Definition of "unpliant"

The brawny craftsman finds it no child's play to mould his unpliant rugged masses; neither is guidance of men a dilettantism: what it becomes when treated as a dilettantism, we may see!

1839 (indicated as 1840), Thomas Carlyle, “Laissez-Faire”, in Chartism, London: James Fraser, […], pages 52–53