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stops to brood over an incident or a character, with an inner eye intent on penetrating to the lowest depth of motive and cause, to the furthest complexity of impulse, calculation, and subtle incentive. The spirit of analysis is not in him. His whole mind runs in action and movement; it busies itself with eager interest in all objective particulars. He is seized by the external and the superficial, and revels in every detail that appeals to the five senses. "It may be noticed that the remarkable interest he often awakens in a story, which he tells so admirably, is nearly always the interest of adventure, never the interest of psychological analysis. Events and outward actions are told with incomparable clearness and vigor-but a thick curtain hangs before the inward theatre of the mind, which is never revealed on his stage." 2

Another quality which hurts Macaulay in the opinion of men who are accustomed to careful and accurate thinking, though it is another reason for his popularity with the masses, is the extreme positiveness which pervades his writings. He represents everything as absolutely certain, and "goes forward with a grand confidence" in himself, his faults, and his opinions, which is delightful to many, but displeasing to those who know how extremely uncertain just these very things are. Macaulay is a "dealer in unqualified propositions."3 However much obscurity may envelop a fact of history or a subject in literature, he "marches through the intricacies of things in a blaze of certainty." This confident tone is partly the expression of Macaulay's character, for he was a man of very positive convictions; but it is also, perhaps, a rhetorical quality cultivated in the interest of absolute clearness to the ordinary mind. "Eschewing high thought on the one hand, and deep feeling on the other, he marched down a middle road of resonant commonplace, quite certain that where 1 Mr. John Morley. 3 Mr. Morley.

2 J. C. Morrison.

'Bang, whang, whang, goes the drum,

And tootle-tee-tootle the fife,'

the densest crowd, marching in time, will follow the music." 1 A dense crowd has, indeed, followed Macaulay's drum and trumpet style with great satisfaction; but persons of highly cultivated taste are disposed to stop their ears in the presence of his resounding, banging phrases. Pattison well expressed the feeling of this class of readers when he said: "He has a constant tendency to glaring colors, to strong effects, and will always be striking violent blows. He is not merely exuberant, but excessive. There is an overwhelming confidence about his tone; he expresses himself in trenchant phrases, which are like challenges to an opponent to stand up and deny them. His propositions have no qualifications. Uninstructed readers like this assurance, as they like a physician who has no doubt about their case. But a sense of distrust grows upon the more circumspect reader as he follows page after page of Macaulay's categorical affirmations about matters which our own experience of life teaches us to be of a contingent nature. We inevitably think of a saying attributed to Lord Melbourne, 'I wish I were as cock-sure of any one thing as Macaulay is of everything." "2

This is what critics mean when they speak of Macaulay's inaccuracy. It is not that his memory is at fault or that his learning is inadequate, but that the rush and the vigor of his thought lead him occasionally into sweeping assertions which are really exaggerations. His writings abound in superlative expressions; his style is marked by a wonderful vigor that sometimes overshoots the mark. When a difficult question crosses his path, he disposes of it in a dashing way with some simple, easy answer, which everyone can understand, but which more profound thinkers perceive to be inadequate and unsatisfactory. It is cerJ. C. Morrison. Encyclopædia Britannica.

interesting as a skilful novelist makes the creatures of his imagination. We see a figure from the eighteenth century as vividly as if he were present, and seem to understand everything that happened as if we had been there. And so easily is all this done that the story seems to tell itself. As the reader sees and understands with perfect ease, so there is no trace of effort on the part of the author.

Macaulay, then, knew a marvellous number of interesting things, which he imparts to the reader in a most lively and attractive manner, being, in fact, one of the best story-tellers that ever lived. To these qualities which make him a favorite with the masses must be added the fact that he never perplexes his readers with deep thinking. His writings are full of strong, English common-sense; but of profound reflection and close, subtle reasoning there is no trace. Anything that would be hard for an ordinary man of business to understand is carefully avoided; everything is looked at from the point of view of the middle classes, who cannot understand philosophers, and do not care to do overmuch thinking. He deals, not in the abstract, but in the concrete. Into the higher regions of thought he never goes. His mind moves along a middle plane, where the masses can easily follow, and this is another reason why the masses like to read him.

Macaulay's want of aspiration, of all effort to rise into the higher regions of thought, has lost him the good opinion of some readers, and is the first of those shortcomings which expert critics consider grave faults. "He is one of the most entertaining, but also one of the least suggestive, of writers." He did nothing to stir the deeper mind or the deeper feelings of his multitude of readers." "He never had anything to say on the deeper aspects and relations of life; and it would not be easy to quote a sentence from either his published works or private letters which shows insight into or meditation on love, or

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marriage, or friendship, or the education of children, or religion." "His learning is confined to book lore; he is not well read in the human heart, and still less in the human spirit." "His strength lay not in thinking but in drawing. These are some of the criticisms made with perfect truth by such critics as Walter Bagehot, Cotter Morrison, Mr. John Morley, and Mr. Leslie Stephen.1 "Compare him with a calm, meditative, original writer like De Quincey, and you become vividly aware of his peculiar deficiency, as well as his peculiar strength; you find a more rapid succession of ideas and greater wealth of illustration, but you miss the subtle casuistry, the exact and finished similitudes, and the breaking up of routine views. No original opinion requiring patient consideration or delicate analysis is associated with the name of Macaulay. It better suited his stirring and excitable nature to apply his dazzling powers of expression and illustration to the opinions of others."2

This lack of depth in Macaulay's thinking is most noticeable, perhaps, in his sketches of character. It has been justly said that no one else describes so well the spectacle of a character, for Macaulay can always tell what people said, what they did, what they looked like; but he had "no eye for the deeper springs of character, the finer shades of motive." 3 "He can draw a most vivid portrait, so far as can be done by a picturesque accumulation of characteristic facts; but he never gets below the surface." 4 He can describe graphically exterior life, but his insight into men's bosoms is not deep. "Some portion of the essence of human nature is concealed from him; but all its accessories are at his command."5 "Macaulay never

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tain, however, that Macaulay was never intentionally inaccurate, and that he never knowingly called black white, or white black. He is a thoroughly honest, manly writer; and his exaggerations are only manifestations of that heartiness which was a part of his strong character.

To sum up, Macaulay, as Mr. Frederick Harrison has remarked, has led millions who read no one else, or who never read before, to know something of the past, and to enjoy reading. Let us be thankful for his energy, learning, brilliance. He is no priest, philosopher, or master; but let us delight in him as a companion. In one thing all agree-critics and the public, friends and opponentsMacaulay's was a life of purity, honor, courage, generosity, affection, and manly perseverance, almost without a stain or a defect. His was a fine, generous, honorable, and sterling nature. His books deserve their vast popularity; but Macaulay must not be judged among philosophers nor even among the greatest masters of the English language. He stands between philosophic historians and the public very much as journals and periodicals stand between the masses and great libraries. and reviewer, who brings the matured results of scholars to the man in the street in a form that he can remember and enjoy, when he could not make use of a learned book. He performs the office of the ballad-maker or story-teller in an age before books were common. And it is largely due to the influence of his style that the best journals and periodicals of our day are written in a style so clear, so direct, so resonant.1

Macaulay is a glorified journalist

The technical elements of Macaulay's style can be profitably studied only in connection with the text of his writings; all discussion of such matters is therefore reserved for the Notes (see p. 104).

'This paragraph is based, with some changes, upon a portion of Mr. Harrison's article in The Forum for September, 1894.

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