Like Kant he takes his stand on the principles of ethical idealism.

God is to be sought, not through speculation, or syllogism, or the learning of the schools, but through the moral nature.

It is the soul in action that alone finds God.

And the finding of God means, not happiness as the world conceives it, but blessedness, or the inward peace which passes understanding.
The connection between the transfigured autobiography which serves to introduce the directly didactic element of the book and that element itself, will now be clear.

Stripped of its whimsicalities of phraseology and its humorous extravagances, Carlyle's philosophy stands revealed as essentially idealistic in character.