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Dr. Robert W.
Dillon, Sr.
“Teufelsdröckh’s Zodiac: Krishna’s
Calendar in
Thomas Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus.” © 1984, 2006
1
In
Sartor Resartus, Diogenes Teufelsdröckh summarizes Thomas
Carlyle's theory of the symbol: 'Man thereby, though based. to
all seeming, on the small Visible, does nevertheless extend down
into the infinite deeps of the Invisible, of which Invisible, in-
deed, his life is properly the bodying forth.'1 Man is essentially
a duality of body and spirit, both descendental and transcendental,
visible as clothes and invisible as god-soul-geist.
Diogenes
Teufelsdröckh is per se a
symbol, a man yet a god, a body yet a mind,
a personality who conceals as well as reveals himself and his clothes
philosophy under the vesture of time. He is a man with no distinct
earthly origin, who was apparently sent from heaven as a prophet to
mankind. Wrapped in Persian clothes, Teufelsdröckh has Eastern origins
and an Eastern philosophy. All we know of his life is found in six
bags delivered to Herr Heushreck, the Editor of Sartor, who has the
thankless task of building the "hell bridge" over the chaos of six
bags of incoherent, disorganized, and incomplete biographical fragments.
The six bags--the key to Teufelsdröckh's character and the entire
clothes philosophy--are labeled with the last six signs of the Zodiac.
The Zodiac's enigmatic role in Sartor, Book Second, remains an odyssey
for the Editor, but a thorough theory on its role as symbol in Sartor
has yet to be undertaken.
Even the reader familiar with Carlylese
feels that the Zodiac conceals more than it reveals, but this is not
the case--a fact that is to be investigated in the ensuing pages.
1. Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr
Teufelsdröckh. Ed. Charles Frederick Harrold. (New York: Odyssey, 1937),
pp. 217-18. All subsequent primary references will be to this edition,
hereafter called Sartor.
2
Carlylean criticism either ignores the Zodiac in Sartor or
treats it inadequately, if not apologetically. G. B. Tennyson
establishes some significance in discussing the Zodiac bags: "In
short, Carlyle has taken the zodiac as another means of symbolizing events."2
But Tennyson's study, although an admirable analysis of
the total Sartor, sees the Zodiac as just one image in a larger net-
work of concerns. The problem that still remains regarding the use
of the Zodiac is twofold: first, why these particular signs?;
second, why the Zodiac in the first place? Both questions require
more thorough and exclusive analysis.
Teufelsdröckh's character and dilemma are archetypal, and the
Zodiac depicts his mythic pattern. Just as Teufelsdröckh
moves
from Genesis to the Everlasting Yea, a Bildungslehre or study in
character growth emerges. Teufelsdröckh's character growth and
peregrinations on this earth are symbolized on a cosmic scale in
the figure of the sun which symbolizes Teufelsdröckh moving through
the constellations that constitute the signs of the Zodiac. As will
be explained, each sign is symbolic of a particular stage in this
process of Bildung, with each sign appearing in a deliberate order of
experience. A study of Teufelsdröckh's life in terms of the zodiacal
signs will form a strategic unifying symbol for all of Sartor because
Teufelsdröckh is Gemut (Character), Werden (Origin) and Wirken (Effects)
in one
symbol,
and therefore he is the key to die Kleider (Clothes).
2. G. B. Tennyson, 'Sartor' Called 'Resartus': The
Genesis, Structure, and Style of
Thomas Carlyle's First Major Work (Princeton UP, 1965), p. 220.
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To discover a principle
of unity for Book Second is to find
the principle of unity
for all of Sartor. This key to das gemut of
Teufelsdöckh is the Zodiac. If Thomas Carlyle is to be consistent,
unity can only be found in seeming chaos. The editor insists in
"Prospective" that "Selection, order, appears to be unknown to the
Professor. In all Bags the same imbroglio."3 No "recognizable
coherence" exists, or so the Editor believes, but the Editor too
must be edited by the reader. Carlyle deliberately leaves the reader
with apparent chaos, believing that anything worthwhile must be
enigmatic, that some principle of silence or mystery is necessary.
Although a totally Utilitarian, mechanical explanation of the Zodiac
in Book Second might seem anti-Carlylean (too much Sprechen.
not enough Schweigen), a definite pattern is evident: first,
in the choice of the Zodiac as symbol in the first place; second, in
the choice of the last six signs (Libra through Pisces)
as the transcendental correlatives to Teufelsdröckh's Wanderlahre.
The chaos is a matter of surface style concealing geistig. As
symbols within a symbol, as clothes themselves, the signs of the
Zodiac must reveal, not just conceal.
The
Zodiac, therefore, is just so much clothing, but like all cloth, it
is the descendental key to the transcendental Pericardial
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tissue
of Sartor. The only information available to the Editor
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about
Teufelsdröckh is contained in the six bags of autobiographi-
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cal
fragments from which the Editor tries to derive some principle
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of
order for Sartor. Carlyle's use of the occult reinforces the
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significance of man as mystery, while it simultaneously reinforces
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man's
rage for order and a sense of place in the cosmos. In draw-
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ing
zodiacal distinctions, man seeks the transpersonal coalescence
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and
coherence among such distinctions. Carlyle's Zodiac is tradi-
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tional
in its mythic quest to unify opposite psychical states of
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mind
and states of being. The zodiacal signs have traditionally
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been
used as a symbol for the wholeness and coherence of created
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multiplicity:
The
division of the Zodiac into twelve sections (or into eight, sixteen,
or twenty sections) is based fundamentally upon the belief that the
universe is coherent and that the numbers are not mere inventions of
man allowing him
to
make purely quantitative distinctions, but rather the symbolic keys
to qualitative laws that govern the coherent universe. All
esoteric traditions have always sought to express the multiplicity
within unity, and this has always involved the use of numbers, and
the use of symbols; astrology is a particularly ingenious method of
combining them.4 |
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Teufelsdröckh's Zodiac in Sartor continues this symbolic
tradition
of relating the part to the whole, the many to the one, the material
to the immaterial, and the
personal to the transpersonal. 'The first problem is to unite
yourself with some one |
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and with somewhat,' says the
professor.5 The Zodiac is his vehicle to body forth this unity.
