gives us good men, and gives us beautiful creations;
and we, perceiving by the instincts within ourselves that celestial
presence in the objects on which we gaze, find out for ourselves the
laws which make them what they are, not by comparing them with any
antecedent theory, but by careful analysis of our own impressions, by
asking ourselves what it is which we admire in them, and by calling that
good, and calling that beautiful.

So, then, if admiration be the first fact--if the sense of it be the
ultimate ground on which the after temple of morality, as a system,
upraises itself--if we can be challenged here on our own ground, and
fail to make it good, what we call the life of the soul becomes a dream
of a feeble enthusiast, and we moralists a mark for the sceptic's finger
to point at with scorn.

Bold and ably-urged arguments against our own convictions, if they do
not confuse us, will usually send us back over our ground to re-examine
the strength of our positions: and if we are honest with ourselves, we
shall very often find points of some uncertainty left unguarded, of
which the show of the strength of our enemy will oblige us to see better
to the defence. It was not without some shame, and much uneasiness,
that, while we were ourselves engaged in this process, full of
indignation with Lord Macaulay, we heard a clear voice ringing in our
ear, 'Who art thou that judgest another?' and warning us of the presence
in our own heart of a sympathy, which we could not 'deny,' with the
sadly questionable hero of the German epic, 'Reynard the Fox.' With our
vulpine friend, we were on the edge of the very same abyss, if, indeed,
we were not rolling in the depth of it. By what sophistry could we
justify ourselves, if not by the very same which we had just been so
eagerly condemning? And our conscience whispered to us that we had been
swift to detect a fault in another, because it was the very fault to
which, in our own heart of hearts, we had a latent leaning.

Was it so indeed, then? Was Reineke no better than Iago? Was the sole
difference between them, that the _vates sacer_ who had sung the
exploits of Reineke loved the wicked rascal, and entangled us in loving
him? It was a question to be asked. And yet we had faith enough in the
straight-forwardness of our own sympathies to feel sure that it must
admit of some sort of answer. And, indeed, we rapidly found an answer
satisfactory enough to give us time to breathe, in rem