Worship, that is, as I said above, admire without limit: this, in the full
use of their faculties, with all sincerity of heart, they could do. I
consider Hero-worship to be the grand modifying element in that ancient
system of thought. What I called the perplexed jungle of Paganism sprang,
we may say, out of many roots: every admiration, adoration of a star or
natural object, was a root or fibre of a root; but Hero-worship is the
deepest root of all; the tap-root, from which in a great degree all the
rest were nourished and grown.

And now if worship even of a star had some meaning in it, how much more
might that of a Hero! Worship of a Hero is transcendent admiration of a
Great Man. I say great men are still admirable; I say there is, at bottom,
nothing else admirable! No nobler feeling than this of admiration for one
higher than himself dwells in the breast of man. It is to this hour, and
at all hours, the vivifying influence in man's life. Religion I find stand
upon it; not Paganism only, but far higher and truer religions,--all
religion hitherto known. Hero-worship, heartfelt prostrate admiration,
submission, burning, boundless, for a noblest godlike Form of Man,--is not
that the germ of Christianity itself? The greatest of all Heroes is
One--whom we do not name here! Let sacred silence meditate that sacred
matter; you will find it the ultimate perfection of a principle extant
throughout man's whole history on earth.

Or coming into lower, less unspeakable provinces, is not all Loyalty akin
to religious Faith also? Faith is loyalty to some inspired Teacher, some
spiritual Hero. And what therefore is loyalty proper, the life-breath of
all society, but an effluence of Hero-worship, submissive admiration for
the truly great? Society is founded on Hero-worship. All dignities of
rank, on which human association rests, are what we may call a _Hero_archy
(Government of Heroes),--or a Hierarchy, for it is "sacred" enough withal!