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So
far, no thorough investigation of the Zodiac as a principle
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4.
John Anthony West and Jan Gerhard Toonder,
Astrology
(New York: Coward-McCann, 1970), p. 30.
5. Sartor,
p. 129. |
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of
imagination has been undertaken, and certainly no attempt has
been made to focus it clearly in terms of the stages in Teufels-
dröckh's life and in terms of Carlyle's overall
aesthetic.
That Carlyle knew astrology and its associated myths
can be proven
inductively by an analysis of the undeniable facticity of their
applied presence in Sartor. He was
well trained in science and expressed
a desire to be an
astronomer. His knowledge of astrological myth, based on vast
readings, based on personal contacts with Schlegel's and
Emerson's direct knowledge and translations of Sanskrit, and on
his awareness of public and universal knowledge, make valid
application of Oriental and Occidental zodiacal myths an
inevitable reality in Sartor. Carlyle's only problem was
to unify man and myth in the biography and character of the hero
Teufelsdröckh. The use of the Zodiac to explain the human psyche
is not a new phenomenon, but it is as old as man himself. This
article will attempt to shed some imagination (Vernunft),
not metaphysics (Verstand), on the greatest "Sphinx
riddle" in Sartor--the Zodiac.
One fact is clearly
becoming accepted among Carlylean critics of Sartor,
i.e.,
that the signs refer somehow to the stages in the life of Teufelsdröckh.
But no definitive analysis has been made. In essence, Teufelsdröckh is the sun who travels the symbolic journey
through the signs of the Zodiac. The zodiacal pilgrimage from
Libra through Pisces is the cosmic equivalent of his
earthly pilgrimage |
6
from his "Genesis" through the
"Everlasting Yea." Carlyle calls
this process Palingenesia, an
early equivalent of Jung's archetype
of
transformation. Thomas Carlyle's principle of Palingenesia
(literally meaning "many
origins") has, as its major symbolic
vehicle, the zodiacal signs.
Libra
Thomas Carlyle uses zodiacal
signs seven through eleven as he
symbolizes life and its
archetypal stages through astrology. Sign
seven is Libra . Its
dates extend from September 23 to October 22--
the beginning of autumn.
Its traditional symbol, like the others,
is basically Oriental: 
As is the case with all signs
of the Zodiac,
it consists of a dualistic or dialectical
principle which
creates a unity or implies a stage in the development
or
disintegration of a unity. Christian interpretation sees in the
above sign the
symbols of the cross and the sword, stressing both the
necessity of
death as the purpose and end of birth, as well as the
principle of
struggle found in the church-militant metaphor. Another
Western
interpretation sees the Libra symbol as the beam of a balance
and the top of
an altar--a more likely interpretation. Libra is
symbolized by
the zodiacal scales and is, above all, a sign of balance.
Libra
encompasses Chapters I and II of Book Second of Sartor ("Genesis"
and "Idyllic").
The sign, Libra, directly symbolizes the serenity and
pastoral harmony
of Teufelsdröckh's early years with the Futterals, a
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period largely
untouched by discord. Libra is psychical balance
of childhood
innocence, the equilibrium between the spiritual
ego of
man (Selbst)and the external ego (personality), between
'Me'
and
'Not-Me,' between good and evil. The Editor says, quoting
Teufelsdröckh,
“In the village of Entepfuhl,” thus writes he in
the
Bag Libra, on various Papers, which we arrange with
difficulty
“dwelt
Andreas Futteral and his wife; childless.” 6 In des-
cribing the arrival
of the stranger carrying the baby-basket,
Teufelsdröckh
continues, 'Into this umbrageous Man's-rest, one
meek yellow evening
or dusk, when the Sun, hidden indeed from
terrestrial Entepfuhl,
did nevertheless journey visible and radiant
along the celestial
Balance(Libra) ••••” 7
And so, Teufelsdröckh
arrives in a basket, Moses-like, but
dressed in Oriental clothes, "overhung with green Persian silk."
The Editor repeats '••••• the Sun was in Libra ••••••'
8 Libra is the
only constellation mentioned in Book Second until Chapter III
and, logically as well as symbolically, it bodies forth
Teufelsdröckh's
idyllic childhood("Happy Childhood"). This happy time is not ex-
posed to Time the destroyer and to the evils of Blakean
experience:
'The young spirit has awakened out of Eternity, and knows not
what
we mean by Time; as yet Time is no fast-hurrying stream, but a
sportful sunlit ocean… years to the child are as ages.'9 Youth
is
man's only truly happy period mostly because of its lack of the
consciousness of evil. Maturity brings only blasted fruit.
In |
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6. |
Ibid. |
pp. 81-82.
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7.
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Ibid.
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p.
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83.
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8.
Ibid..,
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p.
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85.
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9.Ibid.,
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p.
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90.
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Wordsworthian terms, the
child is closer to his heavenly home and
to God. The child still has his intimations of immortality, is
still uncorrupted by his human prison, including Utilitarianism,
"Necessity," and human habit.
