ht honorable gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) who three years ago was
conducting the administration of this country with such brilliant
success was first generally known to his countrymen as a remarkable
writer. During forty years of arduous service he never wholly deserted
his original calling. He is employing an interval of temporary
retirement to become the interpreter of Homer to the English race, or to
break a lance with the most renowned theologians in defense of spiritual
liberty.

A great author, whose life we have been all lately reading with
delight, contemplates the year 3000 as a period at which his works may
still be studied. If any man might be led reasonably to form such an
anticipation for himself by the admiration of his contemporaries, Lord
Macaulay may be acquitted of vanity. The year 3000 is far away, much
will happen between now and then; all that we can say with certainty of
the year 3000 is that it will be something extremely different from what
any one expects. I will not predict that men will then be reading Lord
Macaulay's "History of England." I will not predict that they will then
be reading "Lothair." But this I will say, that if any statesman of the
age of Augustus or the Antonines had left us a picture of patrician
society at Rome, drawn with the same skill, and with the same delicate
irony with which Mr. Disraeli has described a part of English society
in "Lothair," no relic of antiquity would now be devoured with more
avidity and interest. Thus, sir, we are an anomalous body, with very
ill-defined limits. But, such as we are, we are heartily obliged to you
for wishing us well, and I give you our most sincere thanks.

LITERATURE AND POLITICS

BY JOHN MORLEY

Mr. President, Your Royal Highness, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen:--I
feel that I am more unworthy now than I was eight years ago to figure as
the representative of literature before this brilliant gathering of all
the most important intellectual and social interests of our time. I have
not yet been able like the Prime Minister, to go round this exhibition
and see the works of art that glorify your walls; but I am led by him to
expect that I shall see the pictures of Liberal leaders, including M.
Rochefort. I am not sure whether M. Rochefort will figure as a man of
letters or as a Liberal leader, but I can understand that his portrait
would attract the Prime Minister because M. Rochefort is a politician
who was once a Liberal le