This bracing doctrine carries us at once into The Everlasting Yea.  It is not enough that a man pass from the morbid and self-centered mood to an interest in the outward world that surrounds him.  That might transform him simply into a curious but heartless dilettante, a mere tourist of the spirit, whose sole desire is to see and to take notes.  But that could never satisfy Carlyle; for that is but self-indulgence in its more refined form of the lust of the eyes.  It was not for this that the Everlasting No had set Teufelsdroeckh wailing, nor for this that he had risen up in wrath and bidden defiance to fear.  From his temptation in the wilderness the Son of Man must come forth, not to wander open-mouthed about the plain, but to work his way “into the higher sunlit slopes of that Mountain which has no summit, or whose summit is in Heaven only.”

In other words, a great compassion for his fellow-men has come upon him.  “With other eyes, too, could I now look upon my fellow-man:  with an infinite Love, an infinite Pity.  Poor, wandering, wayward man!  Art thou not tried, and beaten with stripes, even as I am?  Ever, whether thou bear the royal mantle or the beggar’s gabardine, art thou not so weary, so heavy-laden; and thy Bed of Rest is but a Grave.  O my Brother, my Brother, why cannot I shelter thee in my bosom, and wipe away all tears from thy eyes!” The words remind us of the famous passage, occurring early in the book, which describes the Professor’s Watchtower.  It was suggested by the close-packed streets of Edinburgh’s poorer quarter, as seen from the slopes of the hills which stand close on her eastern side.  Probably no passage ever written has so vividly and suggestively massed together the various and contradictory aspects of the human tragedy.

One more question, however, has yet to be answered before we have solved our problem.  What about happiness?  We all cry aloud for it, and make its presence or absence the criterion for judging the worth of days.  Teufelsdroeckh goes to the heart of the matter with his usual directness.  It is this search for happiness which is the explanation of all the unwholesomeness that culminated in the Everlasting No.  “Because the THOU (sweet gentleman) is not sufficiently honoured, nourished, soft-bedded, and lovingly cared-for?  Foolish soul!  What Act of Legislature was there that thou shouldst be Happy?  A little while ago thou hadst no right to be at all.  What if thou wert born and predestined not to be Happy, but to be Unhappy!  Art thou nothing other than a Vulture, then, that fliest through the Universe seeking after somewhat to eat; and shrieking dolefully because carrion enough is not given thee?  Close thy Byron; open thy Goethe.”  In effect, happiness is a relative term, which we can alter as we please by altering the amount which we demand from life.  “Fancy that thou deservest to be hanged (as is most likely), thou wilt feel it happiness to be only shot:  fancy that thou deservest to be hanged in a hair-halter, it will be a luxury to die in hemp.”