But akin to Blake's
Innocence, there is a blindness in child-
hood where creativity often gives way to mimesis and obedience.
Teufelsdröckh's only criticism of his childhood was that it was
'rigorous,' 'too frugal,' 'too Stoical.’10 But this deference to
'Obedience' and 'Duty' was to become a formative element in his
later adult character--the Hindu, ascetic element of the mature
Brahman Teufelsdröckh. It is in Libra that he experiences
birth
and childhood; therefore, Libra functions for the
process of Palingenesia as the Child is Father of the Man.
Like Wordsworth's six-year old of pygmy size in the Intimations Ode,
the child be
comes the victim of habit. Teufelsdröckh says,
'My
Active Power ••• was
unfavorably hemmed-in.’ 11 As in Blake's Songs of Innocence,
the experience to be realized is always latently present in the idyllic
childhood. Childhood is not all carefree joy; therefore, in the
symbol of Libra, both lines of the zodiacal sign are not perfectly straight and parallel.
In the book, Outer
Space, the Jobes speak of the personality traits of the Man
under Libra--shy, mild-mannered, humane, but |
10 Ibid., p. 98.
11 Ibid.
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above all,
intellectual and pleasure-loving.12 The latter qualities
fit Teufelsdröckh's early life well. Also, the sign of Libra
portrays light held mythically by darkness, an ironic fact found in
the innocence-experience of the to-be professor's childhood. There-
fore, the zodiacal sign of Libra is the perfect symbol of Teufels-
dröckh's character in the first two stages of his Palingenesia--
"Genesis" and "Idyllic."
Scorpio
The eighth sign of the Zodiac is Scorpio, the scorpion. Ac-
cording to astrological calendars, its dates span the days from
October 23 through November 21. As the sun enters Scorpio, it
moves toward winter. Teufelsdröckh passes from his idy1lic in-
nocence and enters the first of several incidents that will form
his experience as he moves farther into the rite of passage and
enters the fringes of the heart of darkness. His childhood
of light ends. In Scorpio, darkness comes more quickly as days
grow shorter.
The symbol for Scorpio is
 --a
crowned snake
or basilisk with the arrow denoting the tail of the scorpion.
Again, the astrological symbol is dialectical in nature, indicating
a tensional motion in many directions. In Book Second, Scorpio
embodies the first half of Chapter III--the Hinterschlag Gymnasium
episode. Hinterschlag can mean back-biting, the physical
12. Gertrude and James Jobes, Outer Space: Myths,
Name, Meanings,
Calendars from the Emergence of History to the Present Day
(New York and London: The Scarecrow Press, 1964), p. 204.
Henceforth cited as Outer Space.
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action of the
scorpion biting defensively, claws forward, from behind. The
scorpion is Teufelsdröckh engaged in verbal assault about his
early education and the uselessness of book learning:
"My teachers ••• were hide-bound Pedants, without knowledge of
man's nature.'13 It is at this point that Teufelsdröckh
ex-
periences human inanity and has his first encounter with evil
through miseducation: 'With my first view of the Hinterschlag
Gymnasium ••• my evil days began.’14 The Scorpio stage
in Teufelsdröckh's Palingenesia is a prolonged Carlylean
criticism of educa-
tion based on memory, metaphysics, and the rod (ala Dickens'
Grinders Academy). Teachers used the birch-rod freely, were
'mechanical
Gerund-grinder (s),' who served only to destroy the creative,
active imagination of youth.
Also, under the sign
of Scorpio, Teufelsdröckh's stepfather,
Andreas Futteral, dies. For the first time, Teufelsdröckh
experien-
ces acute human isolation. He now assumes the role of Ishmael
say-
ing, 'I was like no other.’15 He reasserts his isolation amid
his
academic wasteland: “I was among strangers, harshly, at best
indif-
ferently, disposed towards me; the young heart felt, for the
first
time, quite orphaned and alone.”16 Like Scorpio,
Teufelsdröckh has
his claws facing Libra, recollecting his idyllic days,
contrasting
them in anger with his unhappy present in the Hinterschlag
Gymnasium. |
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13.
Sartor, p. 105. |
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14. |
Ibid. |
p. |
103. |
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15. |
Ibid. |
p. |
107. |
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16. |
Ibid. |
p. |
103. |
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The initial reaction to his present
education is a perverse back-
biting, a profound bitterness of soul at being so misled and
used. Of the scorpion character, the
Jobes say that he is strong-
willed, self-absorbed and sarcastic. 17
Teufelsdröckh shows strength
of will in asserting the Self
against the death of Andreas; he shows
sarcasm in what is the theme of this
Scorpio stage in his Palingenesia
--sarcastic criticism: "As if in the
Bag Scorpio, Teufelsdröckh had not al-
ready expectorated his antipedagogic
spleen ••••” 18
Sagittarius
The Editor, rummaging through the Bag Sagittarius, the ninth
sign of the Zodiac, discovers that Teufelsdröckh has journeyed
from the Gymnasium to the University. Sagittarius spans the dates
of November 22 through December 21--taking Teufelsdröckh up to the
beginning of the winter solstice. In Book Second, the Bag
Sagittarius
encompasses the last half of Chapter III dealing with University
life: "In the Bag Sagittarius, as we at length discover, Teufels¬
dröckh has become a University man •••• "19 Both the symbol of
Sagit-
tarius and its thematic content body forth the psychical stage of
Teufelsdröckh as he enters a darker stage in his rite of passage
than that found in the earlier sign. The symbol for Sagittarius is
. The symbol denotes the bow (tension) and the arrow of
Sagittarius the Archer.
17. Outer Space, p. 243.
18. Sartor, p. 109.
19. Ibid., p. 10
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Again, this sign is a dualistic contrast of two linear
formations.
