yond
the power of a latter-day imagination to fancy a visitor proposing to
fascinate his company by some "scatterings of Seneca and Tacitus," or even
to think ourselves back to a time when these "were good for all
occasions." Yet, those who say "Chaucer[K] for our money above all our
English poets because the voice has gone so," (or had we better substitute
Browning?),[L] are still common enough examples of those who desire to
acquire inexpensively the reputation of good taste.

And there is another variety of modern artificiality which is not spared
in this book. For the many forms of busy idleness, the worship of
organisation and system, and all the other hindrances to life properly
so-called, which it has been the cherished labour of this age to
multiply, Earle would have had no reserve of patience. "The dull
physician," we are told, has no leisure _to be idle_, that is, to study.
"The grave divine," who has "studied to make his shoulders sufficient for
his burden, comes not up thrice a week into his pulpit because _he would
not be idle_"; whereas the commendation of the young raw preacher is that
"he speaks without book, and, indeed, he was never used to it."

We may justly boast of the superior humanity of our century; but few would
deny that the elaborate apparatus of modern philanthropy has too often
become an end in itself, and absorption in it a serious detriment to any
worthy preparation for the work of edifying. In the absence of leisure
pulpits will hardly furnish us with that "sincere erudition which can send
us clear and pure away unto a virtuous and happy life."[M] Nor is such a
loss compensated by an endless succession of services or even a whole
street of committee-rooms.

One would not, however, wish to rest in negations or dwell in the last
resort on Earle's critical attitude. One feels that the delightful house
at Tew did not spend all or even its best strength on criticism. Earle may
have there pursued the method of verification and studied his characters
in the flesh. Perhaps he saw there "the staid man," and duly appraised
this specimen of "nature's geometry";[N] while his obvious gifts as a
rational peace-maker, if not much needed in such a company, would not be
overlooked by Lord Falkland. "The good old man," too is a portrait so
strongly individualized that I cannot help thinking some very personal
experience went to the making of it--experience of a sort that was sure to
be revived at Tew, w