Page:Essays and studies; by members of the English Association, volume 1.djvu/196

 less than in the direct light which it recognized in man himself—he found the new faith, and the new motive to action and patience, of which he was in search.

There are two passages of his published works in which Carlyle makes explicit reference to these doctrines. One of these occurs in the Lectures on Heroes (v). The other, which is the earlier and therefore for our purposes the more significant of the two, is to be found in the essay on The State of German Literature (1827), to which allusion has been made so often:—

The date of this passage enables us to carry back Carlyle's acquaintance with Fichte to the very beginning of his literary career; to the years immediately following his first venture in authorship, the Life of Schiller, and immediately preceding the composition of his earlier Essays and that of Sartor