nd
tatters.

I rather think that Macaulay's illustration is as good as any. 'A
traveller,' he says in his essay on Sir James Mackintosh, 'falls in
with a berry which he has never before seen. He tastes it, and finds
it sweet and refreshing. He presses it, and resolves to introduce it
into his own country. But in a few minutes he is taken violently sick;
he is convulsed; he is at the point of death. He, of course, changes
his mind, pronounces this delicious food a poison, blames his own folly
in tasting it, and cautions his friends against it. After a long and
violent struggle he recovers, and finds himself much exhausted by his
sufferings, but free from chronic complaints which had been the torment
of his life. He then changes his mind again, and pronounces this fruit
a very powerful remedy, which ought to be employed only in extreme
cases, and with great caution, but which ought not to be absolutely
excluded from the Pharmacopoeia. Would it not be the height of
absurdity to call such a man fickle and inconsistent because he had
repeatedly altered his judgement?' Of course it would. A man cannot
go all through life wearing the same suit of clothes. For two reasons.
It will not always fit, and it will wear out. And, in precisely the
same way, and for identically similar reasons, a man must sometimes
change his opinions. It is refreshing to think of Augustine carefully
compiling a list of the mistakes that had crept into his writings, so
that he might take every opportunity of repudiating and correcting
them. I never consult my copies of Archbishop Trench's great works on
_The Parables_ and _The Miracles_ without glancing, always with a glow
of admiration, at that splendid sentence with which the 'Publisher's
Note' concludes: 'The author never allowed his books to be stereotyped,
in order that he might constantly improve them, and permanence has only
become possible now that his diligent hand can touch the work no more.'
That always strikes me as being very fine.

But the thing must be done methodically. Let me not rush upstairs and
change either my clothes or my mind for the mere sake of making a
change. Nor must I tumble into the first suit that I happen to
find--in either wardrobe. When I reappear, the change must commend
itself to the respect, if not the admiration, of my fellows. I do not
want men to laugh at my change as we have laughed at these Maltese
natives, at old Hogarth, and at my absent-m