The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Past and Present

PAST AND PRESENT, a work by Thomas Carlyle, published in England in April 1843 and in May in the United States. It was written in seven weeks, as a respite from the harassing labor of writing &lsquo;Cromwell.&rsquo; In 1842, the Camden Society had published the &lsquo;Chronicles of the Abbey of Saint Edmund's Bury,&rsquo; written by Joceline de Brakelonde, at the close of the 12th century. This account of a mediæval monastery had taken Carlyle's fancy; and in &lsquo;Past and Present&rsquo; he contrasts the England of his own day with the England of Joceline de Brakelonde.