he understands and sees through what he is about; and it is
unpardonable for a man to lay his thoughts before others when he is
conscious that he himself does not know whereabouts he is, or how the
matter before him stands. It is coming abroad in disorder, which he
ought to be dissatisfied to find himself in at home.'

Butler weighed his thoughts rather than his words in an age when many
distinguished writers were tempted to regard form as of more consequence
than substance. It must be admitted, however, that if the ideal of fine
literature be the expression of beautiful and richly suggestive thoughts
in a style elevated by the imagination, and by a sense of rhythmical
harmony, Bishop Butler's place is not among men of letters. His profound
sense of the seriousness of life limited his range; but as a thinker,
what he lost in versatility he probably gained in depth. The _Analogy_
is a striking instance of a great work wholly without imagination, while
full of the intellectual life which sustains the student's attention.
There is not a dull page in the book, or one in which the author's
meaning cannot be grasped by thoughtful readers. The work is full of
weighty sayings on the power of conscience, the rule of right which a
man has within him, the force of habit, the necessity of action in
relation to belief, and the uselessness of passive impressions. It has
been said that the defect of the eighteenth century theology 'was not in
having too much good sense, but in having nothing besides,' and the
straining after good sense, so prominent in Pope's age, affected alike,
men of letters, philosophers, and theologians. The virtue was carried to
excess and is conspicuous in Butler. He has his weaknesses both as a
philosopher and a theologian, but the reader of the _Analogy_ and of the
three sermons on Human Nature, will be conscious that he is in the
presence of a great mind.

[Sidenote: William Warburton (1698-1779).]

William Warburton, Pope's commentator, was born at Newark-upon-Trent in
1698, and died as Bishop of Gloucester in 1779. The main argument of his
principal work, _The Divine Legation of Moses_ (1738-41), is based upon
the astounding paradox that the legation of Moses must have been divine
because he never invoked the promises or threatenings of a future state.
The book is remarkable for its arrogance and lack of 'sweet
reasonableness.' It claims no attention from the student of English
literature, neither would