The arrow represents what is now Teufelsdröckh's positive,
pointed
criticism towards the academic life in the University: "As if,
from the name Sagittarius, he had thought himself called
upon to
shoot arrows.”20 The arrows resemble the barbs of criticism
thrown
at
university professors. The criticism is direct, rarely
sarcastic,
but always incisive. For example, he refers to the cliche of
the 'blind leading the blind,' as 'Deception takes the place
and wages
of Performance.' 21 He refers to the pseudo-professors who can no
longer teach, but who only live in ease on their reputations.
In
Sagittarius, Teufelsdröckh aims his arrows at short
range;
he has no specific long range goal or target in life. He is
still
caught between his past and his present. In astronomy, the arrow
of Sagittarius is aimed at Scorpio indicating the
dialectical tend
ency of the mythical signs to point in two directions, like the
human mind--one forward, one backward in time. The bow in
Sagittarius
symbolizes, perhaps with some influence from Heraclitus, the
tensional
principle which sustains all of Sartor.
The tension most evident in the Sagittarius stage of
Teufels-
dröckh's Palingenesia is one between belief and
skepticism. He
suffers from an "impotent Scepticism." According to Carlyle,
ages
of skepticism must alternate in dialectical fashion with ages of
faith, 'As in the long-drawn systole and long-drawn diastole,
must
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20.
Ibid., p. 109.
21. Ibid., p. 110. |
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the period of
Faith alternate with the period of Denial.'22 This
notion later becomes the "Phoenix" doctrine of Book
Third of Sar-
tor.
Within Teufelsdröckh, negativity alternates with
positivity.
He suffers 'fever paroxysms of Doubt,' undergoes a
'nightmare of
Unbelief,' and 'Purgatory pain.' It is during the
University period
that he realizes the necessity of suffering during the
rite of pas-
sage; however, it is also from this suffering that
Teufelsdröckh
realizes his own formative genius and has inklings of
the clothes
philosophy to come. He has achieved his first "toughguttism"
against the insipidity of the world with its mechanical
systems of
education.
The sign
Sagittarius, with the arrow thrusting through the
parallel lines, symbolizes Teufelsdröckh's subconscious
'Me' sur-
facing through into consciousness. The arrow emerges,
along with
his manhood, from the threshold of the submerged Self,
indicating
upward movement and character growth. Education has
proven to be
his negative key to self-consciousness. Like Sagittarius
the
Archer, Teufelsdröckh is a centaur figure—half
intellect, half
animal. The zodiacal sign upholds the dualistic
principle of the
character as avatar whose time of public life nears and
whose
doubt begins
to vie with certainty for the man's soul. Like a
Biblical figure,
Teufelsdröckh is in a 'desert waste and howling with
savage monsters.'
As Teufelsdröckh is about to enter the winter solstice
of his life,
where he learns to cultivate his intellectual side as a
defense against the
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14
world and its evils. It is also
interesting to note that Ishmael,
here Teufelsdröckh's prototype, became an archer (Genesis xxi,
20).23
In Sagittarius, Teufelsdröckh emerges as the prophet,
stres-
sing eternity as man's goal through work in time (the
"Seed-field")--
'For man lives in Time, has his whole earthly being, endeavor
and
destiny shaped for him by Time. Only in the transitory
Time-Symbol
is the ever-motionless Eternity we stand on made manifest.' 24
It is
in Sagittarius that Teufelsdröckh first formulates the basis of
the Carlylean theories of Time and Natural Supernaturalism. The
Jobes, in Outer Space, note the character traits of the
Sagittarian--
he is candid, impatient, ambitious, just and prophetic--some of
Teufelsdröckh's major qualities during the University stage of his
Palingenesia. 25
Pisces
Instead of proceeding to Capricornus, the next and
tenth sign of
the Zodiac, Teufelsdröckh's life is now in the Bag Pisces—the
twelfth sign of the Zodiac. Therefore, Teufelsdröckh's rite of
initia-
tion does not follow the chronological order of signs
7,8,9,10,11, and
12. Instead, the sun follows the following path through the
zodiacal
chain-- 7,8,9,12,10, and 11. This break in the sequence might be
called
the displaced Bag theory in Sartor. Theoretically, Pisces
should come
last; instead, it comes two-thirds of the way through the
journey.
This displacement problem and its solution reside in the fact
that the
23. Ibid., p. 114.
24. Ibid., p. 112.
25. Outer Space, p. 239.
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reader, weaned on western archetypes, expects
Teufelsdröckh's Ever-
lasting Yea to occur in Spring. We are
accustomed to equating
resurrection with Easter and the vernal equinox,
i.e., with Pisces
(March). However, the Oriental mind does not
draw such an equation.
Death and resurrection are simultaneous and they
occur, in the
Oriental liturgy, during the winter solstice. By
going directly
from Sagittarius to Pisces,
Carlyle applies an Oriental pattern of
dark initiation, not an Occidental pattern of
light and reason.
Another solution to the Pisces
displacement problem is the
fact that Carlyle was fond of deliberately
breaking and thwarting
the reader's logical, habitual patterns of
thinking. Like Laurence
Sterne, Carlyle deliberately breaks a pattern
previously set up just
to disrupt the metaphysician's Verstand.
Carlyle's approach is
intuitive and imaginative, not empirical and
rational. Carlyle
was fond of structural irony, i.e., using
asymmetrical structure to
satirize symmetry itself. For example,
Teufelsdröckh engages heavily
in metaphysics in his autobiographical scraps,
but Carlyle detested
metaphysics. He uses the structural technique of
metaphysics to
satirize metaphysical content in Western
thinking. The Oriental
mind, unlike its Western counterpart, is
accustomed to the irrational
and the illogical. Therefore, Carlyle
deliberately breaks the
slavishly chronological pattern of the pattern
from Libra through Pisces.
