From Thomas Archer Hirst   April 16th, 18501

Halifax, | April 16th, 1850.

My dear Tyndall,

Your last letter2 reached Lincolnshire where I was engaged in some engineering business being ‘lent’ by Mr Carter;3 since then I have been knocked about too much to attempt a reply; now I have got into still water once more and gladly commence my task. But I recollect now I received another scrap4 since then forwarded from Preston, but have been unable to comply with its wishes on account of the Preston Chronicles never having reached me altho I had written expressly for them. I can only account for the circumstance in one or the other of the following ways. They are full of other matters, or the tenor of the article5 does not suit them, if the former is true it will appear by and bye, if the latter is the cause I want you to request the Editor to forward the MS. to me. I have great curiosity to see it & have a suitable means for its publication enclose such letters6 (should you think proper to write it) to me, so that in the event of its appearance before arrival I may withhold it. The Editor of the Peoples Journal7 wrote me a very kind answer back saying that had he not unluckily just engaged a continuous article on a similar subject he would have been very glad to accept it for he thought very highly of it. I shewed it to Phillips who also liked it & with his help I could have easily got it published had I not had another scheme in view. A new paper called the ‘Leader’ has just appeared a very able one indeed & conducted by a party with whom both of us have much sympathy I mean that peculiar class to whom Carlyle has imparted some of his energy. He will write occasionally for it himself. Lewes, Thornton Hunt, Linton, Ballantyne, & Phillips are other contributors8 that I know of for the rest I will send you a number for your own perusal. It is already supported by the best heads in England perhaps and as a means of effecting much good gives great promise. Now we can get access to this and I want you to extend your sketches9 to 6 not striving so much for mere popularity as would have been requisite had the Peoples Journal been the medium of publication. The rest I shall leave to yourself only you must get to work quickly for should circumstances hinder its publication even here I am determined they shall appear. I have got amongst a good deal of literature & literary men here. Phillips, who has an extensive & well selected (intellectually not fashionably) acquaintance & who as I said, has taken a great liking to me, takes every opportunity to introduce me. I know his intention is good, but to tell the truth I don’t much like it. I have got to know some able & right good fellows certainly, but I find its effect on me is not one of the best. In the first place I am naturally of a retiring disposition, and one of few words & being thrust forward as it were, is uncomfortable from the ever present notion that something is expected from me, and were there anything in reality to satisfy that expectation it is just the way to keep it back. In default thereof I feel dissatisfied with myself & find previous determinations to steady persevering effort at times weakened. All this shews me Tyndall that I am not ready and worthy to play such parts it arises in fact from a small conceited spirit of ambition which must be purged out of me, either by such meetings or without. But here I am again lamenting and exposing my own shortcomings as usual & filling up a melancholy letter when I have plenty of other things to say. It must be some secret influence in that long solemn face of yours that always seems to say ‘Tom, confess or I’ll tell you all about it myself’, and there is an influence just as strong in me too that always & yet for the most part unconsciously prompts me to do so if I tell my conscience a secret it can’t keep it but must share it with its brother John not that we want brother John to do for us what is our work, but because the desire is irresistible & we cannot help it. To change the theme therefore. Among the best of these acquaintances is a young fellow called Smith, formerly of Manchester but who has come to reside in Halifax. he is as clever & generous little fellow as one often meets, with some failings of course like all the rest of us but be-hanged to them at present. He has written a work a life history of Mirabeau,10 of which Carlyle said ‘it is a highly creditable book, good in itself but giving promise of far better’ which is as short & significant a criticism as I can give you. Carlyle awakened him too, & this work was the result. Some of the reviews of course severely castigated it11 & could see nothing or rather would see nothing but the Carlyle-isms with which its diction abounded, but to a deeper looker it displays a depth & ability sufficient to render Carlyle’s predictions a moral certainty. Carlyle then advised him in a beautiful letter which I have seen to turn his attention to an English subject & try to extract something of value from his own life & experiences in Manchester. Carlyle of course saw he was able to do this & the result has proved he was not entirely wrong nor his advice without effect. He is publishing at present a work entitled ‘Social Evils’12 (I think) of which I have seen the MS & I consider it one of the most interesting & cheering signs of the day. It is just this – The word that most wanted saying, well said. It is the result of a varied experience in the Middle Classes, a keen eye for its shams & failings & a sincere honest love for a reality & truth.13 With a broad liberal spirit he has manfully grappled with his subject & with an earnestness that sincerity alone can impart he has spoken what will meet with sympathy & energy from every thinking young man. You will see I like the book Tyndall amazingly. I cannot give you a just idea of it but you will soon see it for yourself, I hope. He is a cotton-spinner by trade & has just set up business here he is worth some little money, at any rate does not follow literature for a living but because it is his taste & forte. Well he’s going to commence a new journal to be edited at least by him & Phillips together & to come out probably in September next; it is to be about the same size & of the same stamp as the Truth-Seeker (without its eternal Teetotalism, Critical Notes & Social Science of course)14 in fact it will be more like the Leader in quality & from their extensive acquaintance they hope to gather together an able & staunch number of contributors. It will do much good for there is a want of a suitable medium for the thoughts of this class that are every day increasing. It was first mooted in my little room & after considering the matter for some time we met again & decided upon the project £75 was raised there and then by this little knot of fellows that we have found in Halifax, as a guarantee fund that might be calculated on should the first year prove a loss (which we calculated would in the worst circumstances be the greatest amount), should it prove profitable the surplus is to pay the editors or any contributors, so as to ensure talent. I mention all this because on your return & when we change places I should like you to keep it in view indeed I have promised them your help & I have no fear you will give it.- Good Gracious I have such a lot of things to say & such a number of questions to ask I don't know where to begin or what to say next. I wish we could fly & hold an interview for an hour on the top of the Drakenfels15 or some central meeting place. I don’t know what to make of you in one respect you must either be a man most lamentably without a fixed object in the world or else you’re very close fisted about it. I want to know when you are coming home and what you are going to do first when you get here. Are you going to seek another situation as Tutor or Surveyor? you ought not to stop at either long. Have you got your degree?16 You have never told us yet. Phillips has some sort of a scheme about establishing a Peoples College, but I won’t attempt to describe it for I cannot do it justice. it is a favourite notion of his for giving first rate instruction to classes who could not afford to go to Cambridge etc. indeed establishing an University something after the German fashion17 (with regard to expense especially) he will talk to you himself about it when he sees you for he is curious to know how you will regard it & how far you would fall in with it. But however that will not find you employment on your return and I guess you will not want to be resting long. What do you think to coming to Carter again a bit. I shall have done there in August. He has not said a word yet about my further stay nor has he made any arrangements towards filling our places (for we both leave near together) Now I don’t care if I start immediately (that is in October next) to Germany indeed I should like, but if he at all seemed to wish or to rely on my stopping a little longer I should not mind for an additional 6 months, though I feel to be wasting the best part of my life almost at present. Again had it been possible I should have liked much to have commenced my studies with you before you left Marburg. Could that be managed? Then again failing that I should want a lot of instructions about costs &c from you, so as to see my course straight before me before embarking. Consider all this & give me your advice as also full information about yourself. If you would care to engage with Carter in the place of us two (I don’t know what Jemmy will do, get a situation in London I fancy) I would sound Carter on the subject. Another idea strikes me, you said something about coming over to England and returning if you could do that I would wait a little longer & go back with you. But however I depend on you to be a way out of all this, recollect my actions must be such as will serve my own interests best, that is to say, there is no fear of going against the wishes of any of my relations and I am glad to be able to say that, for all to whom I have yet made known my intentions altho they could not enter sufficiently into the merits to advise the step, yet they express no objection, indeed have expressed their faith in my own prudence.

