“Fool! The Ideal is in thyself, the impediment too is in thyself: thy Condition is but the stuff thou art to shape that same Ideal out of: what matters whether such stuff be of this sort or that, so the Form thou give it be heroic, be poetic? O thou that pinest in the imprisonment of the Actual, and criest bitterly to the gods for a kingdom wherein to rule and create, know this of a truth: the thing thou seekest is already with thee, ‘here or nowhere,’ couldst thou only see!”

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Originally said in English.

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About Thomas Carlyle

Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher

Thomas Carlyle was a Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher. Known as the "sage of Chelsea", he helped shape the intellectual and artistic life of the Victorian era. His writing carried wide influence in his own time, especially among readers interested in history, ideas, and culture. He is remembered for a body of work that marked him as a major public thinker of the nineteenth century.

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Books by Thomas Carlyle

Sartor resartus

2002

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The French Revolution

2002

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