A
third solution to the displacement of Pisces
(placed between
Sagittarius and Capricornus) lies in
the autobiography itself. The
displacement is organic to the man,
Teufelsdröckh, and to his Palingenesia.
.The "Springtime" of Teufelsdröckh's
life, his "Easter" |
16
of sorts, is in his young
manhood. Carlyle uses Pisces to symbolize
the character's coming-of-age; therefore, Pisces
naturally follows
Sagittarius as manhood follows the University
life. The reader must
remember that Teufelsdröckh's life after the University
covers an in-
definite number of years. The winter months of the
Zodiac encompass
months from different years, not months from the same
year. Therefore,
a slavishly chronological order would be both foolish
and inappropriate
for Carlyle's purpose and for Teufelsdröckh's character
development.
As G. B. Tennyson notes, "But Teufelsdröckh's life is
measured not by
months, but by years.”26 Chances are that there are at
least five
years of the professor's life covered between Chapter IV
and Chapter
IX, between his graduation from the University and his
Everlasting Yea.
Pisces, embodying the birth dates between
February 19 and March 20,
is the crucial time of Teufelsdröckh's Bildung. He now
applies his
previous knowledges to a new confrontation with the
external world, a
confrontation between the 'Me' and the 'Not-Me.'
Pisces covers Chapter
IV ("Getting Under Way") and the early part of Chapter
V. In the Bag
Pisces, early indications of love for Blumine are
to be found, but the
love crisis itself is not in Pisces. According to
Oriental mythology.
Pisces represents self-assertion against the
world, and the 'Me' con-
tains within itself the beginning of a new cycle in
life. 27 Under
Pisces, Teufelsdröckh applies the "thaumaturgic
art of thought" to the
Self and its relationship to the 'Not-Me.'
Teufelsdröckh says, 'But
26. Tennyson, p. 219.
27. J .E. Cirlot, Dictionary of Symbols, trans. Jack
Sage.
(New York: Philosophical Library, 1962), p. 244.
17
the hardest problems were ever this first'—“To find by
study of your-
self, and of the ground you stand on, what your combined
inward and
outward Capability specially is.” 28 During
Bildung, while the sun
is in Pisces, Teufelsdröckh learns the essence of
the work philosophy
--the discovery and application of an innate capability
to the environ-
ment ( Not-Me). Bildung, as bodied forth under
Pisces, is the key to
Carlyle's theory of work.
In Pisces, Teufelsdröckh's
psychical progression takes on a
greater tension, beginning with an archetypal falling
pattern that
will reach its dark night of the soul in the love fiasco
with Blumine.
The Editor sets the stage for the fall to come: "We see
here, signifi-
cantly foreshadowed, the spirit of much that was to
befall our Auto-
biographer, the historical embodiment of which, as it
painfully takes
shape in his Life, lies scattered, in dim disastrous
details, through
this Bag Pisces and those that follow.”29
Teufelsdröckh now confronts
the world--alone and without guidance. The "Son of Time"
suffers from
der Angst, has "No Object.” 29 He practices law
(auscultator-
ship), even serves as a tutor. He fails at both.
Furthermore, in Pisces, Teufelsdröckh suffers
from nineteenth-
century dualism. The symbol for Pisces further
bodies forth Teufels-
dröckh's dualistic character as he gets under way in the
world:
 .
Pisces is Latin for fish (plural) represented by the
two curved lines in the diagram. The horizontal line
represents the
fixed element. The two fish are parallel, but are facing
different
28. Sartor, p. 119.
29. Ibid., pp. 120-121.
18
|
directions, indicating dualism and
tension. Both are half in and
half out of the universal
solvent--water. From an Oriental view
point, the upper halves represent
evolution, while the lower halves
represent involution. Cirlot stresses
the left fish as involution,
the right as evolution. 31
Either way, the evolution stage
implies
Teufelsdröckh's radicalism, his
Bildung that wants to progress
in the world outside the self. The
involutive half is Teufelsdröckh's
desire to return to an old cycle,
perhaps with new manifestations.
The latter is his Stoical half. his "Hindoo"
passivity. He is caught
between two worlds: the past dead, the
future uncertain. This
dualism is aggravated by his
predeliction for metaphysics. Like an
early Prufrock, Teufelsdröckh desires
without acting, is aware of
Time as both Kronos (Destroyer) and
Chronos (Creator and Preserver).
He falls upon the thorns of life. The
result, in Pisces,
is a nightmare of uncertainty.
Therefore, in Pisces,
Teufelsdröckh emerges as a character
distinct
from his submerging environment, but the
emergence is incomplete. The
Messianic implications of fish as a
Christ symbol are probable and are
certainly not in conflict with
Teufelsdröckh's role as avatar. Cirlot
mentions in relation to Pisces
that the piscean avatar was in the
form
of a fish or Vishnu in Indian
mythology.31 Above all, the Pisces
sym-
bol represents the character's
nineteenth-century psychical
schizophrenia
and its ensuing stasis. He suffers from
what Carlyle called the disease
of the age--self-consciousness: '0
Time-Spirit! How hast thou environed
and imprisoned us •••• Me. however, as a
Son of Time. unhappier than some
|
|
30. Cirlot, p. 244.
31.Ibid. |
19
|
others, was Time threatening to eat
prematurely; for, strive as
I might, there was no good Running, so
obstructed was the path,
so gyved were the feet.’32 So the
character feels stopped in his
path. Of interest, the Jobes list the
traits of the Pisces char-
acter-- sensual, sensitive, psychic,
restless and unaggressive.33
Teufelsdröckh refuses the attitude of
bold attack against the world
|
|
and becomes "too defensive," i.e.,
involutive. He is a creature of
"Division, not union." |
|
Capricornus
Teufelsdröckh's most vulnerable stage in
his Bildung, the most
critical step in the entire
Palingenesia, is the romance with
Blumine.