And now about the remittance you received; I must set you right in a small error you are unconsciously labouring under, & tell you that you it is not to me you are entirely indebted, though all, or such of your gratitude as is worthy my reception, I am inclined to receive on the same ground as you would absolve yourself, namely that there was the will if not the way. It happened thus. Your letter18 to Carter, & your aprising me of its contents, rather made me uneasy; because I thought you were in need of the installment more, than you liked to confess, & also because I both feared Carter could not, & was persuaded he ought not, to do what I could do better; but as I had told you, I had not the money yet by me. I knew Jemmy to have some at his own disposal, with which he did not know well what to do. I asked him for a loan & to guard from misinterpretation, told him what I intended to do with it; & that I should be able to pay him shortly, he jumped at the opportunity, lent me it, and I forwarded it, but the little rogue insisted upon considering it his loan, because he would have it he was quite as able, & more so than me. It was sent however in my name, and if there is the slightest need, or he will allow [me], I shall take it in my own hands for it will be no inconvenience. I should not have submitted to this small deception my good lad, but for fear you should make any foolish ‘boggles’19 about the matter, I determined it should get into your hands, & then you might know all about it. And now thou mayest add a codicil to thy journal entry, & [canst] shew a future Tyndall, that instead of one thou hast two friends, who can trust thee not only with £20, but with far more & that, of another & superior quality. The little fellow has done it from the purest & most disinterested motives, & was moved to the act by a honest unassuming wish to be of use to one of his best friends –

