point or excuse myself for I know I write to one who has already felt & anticipated my reply – ‘Life is a string of Moods’³ How humiliating yet how true! I have attempted & partly executed one or two replies before this Tyndall & destroyed them both, and why? Because I re-read them in a different mood. While fresh under the heart, emotions that your letter caused, I was all abandonment, had you been within reach I should have forgot my habitual calmness of exterior & hugged you heartily, and I know well, should have felt the greatest confusion & blushed the moment after, as if in overstepping the line of custom I had committed a heinous fault. Just so it was in the absence of your bodily self. I wrote & then spoilt all by re-consideration. I was not afraid you would think them forced, for they were honest heart utterings that to you would have carried their own guarantee of honesty. But I thought they were not worth the postage, that they were more valuable to me than you, & that it needed no such professions (genuine, though they might be) to convince you of what you already know. I care not that you at least should find me contradicting myself in each succeeding letter. I will tell you truth & every one⁴ shall be sincere in itself. With others I dare not yet do so, but you are my surveyor & will plot the section of my life on a natural scale & its angularities will then vanish – And now for my bit of Biography since I last wrote. You expressed some anxiety to know the result of the ordeal I thought then before me Yet you must have known that it would be just nothing at all – that it too would slip through my fingers when I grasped hardest – indeed your advice – to work – was just calculated to bring about that same, and this has been the case.– I was in a poor way then Tyndall, perfectly miserable, looking back on it at least; though then, I grieved that I could not feel miserable enough, your letter seemed to hint at a bitterness that I really did not taste; you seemed to credit me with a harder trial than existed; and thus I tortured myself with the additional bugbear that my effort & trial was not sufficiently real: You told me not to sit looking into myself, but to act. I thought it cowardly to do so. True I found relief by so doing daily, but when night came, instead of satisfaction I had a sense of duty, shirked, & set to once more at my crimino-judicial task. Well what came of it? I wish I could say; but the fact is I cannot recall anything, but gross blackness, everything seemed hollow and unreal, life but a useless misery & struggle, between conscience and the senses. I thought I ate too much, then smoked too much, & so on with most indulgences, & I could see little in life but struggles to keep such in abeyance, the world looked drear & lonely enough.

‘So lonely ‘twas, that God himself

Scarce seemed there to be’.⁵

About this time my Aunt⁶ the last relative on my Mothers side, a good kind soul as ever breathed, sent for me to Bristol. She could not pass the Christmas happily unless as usual, we met round the same fire. Her letter to me was simple enough, I have received many such before & never thought more of them; but its honest loving words struck a chill through me now: ‘I long’ she said ‘to see your dear faces once more about me. We shall have such a Merry Christmas. Wont I make you a nice plum pudding & give you a hearty welcome, & what’s more you shall have a pipe after it. Do come’ The contrast ‘twixt this & me was painful at first, it seemed as if I alone were miserable, so had thought shed its sickly cast over me and all I once had loved.

--------------------------------------------------

I have just been downstairs to M^r Wright who is drunk, and very disorderly. Poor M^rs Wright was standing between him & another person (whom he professed he had some intentions of killing on the spot) her hair & cap all torn and greatly afraid of disturbing her revered Lodgers.⁷ What a miserable existence she has & what a pitiable specimen of humanity for a husband. I have sat with him for an hour & by the greatest difficulty dismissed his enemy & turned his mind on artists & painting I hope he’ll be quiet for the night; at any rate he has turned the train of my thoughts so I must continue my narrative tomorrow.