This occurs during, and is found in, the
bag Capricornus. In Sartor,
the Bag Capricornus encompasses
the end of the "Getting under Way"
phase and proceeds through the "romance"
itself (Chapter V), through
the "Sorrows of Teufelsdröckh" (Chapter
VI) into, but not including, the
actual Everlasting No of Chapter VII.
Teufelsdröckh's actual denial
of the Everlasting No, which occurs at
the very end of Chapter VII,
is not under Capricornus.
Therefore, the chapters of
Teufelsdröckh's
life encompassed by Capricornus
are late IV through most of VII.
This can be proven both by occasional
references to Capricornus during
this stage of development, as well as by
a particular reference to
the adjacent Bag theory. The Editor
states in Chapter V: "From
multifarious Documents in this Bag
Capricornus, and in the adjacent
|
|
32. Sartor, pp. 127-128.
33. Outer Space, p. 232. |
20
|
ones on both sides thereof, it becomes
manifest that our philosopher,
as stoical and cynical as he now looks,
was heartily and even frantic
ally in Love."34. Therefore, amid the
chaos of autobiographical Bags,
love elements are found scattered in
Pisces and in Aquarius, but
evidence proves that Capricornus
is the primary zodiacal sign for the
jilt by Blumine.
Capricornus
spans the days from December 22 through
January 19;
the
sun enters the winter solstice in
Capricornus. The love affair
with Blumine and its subsequent jilt and
chronic despair occur during
the heart of winter--a fitting and
organic symbol for Teufelsdröckh's
dark night of the soul, his winter of
discontent brought on by Blumine's
jilt. It is both fitting and necessary
that Capricornus occur between
Pisces and Aquarius because,
organically, Teufelsdröckh's naivete in
love and his doubt brought on by his
University years are
responsible for his inability to love
fully. Subsequently, his failure at love
brings on the confrontation with the
Everlasting No. The jilt by
Blumine makes the 'No' possible by the
acute despair it effects.
Psychical descent makes ascent and
subsequent resurrection possible.
Like Eliot's Prufrock and Dostoyevsky's
underground man, Carlyle's
Teufelsdröckh is incapable of physical
confrontation with the 'Not-
Me.’ He sees Blumine in zodiacal terms
as totally transcendental,
and his idealization of her is a
probable cause of the jilt. She
is an 'Angel,' a work of 'Celestial
Art,' the 'Goddess of Flowers.'
Teufelsdröckh states his heavenly love
in zodiacal
terms:
'It
was
appointed…that the high celestial orbit
of Blumine should intersect
|
21
the low sublunary
one of our Forlorn.’ 35 Far from
sublunary,
Teufelsdröckh has no confidence in himself; he
is no match
for the "Queen of Hearts." He engages in
"Fantasy" and "Aes-
thetic Tea," and so the hyacinth girl deserts
her Tiresias. The
Editor describes the fall from love in zodiacal
terms: "Suffice
it to know that Teufelsdröckh rose into the
highest regions of
the empyrean, by a natural parabolic track, and
returned thence
in a quick perpendicular one.” 36
As a sign of the Zodiac, Capricornus bodies
forth Teufelsdröckh's
"Romance" episode. In astrology, Capricornus
begins the process of
dissolution with a distinctly sexual basis, an
appropriate descrip-
tion of the professor's dilemma. His character
traits are also typi-
cal of the Capricorn in that the Jobes say he is
one who suffers
much tragedy.37 Because Capricornus marks the
lowest point in Teufels-
dröckh's journey, other mythical facts increase
the interest in this
sign. Joseph Campbell makes note in The Masks
of God of the cycle of
God Enki or Ea in Occidental mythology.38
Ea was the god of the
house of water. Ea myth is embodied in the
symbol of Capricornus--
The god Ea had the foreparts of a goat, but the
body of a fish. In the context of Book Second,
the fish element of
the dualistic Capricornus refers to
Pisces where fish and water are
predominant elements. The goat element of
Capricornus stresses the
element of earth. Both elements symbolize the
dual tendencies of
35. Ibid., p. 136.
36. Ibid., p. 145.
37. Outer Space, p. 142.
38. Joseph Campbell, The Masks of God:
Occidental Mythologv
(New York: Viking, 1964), pp. 349-50.
22
|
life toward the abyss (water and
fish) and toward the heights
(the
goat). In Hindu myth, both fish
and goat represent the involu-
tive and evolutive tendencies of
the human psyche. In Occidental
mythology, the goat is
frequently a symbol of sterility
and lust.
In the Old Testament, the animal
is frequently linked with
the purgative element of fire as
a sacrificial animal. If not
immolated,
the goat is a scapegoat, forced
into the desert bearing the sins
of
the people. In Capricornus,
the contrasting elements of sea
and earth, water and fire, are
symbolized.
On December 25, in
Capricornus, the sun enters
fully the winter
solstice for rebirth, according
to Oriental myth. Ea, according
to
Campbell, functioned as a god of
purification in the water
rituals.