Carlyle is in the field again! and is astonishing the world with some ‘latter-day pamphlets’,20 on topics of the day; 3 have already appeared, and another is published in London today. ‘The Present Time No 1’ of which I sent a short article to the Truth Seeker,21 which you have perhaps ere this noticed No. 2, ‘Model Prisons’ an enquiry into the Anti capital punishment mania of the day, and some right-solid remarks thereon; and No 3 ‘Downing Street’, a thorough exposure of our so-called Government their miserable inefficiency, & what is new for Carlyle; a decided measure for their improvement; but in the next which is entitled ‘New Downing Street’, I expect a further elaboration of these, something tangible & fit for immediate application; and coming from such a quarter likely to create a great sensation. But I will not attempt further description here, as if all is well, I may perpetrate a few more remarks on the same for the Truth Seeker, which you can then see; I can tell you however that they are wonderful performances & such as you will read with no small interest when you see them. I have read a good deal of his works lately, from his first efforts, those splendid critical & biographical articles that appeared in the magazines of 1828 & 3022 – those clear, calm & deep portraits, where Jean Paul, Goethe, Burns, Voltaire, Werner, Heyne & others are taken and literally turned inside out, imaged there before you, perfectly plastic, aye breathing with vitality: – Such Biography I never saw before or since. Pity there are so few to be had. – Next I take his Hero Worship23 for a philosophy of Human Nature, and after that, that strange autobiography the ‘Sartor Resartus’24 the record of his life struggles, his glorious battles & victory, with the world & himself; I mark too, that at this point he turns from his own high & self-created sphere, & [veteran]-like places himself at the head of his fellow-comrades, to lead them too, to warfare & to victory. His ‘Chartism’,25 his ‘Past & Present’,26 & last of all his ‘Latter-day Pamphlets’, have this for their object. God bless him then I say, for the true & valiant Hero of the day! the finest MAN perhaps of this era. Thousands are indebted to him for an ‘inheritance incorruptible & that fadeth not away’,27 and when his work shall be done, & he shall have rested from his labours (which may God prolong) he will carry with him our blessing, & along with Luther, Shakespeare, Jean Paul & Goethe, shall be reckoned as an inspired brother; sent from God, amid the downfall of Religious & the reign of blind Scepticism, to build up once more a true temple to his praise. Long live Carlyle! –

Amongst other literary news, or what will be such to you perhaps, is a new volume of Lectures from Emerson, called ‘Representative Men’, being the 7 lectures that he delivered when in England, and one of which I recollect you heard in Halifax (‘Napoleon’)28 I venture to say if Cicero had only read these 7 lectures, before he expressed his opinion on the use of books, he would have defined them as something more than ‘entertainment for leisure hours, charm for solitude, or alleviation for sorrow’29: at any rate if he had stuck to, and acted upon, his narrow hypothesis, he would have considered the work before us as so much unmeaning jargon, & would have advocated its immediate extinction, & perhaps a straight jacket for the Author. In fact, Emerson’s is no rudimentary treatise; no superstructure raised gradually from a well-known axiom as foundation; he presupposes a reader of something of his own grasp of thought & he deals with results ready made, omitting the processes as superfluous. In a sentence may often be found the net result of volumes, & the student must with much difficulty & brow-sweating fill up these vacuities: must scramble down the one side & climb up the other of these chasms, unless luckily he be nimble enough to jump them. There is the sum-total here of 30 years of not common place but quite original life & experience, a saturated solution of it dissolved in concentrated Thought acid & then crystallized. It must be no tyro in intellectual chemistry that will analyze this compound; the first step towards this, its resolution, is a task that will occupy us yet for some time to come. –

But to cease from my chemical illustrations, which nevertheless will bear even more prolongation yet, this book is published for the small charge of s1(!) by Bohn, who by some means or other issued his edition at the same time that the s5 one by John Chapman30 appeared, & by this means gave the book an immense circulation, it is the cheapest shilling’s worth I know certainly.

