So early one November morning he set out in the cold and dark
upon his long tramp of more than eighty miles to Edinburgh. It
was dark when he left the house, and his father and mother went
with him a little way, and then they turned back and left Tom to
trudge along in the growing light, with another boy a year or two
older who was returning to college.
Little is known of Carlyle's college days. After five years'
study, at nineteen he became a schoolmaster, still with the
intention of later becoming a minister as his father wished. But
for teaching Carlyle had no love, and after some years of it,
first in schools and then as a private tutor, he gave it up. He
gave up, too, the idea of becoming a minister, for he found he
had lost the simple faith of his fathers and could not with good
conscience teach to others what he did not thoroughly believe
himself. He gave up, too, the thought of becoming a barrister,
for after a little study he found he had no bent for law.
Already he had begun to write.
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