---------------------------------------------------

Well at first I refused to go. ‘What use’ I thought ‘any more attempting to realize that phantasm, a Merry Christmas: have I not always failed to do so, could I leave this devil ‘self’ at home, I might! I changed my mind however and went, not with the intention of escaping myself; but of breathing a short time the atmosphere of contentment and love, in fact as an experiment, to see how they could live. How vain the effort, you may guess; what means had I for judging this case. From my standpunkt they might look fair enough; but from their own? – It was the verdict of intellect apart from the moral emotions. It is almost useless to continue further to recall such unhealthiness; I probably seemed to enjoy myself as much as usual but to myself I seemed villainous. When all sat together on that Christmas Eve, when every lip seemed to express unrestrained the hearts emotion, all restraint withdrawn, & mutual confidence established, I watched them narrowly, and seemed to myself a cool spectator, an excluded member. Now they would recall the memory of those who once had been amongst us, and seemed to heave as it were one long heartrending sigh and their countenances bore witness of its sincerity. But I – Good God I could not join them here. Their grief I could not get near enough to me, & I was in agony that I could not sigh – so in their prospects for the future – all were as one to me: indifferent. The thought that I ought to enjoy myself was continually before me, but the more I grasped the more it slipped through my fingers. In fact I had lost myself & seemed to suspect someone had stolen me. I am better now but how I became so, I am at a loss to know, perhaps it might be accounted for on Pharmaceutical principles. This only I am conscious of, that your letter at that time only served to make me worse; for I could not help contrasting you with myself, and foolishly thinking that I was too weak in my powers of resolution. I thought of M’Arthur⁸ & other instances nearer home, where this very feeling & internal antagonism had led to consequences most frightful, & instead of manfully facing these goblins, & as Carlyle says sending them to their own Hell by action;⁹ I trembled like a coward at an idea that once flashed on me that they might conquer me too.

Well – we grew exceedingly busy at the office, a geological paper too, that must come off had yet to be prepared, so that luckily I was forced to work; one night or rather morning at 3:30, when I had been engaged in my essay,¹⁰ it flashed on me all on the moment that I was somewhat changed to what I was a few weeks back. I opened your letter again Tyndall – read it & as I said could have kissed you. My essay at length was finished & delivered, and here again I had to discipline myself to avoid a relapse. I had thought to accomplish something but as usual it has escaped me & the thing when done is next to worthless. Well! what matter? It has been employment and personally has done much good, though intrinsically valueless, & I will be satisfied & replace it as quickly as possibly with other employment. ‘To fill the hour – that is happiness: to fill the hour & leave not a crevice for repentance or approval’,¹¹ or as some old classical writer says:

He alone is happy, who can say

When night comes: I’ve lived well to day.¹²

The same old struggles between Reason & Will still go on, yet the regret that such antagonism must be under gone does not so often recur. I wish I could say the task grows lighter, but I cannot: yet I will have hope & courage. Tyndall, I have a mind to burn this letter too; for I cannot faithfully tell you either what I am or have been. I don’t know myself. I’m in a maze, a labyrinth & confused jumble of principles & actions. Surfaces & Realities – Beliefs & Scepticisms, which all belong to me, but are not arranged. Before it was all dark, now I see but dimly, though I do see somewhat; one thing I see, that there is a great tendency in me to exert my intellect to the neglect of my heart: (no, that is not what I mean) I spend too much time in the ideal, & trying to perfect it, to the neglect of the actual. Can you understand me for I can’t? As to religion, I won’t say a single word: I should frighten you, and myself too, were I to put my awful scepticism into black and white. The fact is I avoid the subject at present, though I find it difficult to do at all times – Better for Orthodoxy & my own comfort, if it had never rechallenged me. I’m not in a proper temper to meet it now, but its turn will come.

Phillips and I keep up our intimacy,¹³ indeed it has strengthened much since I last wrote. He is a good fellow, but I like the man much more than his literary attainments: with the latter I don’t much sympathize, but I feel he understands me & although I do not return him brilliant thoughts or actions I am conscious of possessing somehow his regard. You will like him I am sure, and I shall like you to meet him. It is different with Hutchinson. I don’t know what to say of him. I admire his attainments but cannot get nearer him: there is always something of coldness, that I cannot banish in our interviews; with far less intellectual effort, I feel more exaltation & warmth of emotion, with Phillips than with him. He is sarcastic & too critical, all his reading seems to have ended in critical opinions of the talents of his authors, as if never undertaken as a guide to his own actions. I may do him injustice, I hope so truly; but he never seems sincere enough, all is outside with him, & cold. This is the only way I can account for his religious opinions: he views it objectively & never in reality seems to bring it home to himself. The great questions of human life & destiny, he seems to consider as questions in which he has no voice: but has merely to judge between the claims of this or that religionist. Pity one’s first estimate should fall thus. I had expected different & with reluctance even yet give way to my conclusion. It is his worst trait, however; I still like him, but not so much. Have you seen the Truth-seeker for December. What do you think of the ‘Mask of Life’.¹⁴ I don’t understand it fully.

