Read Online Sartor Resartus (Oxford World's Classics) by Thomas Carlyle, Kerry McSweeney, Peter Sabor - Free Book Online Page A
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then half guess his importance, and scrutinise him with due power of vision! We enjoyed, what not three men in Weissnichtwo could boast of, a certain degree of access to the Professor’s private domicile. It was the attic floor of the highest house in the Wahngasse; * and might truly be called the pinnacle of Weissnichtwo, for it rose sheer up above the contiguous roofs, themselves rising from elevated ground. Moreover, with its windows, it looked towards all the four
Orte
, or as the Scotch say, and we ought to say,
Airts: *
the Sitting-room itself commanded three; another came to view in the
Schlafgemach
(Bed-room) at the opposite end; to say nothing of the Kitchen, which offered two, as it were,
duplicates
, and showing nothing new. So that it was in fact the speculum or watch-tower * of Teufelsdröckh; wherefrom, sitting at ease, he might see the whole life-circulation of that considerable City; the streets and lanes of which, with all their doing and driving (
Thun und Treiben)
were for most part visible there.
“I look down into all that wasp-nest or bee-hive,” have we heard him say, “and witness their wax-laying and honey-making, and poison-brewing, and choking by sulphur. From the Palace esplanade, where music plays while Serene Highness is pleased to eat his victuals, down to the low lane, where in her door-sill the aged widow, knitting for a thin livelihood, sits to feel the afternoon sun, I see it all; for, except the Schlosskirche * weathercock, no biped stands so high. Couriers arrive bestrappedand bebooted, bearing Joy and Sorrow bagged up in pouches of leather: there, topladen, and with four swift horses, rolls in the country Baron and his household; here, on timber leg, the lamed Soldier hops painfully along, begging alms: a thousand carriages, and wains, and cars, come tumbling in with Food, with young Rusticity, and other Raw Produce, inanimate or animate, and go tumbling out again with Produce manufactured. That living flood, pouring through these streets, of all qualities and ages, knowest thou whence it is coming, whither it is going?
Aus der Ewigkeit, zu der Ewigkeit hin:
From Eternity, onwards to Eternity! These are Apparitions: what else? Are they not Souls rendered visible; in Bodies, that took shape, and will lose it; melting into air? Their solid pavement is a Picture of the Sense; they walk on the bosom of Nothing, blank Time is behind them and before them. Or fanciest thou, the red and yellow Clothes-screen yonder, with spurs on its heels, and feather in its crown, is but of To-day, without a Yesterday or a To-morrow; and had not rather its Ancestor alive when Hengst and Horsa overran thy Island? Friend, thou seest here a living link in that Tissue of History, which inweaves all Being: watch well, or it will be past thee, and seen no more”
“Ach, mein Lieber!” *
said he once, at midnight, when we had returned from the Coffeehouse in rather earnest talk, “it is a true sublimity to dwell here. These fringes of lamplight, struggling up through smoke and thousandfold exhalation, some fathoms into the ancient reign of Night, what thinks Boötes of them, as he leads his Hunting Dogs * over the Zenith in their leash of sidereal fire? That stifled hum of Midnight, when Traffic has lain down to rest; and the chariot-wheels of Vanity, still rolling here and there through distant streets, are bearing her to Halls roofed in, and lighted to the due pitch for her; and only Vice and Misery, to prowl or to moan like nightbirds, are abroad: that hum, I say, like the stertorous, unquiet slumber of sick Life, is heard in Heaven! Oh, under that hideous coverlid * of vapours, and putrefactions, and unimaginable gases, what a Fermenting-vat lies simmering and hid! The joyful and the sorrowful are there; men are dying there, men are being born; men are praying—on the other sideof a brick partition, men are cursing; and around them all is the vast, void Night. The proud Grandee still lingers in his
Orte
, or as the Scotch say, and we ought to say,
Airts: *
the Sitting-room itself commanded three; another came to view in the
Schlafgemach
(Bed-room) at the opposite end; to say nothing of the Kitchen, which offered two, as it were,
duplicates
, and showing nothing new. So that it was in fact the speculum or watch-tower * of Teufelsdröckh; wherefrom, sitting at ease, he might see the whole life-circulation of that considerable City; the streets and lanes of which, with all their doing and driving (
Thun und Treiben)
were for most part visible there.
“I look down into all that wasp-nest or bee-hive,” have we heard him say, “and witness their wax-laying and honey-making, and poison-brewing, and choking by sulphur. From the Palace esplanade, where music plays while Serene Highness is pleased to eat his victuals, down to the low lane, where in her door-sill the aged widow, knitting for a thin livelihood, sits to feel the afternoon sun, I see it all; for, except the Schlosskirche * weathercock, no biped stands so high. Couriers arrive bestrappedand bebooted, bearing Joy and Sorrow bagged up in pouches of leather: there, topladen, and with four swift horses, rolls in the country Baron and his household; here, on timber leg, the lamed Soldier hops painfully along, begging alms: a thousand carriages, and wains, and cars, come tumbling in with Food, with young Rusticity, and other Raw Produce, inanimate or animate, and go tumbling out again with Produce manufactured. That living flood, pouring through these streets, of all qualities and ages, knowest thou whence it is coming, whither it is going?
Aus der Ewigkeit, zu der Ewigkeit hin:
From Eternity, onwards to Eternity! These are Apparitions: what else? Are they not Souls rendered visible; in Bodies, that took shape, and will lose it; melting into air? Their solid pavement is a Picture of the Sense; they walk on the bosom of Nothing, blank Time is behind them and before them. Or fanciest thou, the red and yellow Clothes-screen yonder, with spurs on its heels, and feather in its crown, is but of To-day, without a Yesterday or a To-morrow; and had not rather its Ancestor alive when Hengst and Horsa overran thy Island? Friend, thou seest here a living link in that Tissue of History, which inweaves all Being: watch well, or it will be past thee, and seen no more”
“Ach, mein Lieber!” *
said he once, at midnight, when we had returned from the Coffeehouse in rather earnest talk, “it is a true sublimity to dwell here. These fringes of lamplight, struggling up through smoke and thousandfold exhalation, some fathoms into the ancient reign of Night, what thinks Boötes of them, as he leads his Hunting Dogs * over the Zenith in their leash of sidereal fire? That stifled hum of Midnight, when Traffic has lain down to rest; and the chariot-wheels of Vanity, still rolling here and there through distant streets, are bearing her to Halls roofed in, and lighted to the due pitch for her; and only Vice and Misery, to prowl or to moan like nightbirds, are abroad: that hum, I say, like the stertorous, unquiet slumber of sick Life, is heard in Heaven! Oh, under that hideous coverlid * of vapours, and putrefactions, and unimaginable gases, what a Fermenting-vat lies simmering and hid! The joyful and the sorrowful are there; men are dying there, men are being born; men are praying—on the other sideof a brick partition, men are cursing; and around them all is the vast, void Night. The proud Grandee still lingers in his
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