gone to the slow building of this
curious structure; stone by stone must have been carved and lifted to
its place. And yet the art is so great that I know no composition of
the same length that has so perfect a unity of mood and atmosphere.
There is never a false or alien note struck. It is never jubilant or
contentious or assertive--and, best of all, it is wholly free from any
touch of that complacency which is the shadow of virtue. The writer
never takes any credit to himself for his firm adherence to the truth;
he writes rather as one who has had a gift of immeasurable value
entrusted to unworthy hands, who hardly dares to believe that it has
been granted him, and who still speaks as though he might at any time
prove unfaithful, as though his weakness might suddenly betray him, and
who therefore has little temptation to exult in the possession of
anything which his own frail nature might at any moment forfeit.

And thus, from its humility, its sense of weakness and weariness, its
consciousness of sin and failure, combined with its deep apprehension
of the stainless beauty of the moral law, this lyric has found its way
to the hearts of all who find the world and temptation and fear too
strong, all who through repeated failure have learned that they cannot
even be true to what they so pathetically desire and admire; who would
be brave and vigorous if they could, but, as it is, can only hope to be
just led step by step, helped over the immediate difficulty, past the
dreaded moment; whose heart often fails them, and who have little of
the joy of God; who can only trust that, if they go astray, the mercy
of God will yet go out to seek them; who cannot even hope to run in the
way of God's beloved commandments, till He has set their heart at
liberty.

March 8, 1889.

I went to see Darell, my old schoolfellow, a few days ago; he wrote to
say that he would much like to see me, but that he was ill and unable
to leave home--could I possibly come to see him?

I have never seen very much of him since I left Cambridge; but there I
was a good deal in his company--and we have kept up our friendship ever
since, in the quiet way in which Englishmen do keep up their
friendships, meeting perhaps two or three times in the year, exchanging
letters occasionally. He was not a very intimate friend--indeed, he was
not a man who formed intimacies; but he was a congenial companion
enough. He was a frankly ambitious man. He went to the b