time, place, and circumstance accurately given-most of them mere malicious lies; yet, if written down to reappear in memoirs a hundred years hence, they are likely to pass for authentic, or, at least, probable. Even where there is no malice, imagination will still be active.

People believe or disbelieve, repeat or suppress, according to their own inclinations; and death, which ends the feuds of unimportant persons, lets loose the tongues over the characters of the great. Kings are especially sufferers; when alive they hear only flattery; when they are gone men revenge themselves by drawing hideous portraits of them; and the more distinguished they may have been, the more minutely their weaknesses are dwelt upon. "C'est un plaisir indicible," says Voltaire, "de donner des décrets contre des souverains morts quand on ne peut en lancer contre eulx de leur vivant de peur de perdre ses oreilles." The dead sovereigns go their way. Their real work for good or evil lives after them, but they themselves are where the opinions expressed about their character affect them no more. To Cæsar or Napoleon it matters nothing what judgment the world passes upon their conduct. It is of more importance for the ethical value of history that acts which as they are related appear wicked should be duly condemned, that acts which are represented as having advanced the welfare of mankind should be duly honoured, than that the real character of individuals should be correctly appreciated.

To appreciate any single man with complete accuracy is impossible. To appreciate him even proximately is extremely difficult. Rulers of kingdoms may have public reasons for what they do, which at the time may be understood or allowed for. Times change, and new interests rise. The circumstances no longer exist which would explain their conduct. The student looks, therefore, for an explanation in elements, which he thinks he understands-in pride, ambition, fear, avarice, jealousy, or sensuality; and settling the question thus to his own satisfaction, resents or ridicules attempts to look for other motives. So long as his moral judgment is generally correct, he inflicts no injury, and he suffers none. Cruelty and lust are proper objects of abhorrence; he learns to detest them in studying the Tiberius of Tacitus, though the character described by the great Roman historian may have been a mere creation of the hatred of the old Roman aristocracy. The manifesto of the Prince of Orange was a libel against Philip the Second; but the Philip of Protestant tradition is an embodiment of the persecuting spirit of Catholic Europe, which it would be now useless to disturb.

The tendency of history is to fall into wholesome moral lines, whether they be accurate or not, and to interfere with

harmless illusions may cause greater errors than it aspires to cure. Crowned offenders are arraigned at the tribunal of history for the crimes which they are alleged to have committed. It may be sometimes shown that the crimes were not crimes at all, that the sufferers had deserved their fate, that the severities were useful and essential for some great and valuable purpose. But the reader sees in the apology for acts which he had regarded as tyrannical a defence of tyranny itself. Preoccupied with the received interpretation, he finds deeds excused which he had learnt to execrate; and in learning something which, even if true, is of no real moment to him, he suffers in the maiming of his perceptions of the difference between right and wrong. The white-washing of the villains of tradition is, therefore, justly regarded as waste of labour. If successful, it is of imperfect value; if unsuccessful, it is a misuse of industry which deserves to be censured. Time is too precious to be squandered over paradoxes. The dead are gone; the censure of mankind has written their epitaphs, and so they may be left. Their true award will be decided elsewhere (The Divorce of Catharine of Arragon).

The last book of his is his Erasmus-lectures delivered at Oxford from the chair to which he was appointed on the death of his bitter critic, Freeman, by Lord Salisbury, one of those very Neo-Catholics Froude so heartily abhorred. Froude felt no obligations to his patron, and with the shades of the prison-house gathering round him, set to work at his old task with all his old vigour. He took as his text the letters of Erasmus, and selecting from them those passages which most interested him as he read them, translated them from the Latin into racy English, passing upon them as he went along his familiar commentary. The result is a most fascinating volume. Erasmus seems alive once more. Whether Froude's Erasmus is the true Erasmus is, of course, matter of controversy. All Mr. Froude would ever have said is, "It is my notion of Erasmus. What is yours? Good history or bad, it is a blow in the face of

Neo-Catholicism, and perhaps that is all Mr. Froude ever meant it to be.

Personal controversy Mr. Froude avoided. He seldom replied to his maddened foes. He made no great pretensions, and held himself aloof from professional authorism. He enjoyed country life and country pursuits, and the society of cultivated women. He has gone from us, leaving the fight in which he took so fierce a part still raging and unsettled. The ranks are closing up, and his old place already knows him no more.

WALTER BAGEHOT

AN ADDRESS DELIVERED AT LEIGHTON HOUSE, MARCH 5TH, 1901

A

T the very outset it is proper I should state I never saw Mr. Bagehot. I know him, if I do know him, through his books alone. There are in this room those who knew and loved the living man. His modes of speech, his manners and customs, his ways and habits, how he talked and laughed and held his peace, how he entered a room, how he sat at meat-all the countless pleasant things, the admirable strengths, the agreeable weaknesses that went to make up his personality, they know, and I do not. What a warning to be silent! To put myself even for a few minutes in competition with such memories, such knowledge, seems ridiculous, and yet perhaps it is not so very ridiculous after all. Unless an English author has had his portrait painted by Reynolds or his life written by Boswell, he has small chance of being remembered (apart from the recollections of a small and ever-dwindling group of friends), save by his books. They are, indeed, his only chance. I do not say it is a good chance. I have fallen asleep over too many books to say that. What I do say is, it is his only chance.

You can know a man from his books, and if he is a writer of good faith and has the knack, you may know him very well; better it well may be than

did his co-directors or his partners in business, or, even-for I am here to tell the truth-his own flesh and blood. It is easier for an author to take in his brother than a really astute well-seasoned reader. I am not disposed to think overmuch of the insight of relations. Joseph Bonaparte has left on record his opinion of his famous brother. "He was," so said this sapient though not hereditary monarch-" he was not so much what I should call a great, as a good man."

It is amazing what things your confirmed author will say in print. The shyest of men when under the literary impulse will tear down the veils behind which men are usually only too well content to live. Mr. Bagehot has himself said in his own picturesque way, "We all come down to dinner, but each has a room to himself." In his books an author will often take you into this solitary chamber.

I have enjoyed on rare occasions the conversation of two distinguished poets, Mr. Browning and Mr. Arnold. To both I felt myself under a huge personal obligation. I longed to hear them even distantly approach the subject-matter of Christmas Eve or Rugby Chapel; they never did in my hearing. "Hardly," says Browning, "will a man tell his joys and sorrows, hopes and fears, beliefs and unbelievings." No! a man will not tell these things, but if he is a true author he will print them.

However, everyone who has read Mr. Bagehot's books will agree at once that he is an author who can be known from his books.

I suppose the only classification of authors of