Talking about Chemistry, we do very little in that line as yet; Surveying, and Lincolnshire trips don’t allow it; we have taken a small room, however for a laboratory, & hope during these coming Summer mornings to renew our acquaintance with it. My studies indeed just now, are necessarily very desultory & consequently not effective. I feel convinced that to prosper, and to make progress in any given study, numerous others extraneous to it must be laid on the shelf, however tempting their interest may render them. Indeed genius as I take it, consists for the most part, in overcoming this temptation to examine the surfaces of many things, & with perseverance, concentrating these our otherwise scattered forces on a single aim; or better thus – all our aims are alike, one lode-star, (call it self-expansion if you like) is our beacon; the unsuccessful traveller runs here & there, now on the one side, now the other, crying for a Road, unconscious, poor fellow, that the road is ever by him, that if he will but strike in anywhere, here close to him, & only follow his nose, with patience, & unwaveringly, he shall prosper.- ‘Well, but’, says a Road-seeker, ‘there is some one thing that every one can do best, and how important that we should discover it’. ‘Quite a delusion this, Sir’, is the answer, from the man with the nose; ‘believe me, the indecision arises altogether from a want of energy to start, & perseverance to pursue. Strive for this, attain this, and your road is clear; you throw in your reagent will; the law of affinity does the rest’. From this you may gather where ‘long Tom’31 (as Phillips calls me) is, at this time; always struggling with some wave you see, & now & then getting a duck too. Amidst it all however, one pursuit remains firm, and is the fruit of more self content than all the rest; I mean my weekly class at the Mechanics;32 I have got a score fellows round me every Thursday Evening that it does one’s heart good to see & be amongst; fellows of all ages, from 16 to 35; hard-working, sharp fellows too, many of them; two or three from vill[ages] 2 miles distant, & one, my oldest pupil (i.e. been with me longest) already stands on the same platform, & as things are, will pass me soon. I have found out this fact there; that actual instruction (i.e. direct gift) is just the least part of a Teacher’s use; provocation & encouragement are the principle; once kindle a love for their task, & the materials are ready enough. Again, this love for the Study is contagious for the most part, & the success for the Teacher will depend equally as much on its personal possession by him; as on his talent. And lastly, if he do possess it, he need not seek to inculcate it by words; it will flow out unknown to him in every action. – I have finished my news, and to finish my paper, I will give you a Sonnet I attempted when in Lincolnshire; I have not room to explain the circumstances that originated it, I can only say that I lived a fortnight at a beautiful Farm-House, past-whose garden gate the River ran, & inside whose walls was genuine hospitality, it was written in the Album of the fair daughter of mine Host. Now listen, and laugh at it if you like –

Gentle River; peaceful, calm and Holy,

Thou pure interpreter of this Glory,

Who made alike thyself, all men, and me,

Companions bound unto shoreless Sea;

There Life upon thy banks, but like thy course,

So void of Strife, so full of silent Force,

Could thus reflect, along its fruitless march,

The lovely Sun-set, or the great high arch

Of Heavens Immensity: azure deep

Where twinkling stars their holy vigils keep:

Then would I live and die contented here,

Here learn from thee my onward path to steer,

And fearless, glide ‘twixt Times green banks with thee,

Unto the unknown, vast Eternity.

Tom

RI MS JT/1/H/144

RI MS/JT/1/HTYP/68–73a

16[18]: Hirst began the letter on 16th, finished it on the 18th, and posted it to Tyndall on the 19th (Hirst, ‘Journals’, 16–19 April 1850).

Your last letter: probably letter 0395, but this was not the most recent letter (see n. 4).

being ‘lent’ by Mr Carter: Hirst was ‘lent’ by his employer, Richard Carter, to assist with a drainage survey at Fenton in Lincolnshire from 26 February until 23 March 1850 (Hirst, ‘Journals’, 26 February to 23 March 1850).

received another scrap: Hirst remembered a short, more recent letter, which is missing. Tyndall had apparently asked Hirst to send him something, perhaps his own published article, from the Preston Chronicle.

the article: it was not published (see letter 0392, n. 2).

enclose such letters: that is, letters to editors. Not only would it prevent confusion, as Hirst explained, but it would save expensive postage.