Ea's Greek name (Occidental
mythology) was Oannes, i.e.,
John in
English, John the Baptist in
Christian thinking.39 The idea
of re-
birth subsequent upon death and
purification by water is a fact
in
Teufelsdröckh's fiasco with
Blumine. It is on December 25
that the
Hindus celebrate the New Year by
the rebirth of the new god
through
the death of the old god pulled
from the Ganges. The Western
cycle
of Easter, with its Crucifixion
and Resurrection, occurs in
Oriental
ritual on December
25--ironically the Western date
for Christmas.
Both events, of course, are
connected because there is no
resurrection
without birth and death, but the
two are simultaneous in the
Brahman's
ceremony at the dawn of the new
year. In short, Blumine is both
Teufelsdröckh's death and the
seed of his potential
resurrection
from that death. He is the
Sol
Invictus,
the resurrected sun whose
|
23
|
cycle will take its
final form in
Aquarius, although
it commences with death
in Capricornus. |
|
Aquarius
As Teufelsdröckh, the
"Son of Time," enters
Aguarius,
the process
of Palingenesia
reaches its redemptive
climax. Teufels-
dröckh undergoes what
was later to be called
the archetype of
transformation (Jung).
Aquarius
encompasses the dates
from January
20 through February 18.
In Book Second of
Sartor, this period
in
volves the very end of
Chapter VII (Everlasting
No) through Chapter
IX (Everlasting
Yea)--the very heart of
Sartor Resartus
and Teufels-
dröckh’s transformation.
The conversional pattern
of Nea-Indifference
Yea is Pauline and
Augustinian (Confessions),
a cataclysmic, traumatic
transmogrification of a
character's entire
personality. The change
is both mystical-- fast
and drastic-- but
nevertheless real and
total. The
archetypal symbol of
this conversion is found
in the sign of
Aquarius
with its implications of
rebirth by water.
Capricornus ends and
Aquarius begins at
the point in
Teufelsdröckh's life
where unrest
ceases to be his sole
guidance, He may still
have doubt, but his
doubt has a "fixed
centre" to revolve
around. He stops running
from
himself and decides to
face his own fears. At
the end of Chapter VII,
the professor says,
'Despicable biped! What
is the sum total of the
worst that lies before
thee? Death?' He asks
the crucial question,
'What art thou afraid
of?’ 40 Teufelsdröckh
rejects the Devil and
the
so-called "Satanic
School" of thinking
(damning the world
without con-
structive action and
recreation); he rejects
the capacity of the
|
24
|
world to destroy
his existence,
'I will meet it
and deny it!'
|
|
Teufelsdröckh's
own 'No' is the
rejection of the
Everlasting
|
|
No's rejection
of him. Defiance
defies all, and
then : |
|
My whole Me
stood up, in
native
God-created
majesty, and
with emphasis
recorded its
Protest •••• The
Everlasting No
had said,
"Behold, thou
art fatherless,
outcast, and the
Universe is mine
(the Devil's),"
to which my
whole Me now
made answer, "I
am not thine but
Free, and
forever hate
thee!"41
|
|
This is
Teufelsdröckh's
'Baphometic
Fire-baptism'
whereby he
"began
|
|
to be a Man."
The element of
water found in
baptism exists
literally
|
|
in Aquarius,
the water
constellation,
and is implied
in the
|
|
death and
purification by
water in
Capricornus.
The fire element
was |
|
also implied in
Capricornus
in the image of
the sacrificial
goat.
|
|
Buddhistic
asceticism
demands the
cleansing of the
Self by fire as
well as
by water (cf.,
"The Wasteland")
as preliminary
to what Carlyle
calls
Selbsttödtung (self-annihilation),
and subsequent
absorption into
|
|
Teufelsdröckh's
self denial is
the conscious
beginning of the
|
|
Self's rebirth.
But his soul is
not yet ready
for redemptive
action-- |
|
"The end of Man
is an Action,
and not a
Thought." The
Centre of In-
|
|
Difference
(Chapter VIII)
is also
experienced
under
Aquarius.
This
|
|
"Centre" is the
void world, like
the infinite
spiral, dark
staircase
|
|
(St. John and
Eliot) that
exists between
the realization
of |
|
the necessity of
action and the
action itself,
between the
denial and
|
|
the affirmation.
During this
period,
Teufelsdröckh
engages in
Carlyle's
|
|
"secular well"
theory of
redeeming the
time before
action through
|
|
physical contact
with the
'Not-Me' for "wholesomer
food" for the
soul.
|
|
He visits the
Great Wall of
China,
battlefields,
much like Childe
|
25
|
Harold, but
with an
acute sense
of purpose.
He
concentrates
on the
|
|
Not-Me,
awaiting the
time and
opportunity
for
redemptive
action.
|
|
The
Everlasting
Yea is the
zenith of
the Aquarian
cycle. Here
the actual rebirth occurs in all its psychical and physical manifes-
|
|
tations.
Carlyle
combines the
path of the
Karma
Yoga
with the
Cal-
|
|
vanistic
doctrine of
work to form
the
Everlasting
Yea. Action
is the
|
|
only cure
for
uncertainty
and the hell
of the Self.
This
redemptive
|
|
process of
Yea involves
distinct
stages.
First, the
character
under-
|
|
goes the
fire
cleansing of
the 'No';
then he
denies the
physical
|
|
world as
être-en-soi;
both are
followed by
"Close thy
Byron; Open
thy
Goethe,"
i.e., the
doctrine of
Entsagen
(Renunciation).
Next the
|
|
character
undergoes
Selbsttödtung
or the
destruction
of the ego.
You
|
|
'lessen your
denominator,'
says Teufelsdröckh,
i.e., your
old ego and
|
|
concern for
the 'Me.'
