ther. Though at the time Athene be not kind enough to
descend from heaven and pluck him backward by the hair, yet the very
_genius loci_ will walk home with him from the lecture room, whispering
monitions, cruel to be kind.

'But,' you will say alternatively, 'if we avoid loose talk on these
matters we are embarking on a mighty difficult business.' Why, to be sure
we are; and that, I hope, will be half the enjoyment. After all, we have
a number of critics among whose methods we may search for help--from the
Persian monarch who, having to adjudicate upon two poems, caused the one
to be read to him, and at once, without ado, awarded the prize to the
other, up to the great Frenchman whom I shall finally invoke to sustain
my hope of building something; that is if you, Gentlemen, will be content
to accept me less as a Professor than as an Elder Brother.

The Frenchman is Sainte-Beuve, and I pay a debt, perhaps appropriately
here, by quoting him as translated by the friend of mine, now dead, who
first invited me to Cambridge and taught me to admire her--one Arthur
John Butler, sometime a Fellow of Trinity, and later a great pioneer
among Englishmen in the study of Dante. Thus while you listen to the
appeal of Sainte-Beuve, I can hear beneath it a more intimate voice, not
for the first time, encouraging me.

Sainte-Beuve then--_si magna licet componere parvis_--is delivering an
Inaugural Lecture in the Ecole Normale, the date being April 12th, 1858.
'Gentlemen,' he begins, 'I have written a good deal in the last thirty
years; that is, I have scattered myself a good deal; so that I need to
gather myself together, in order that my words may come before you with
all the more freedom and confidence.' That is his opening; and he ends:--

As time goes on, you will make me believe that I can for my part be
of some good to you: and with the generosity of your age you will
repay me, in this feeling alone, far more than I shall be able to
give you in intellectual freedom, in literary thought. If in one
sense I bestow on you some of my experience, you will requite me,
and in a more profitable manner, by the sight of your ardour for
what is noble: you will accustom me to turn oftener and more
willingly towards the future in your company. You will teach me
again to hope.

LECTURE II.

THE PRACTICE OF WRITING.

Wednesday, February 12

We found, Gentlemen, towards the close of ou