The Editor of the Peoples Journal: John Saunders was chief editor for the People’s Journal from its founding in 1846 (see letter 0392, n. 3).

new paper called the ‘Leader’ … other contributors: Hunt was Thornton Leigh Hunt (1810–73), an editor, who along with Lewes established the weekly Leader in London in 1850, selling at the price of 6d., with financial backing from noted liberal clergyman Edmund Larken. It ran until 1860. Linton was William James Linton (1812–97), wood-engraver, polemicist and poet; Ballantyne was Thomas Ballantyne (1806–71), radical newspaper editor. See Biographical Register for Lewes and Phillips.

extend your sketches: Tyndall had sent Hirst one such sketch of German University life, requesting that he try to get it published (letter 0395).

a life history of Mirabeau: J. Stores Smith, Mirabeau: A Life-History (London: Smith, Elder, and Co., 1848).

some … castigated it: for example: ‘We notice this book only to stamp it with our severest reprobation. It is an echo of all the most offensive follies of Carlyle; and, like all copies, infinitely more offensive than its original. The Theory of hero-worship, that is, of the adoration of what may be termed brute force separate from goodness, whether intellectual or physical, is here pushed to its vilest excess’ (‘V.-Mirabeau. A Life History’, The English Review, 10:19 (1848), p. 204).

‘Social Evils’: J. Stores Smith, Social Aspects (London: John Chapman, 1850).

shams & failings … reality & truth: all these were characteristic moral metaphors from Carlyle.

the Truth-Seeker (without … Social Science of course): Frederick Lees, Phillips’ co-editor, was a campaigner for many unpopular causes, including teetotalism and Owenite socialism.

Drakenfels: Drachenfels, a high hill and hiking area, with a ruined castle and spectacular views, located near the Rhine, south east of Bonn.

Have you got your degree?: Tyndall obtained his degree in mathematics under advisor Friedrich Ludwig Stegmann in late 1849 (see letter 0408). It is surprising that he had not told Hirst.

German fashion: People’s Colleges were established in Germany to provide adult education for all social classes (see H. J. Arnold, ‘The People’s Colleges of Germany’, The American Scholar, 3:1 (1934), pp. 105–108).

your letter … its contents: in letter 0392 Tyndall told Hirst that he had written to Carter, asking to borrow money.

‘boggles’: objections (OED).

‘latter-day pamphlets’: a series of pamphlets under this title, published through 1850, were collected in Carlyle’s book, Latter-Day Pamphlets. The four already published were: ‘The Present Time’ (1 February 1850), ‘Model Prisons’ (1 March 1850), ‘Downing Street’ (1 April 1850), and ‘New Downing Street’ (15 April 1850). Four more followed between May and August 1850.

a short article to the Truth Seeker: cited letter 0400, n. 7.

those splendid … magazines of 1828 & 30: the essays on German literature which Carlyle published before his first major work, Sartor Resartus, begun in 1831 (see n. 24).

Hero Worship: cited letter 0397, n. 3.

‘Sartor Resartus’: T. Carlyle, ‘Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh’, first published in Fraser’s Magazine (1833–4) and later collected in a volume (London: Saunders & Otley, 1838).

‘Chartism’: T. Carlyle, Chartism (London: James Fraser, 1840).

‘Past and Present’: cited letter 0397, n. 3.

‘inheritance incorruptible & that fadeth not away’: an abbreviated quote from 1 Peter 1:4, ‘To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you’.

you heard … (Napoleon): Tyndall and Hirst both attended Emerson’s lecture on Napoleon in Halifax on 5 January 1848; Tyndall bought some of his books and Hirst attended another lecture in February (Journal, 5 and 7–10 January 1848, JT/2/13b/288–9; Hirst, ‘Journals’, 5 January and 7 February 1848). On the publication of the lectures see n. 30.

‘entertainment … sorrow’: quotation not identified.

s1 … by John Chapman: Emerson’s lectures, delivered in Boston in 1845–6 and then in England in 1847–8, were published as Representative Men: Seven Lectures. In addition to these two editions, there was another 1850 London edition by Routledge, at 1s. (The superscript ‘s’ placed prior to the number is an unusual way to denote ‘shilling’.) We reference the more accessible Chapman edition although Tyndall and Hirst probably read one of the cheaper editions.

long Tom: an allusion to Hirst’s height, 6 ft. 2 ½ in. (Victor L. Hilts, A Guide to Francis Galton’s English Men of Science, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, n.s. 65 (1975), p. 80).

my weekly class at the Mechanics: the Halifax Mechanics’ Institution.

Please cite as “Tyndall0398,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on 28 March 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/tyndall/letters/Tyndall0398