Lastly, a
love for the
'Not-Me'
eclipses the
|
|
love for the
'Me.' The
character
shows pity
for mankind
where
formerly
|
|
he had shown
only scorn:
'Love not
Pleasure;
love God.
This is
the |
|
Everlasting
Yea,
wherein all
contradiction
is solved:
wherein
whoso
walks and
works, it is
well with
him.'
42
Teufelsdröckh
realizes
that
|
|
he must
"Produce,"
he must
work: •••••
“the problem
is not now
to deny,
|
|
but to
ascertain
and
perform."
He realizes
that the
only
impediment
|
|
to action is
the Self:
'Fool! the
Idea is in
thyself, the
impediment
|
|
too is in
thyself.'
Man
positively
redeems
himself out
of the
negativity
of his own
human
condition.
43
|
|
42. Ibid.,
p. 192
43. Ibid.,
p.196.
|
26
|
Aquarius
marks
the
heart
and
culmination
of
Teufelsdröckh's
|
|
resurrection.
Because
the
dates
of
Aquarius
span
January
20
|
|
through
February
18,
resurrection
occurs
not
in
springtime,
but
|
|
in
the
heart
of
winter
and
in
the
heart
of
darkness--an
Oriental
|
|
notion.
The
symbol
for
Aquarius,
like
the
other
five
zodiacal
signs
|
|
discussed,
is
graphically
based
on a
dualistic,
tensional
principle,
|
|
a
unity
of
two
life
principles.
But
unlike
the
other
signs
of
the
|
|
Zodiac,
the
two
lines
in
Aquarius
are
absolutely
parallel
and
identical,
|
|
symbolizing
a
harmony
or
synthesis
achieved
by
tension:
|
|
The
top
line
is
involution;
the
bottom
is
evolution.
For
the
first
|
|
time
in
his
life,
Teufelsdröckh
has
achieved
synthesis
of
involution
|
|
and
evolution,
the
two
tensional
stages
formative
of
human
development.
|
|
His
Everlasting
Yea
is
representative
of
the
final
stage
in a
series
of
|
|
steps
in
his
Palingenesia.
He
has
completed
one
revolution
in
the
|
|
Oriental
wheel
of
rebirth.
The
lines
of
the
Aquarian
symbol
denote
the
flux
(parallel)of
water
itself,
a
symbolic
flood,
the
end
of
one
formal
|
|
universe
and
the
completion
of a
cycle.
The
dark
night
of
the
soul
|
|
has
run
its
course.
The
'Me'
is
reabsorbed
into
the
Oneness,
the
God
|
|
whence
it
came,
and
all
preceding
elements,
which
originally
lead
to
|
|
individual
extremes
and
dualisms,
become
One.
Aquarius
represents
decom-
position
and
dissolution
(Goethe's
Selbsttödtung)
originally
recorded
by
|
|
the
flooding
of
the
Nile.
It
represents
the
imminence
of
liberation
and
|
|
the
dissolution
of
the
phenomenal
world--both
primary
elements
in
Carlyle's
|
27
|
transcendental aesthetic. The phenomenal world is clothing and its |
|
only function is to symbolize and body forth essence and infinity.
The world is geistig, first and last.
Teufelsdröckh's journey as Sol Invictus of Sartor Resartus ends
fittingly and organically in Aquarius, in winter, in the house of |
|
the water carrier where the soul is reborn. Therefore, it can be |
|
seen that Carlyle follows more the Hindu paths and its calendar,
less the Occidental path and its calendric archetypes. After
all, a tailor retailors many suits of clothes. The importance is to
retailor into a harmony. The Jobes state that the Aquarian is
"fortunate," that he is "life-giving.”44 Sartor Resartus is not an |
|
Occidental book in texture, but is a beautiful and violent reaction to
mechanical, Occidental thinking. Its solution is one of imagination,
not of understanding--as Carlyle defines the terms. |
|
Life is one situation with two homes--earth and heaven. We live |
|
on the descendental earth with our heads in the transcendental heavens. |
|
Carlyle says that there is a "Godlike in human affairs." Man is god-
Krishna--this is Carlyle's rich synthesis as he combines Oriental and |
|
Occidental religious myths, as he combines Romanticism and Utilitarianism. |
|
Everything man does is godlike and his redemption must come from his |
|
physical actions in time--a not unwholly Christian good deeds notion. |
|
Man's acts are mirrored in the cosmos because Carlyle, like the |
|
Orientals, postulates a god not distant and different from man.
This divinity, seen through the Zodiac in Sartor, is both immanent
and transcendental simultaneously. As Campbell states regarding the
|
|
Oriental cults, 'The two strengths, outside and within, are finally
to be recognized as identical."45 These are the involutive and
evolutive principles seen in every sign of the Zodiac, and which are
bodied forth in the life of Carlyle's modern Everyman--Diogenes
Teufelsdröckh. The Zodiac, embodying Carlyle's theory of the symbol
and man, represents the psychical stages of every man's character
growth as he/she passes through the Palingenesia. This world is not
distinct from eternity. God-man, as seen in Teufelsdröckh, is time-
in-eternity. God is a state of awareness based on action. Campbell
best sums up the relation between sign (Zodiac) and God in myth when
he says that God is "to be attained by way of the initiatory, knowledge-
releasing imagery of the 'God' as through a sign. The function of
such signs is to effect psychical change of immediate value in itself.”46
This is identical to what Carlyle says of Hierograms in Sartor: “The
Man is the spirit he worked in; not what he did, but what he became.
Facts are engraved Hierograms, for which the fewest have the key."47
|
45. Campbell, p.257.
46. Ibid. |
47.Sartor, p.203 |
************
|
