Thomas Carlyle on Religion
1795–1881 Scotland
← All quotes by Thomas Carlyle
8 quotes
His religion at best is an anxious wish, — like that of Rabelais, a great Perhaps.
Critical and Miscellaneous Essays (1827)
Creation is great, and cannot be understood.
The three great elements of modern civilization, gunpowder, printing, and the Protestant religion.
Critical and Miscellaneous Essays (1827)
Of all acts is not, for a man, repentance the most divine? The greatest of faults is to be conscious of none.
It seems to me a great truth … that human things can not stand on selfishness, mechanical utilities, economics, and law-courts; that if there be not a religious element in the relations of men, such relations are miserable, and doomed to ruin.
On the whole we must repeat the often repeated saying, that it is unworthy a religious man to view an irreligious one either with alarm or aversion; or with any other feeling than regret, and hope, and brotherly commiseration.
[This saying of Alphonso about Ptolemy's astronomy, that] "it seemed a crank machine; that it was pity the Creator had not taken advice."
[B]y awakening the Heroic that slumbers in every heart, can any Religion gain followers.
Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840)