“On the dust of our heroic ancestors we too sit ballot-boxing, saying to one another, It is well, it is well! By inheritance of their noble struggles, we have been permitted to sit slothful so long. By noble toil, not by shallow laughter and vain talk, they made this English Existence from a savage forest into an arable inhabitable field for us; and we, idly dreaming it would grow spontaneous crops forever,—find it now in too questionable a state.”

— Thomas Carlyle

1850s, Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850), The Present Time (February 1, 1850)

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Thomas Carlyle 481

Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian… 1795–1881

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