The other & former part of my letter has lay’n (?) by me some time in order to make some final arrangements before sending this – I should certainly have been cross with you had you not told me the import of that letter to Carter.¹⁵ Why for goodness’ sake Tyndall are you so ceremonious? I tell you candidly I have not delivered that letter, nor ever will; it is quietly stowed away in my pocket & waits only your orders to thrust it unopened into the fire. I do not think Carter has the money to spare just now, nor if he had, should I like you to be under any obligations to him, when others that know, esteem & understand you better have it to spare. Probably before this reaches you, you will have received £20¹⁶ through M^r Schwann (a Merchant of Huddersfield¹⁷ whom Phillips in dedicating a book of his to him addresses ‘Thou great Gods nobleman of Huddersfield’) He has kindly undertaken to convey it by a Bankers order through his Agent M^r C. E. Alder of Frankfort. Write me immediately if you receive it all safe, it will serve as a receipt & security. I hope it will serve your purpose at present, so be ‘asy’;¹⁸ & if you don’t wish to offend you’ll be kind enough to drop all ceremony & write when it is finished, for there’s more at your service when you want it. Meantime you must work & repay by instalments of M.S.S. Your last contains some genuine sterling <1 or 2 words missing> my boy. I have sent it to the Peoples Journal,¹⁹ & though I have not <yet received> a reply have little doubt about its insertion; it is perhaps scarcely popular enough for their readers taste; but it is the most suitable publication I know & from the general tenor of their late numbers, I predict it will be acceptable They are sure to ask me, how many of the sort you will furnish – Suppose I promise 6 – Will it suit you? – and how much would you like for them? or will you leave it to me to bargain, without again communicating with you as to their offer? Write a book by all means, if you have the time; But you should have told me your subject & further particulars, before I could estimate the number of subscribers. What is it? – I’ll be bound as security against all loss, I’ll go about canvassing for subscribers, write glorious reviews in the Peoples Journal, Truth Seeker &c or any other mortal thing that shall be required – Don’t fear about its success – set to it & leave the rest to Providence & Tom Hirst. Whose plumes are you & Professor Knoblauch (by the bye he’s my optical friend ‘nicht wahr’²⁰) about to pluck – Liebig’s?²¹ I shall wish to see your transactions,²² write them to send me a copy or tell me where to get them. Where is Frankland & How is he – & friend Knoll²³ & Gustave (Is he a reality or an ideality?) What are your future intentions; do you still intend to visit Berlin & France? I should like you to do so – Ask your Landlady to reserve your garret for me. I shall want it soon: in 6 months I shall be at liberty, & feel more inclined than ever to take your place, perhaps this time 12 months or earlier.

We do not find our present Laboratory convenient, & are just looking out for a detached one. I often translate D^r [Mill]²⁴ & have got a good part completed. The Halifax Mech: Instⁿ & Mutual Imp. Soc:²⁵ have at last amalgamated and are getting on pretty well. In your remarks in the Preston Chronicle²⁶ you just anticipated a remarkably similar intention I had in view with respect to the Halifax Inst: In these democratical institutions I find office bearing, speechifying &c warping many weak but well designing students from the path of their own improvement. They lack individual exertion & seem to think that breathing a literary atmosphere merely is required. The mere necessary means, Government &c is usurping the legitimate object, self-improvement: not Halifax alone but many other similar institutions are on the decline & depend upon it this is the cause: from Mutual Improvement they denigrate into ‘Sprouting’ Societies, then come Banterings & petty personalities & finally from sheer disease they die a natural death. My class has fallen off gradually until lately I had only one, the one. I still go regularly & hope to make it better by and bye. Jemmy is at a Cavalry Ball this Evening, figuring away in a waltz probably at this moment. I have read Emerson more than ever lately or rather better than ever not more. His essay ‘Experience’²⁷ I am especially fond of, it has been of great value to me lately. If I had not written so much I had intended saying a word about him & also another authoress an anonymous one though privately known as a young lady (28) living at Haworth near Keighley (you know the spot). She has written a novel called ‘Jane Eyre’²⁸ (a rival of ‘Yeast’ even)²⁹ that would do you good to read. By the law, I did not think it possible that we could possess such a precious lump of feminine flesh, & such a heart in it, too! I have fallen positively in love with her. Phillips & I are going to prostrate ourselves at her feet some day soon. Ada³⁰ has forsaken me, I have not seen her for some time, she must have gone to school. I wrote to Ginty but he knew nothing about Jack:³¹ I wish much to hear about him.

John Tyndall | care of Prof. Bunsen | Marburg- | Hesse Cassel, Germany

P^d in England- | Jan. 29th 1850.

RI MS JT/1/H/142