beginning to
feel now a little more tolerant towards the boy who wrote this than the
man who criticised it in 1865; but he was quite right.' The critic of
1865, I may note, is specially hard upon the lad of 1850 for his
ignorance of sound utilitarian authorities. He writes against an
allusion to Hobbes, 'Ignorant blasphemy of the greatest of English
philosophers!' The lad has misstated an argument from ignorance of
Bentham and Austin. 'I had looked at Bentham at the period (says 1865),
but felt a holy horror of him.' Harcourt, it is added, 'used to chaff me
about him.' 1880 admits that '1865, though a fine fellow, was rather too
hot in his Benthamism; 1880 takes it easier, and considers that 1850 was
fairly right, and that his language if not pharisaically accurate, was
plain enough for common-sense purposes.' In fact, both critics admit,
and I fully agree with them, that under all the crabbed phraseology
there was a very large substratum of good sense and sound judgment of
men, to which I add of high principle. Among the special qualifications
of a lawyer, the desire for justice takes a prominent place in his
argument.

Looking at the whole document from the vantage-ground of later
knowledge, the real, though unconscious, purpose seems to be pretty
evident. Fitzjames had felt a repugnance to the clerical career, and is
trying to convince himself that he has reasonable grounds for a feeling
which his father would be slow to approve. There is not the least trace
of any objection upon grounds of dissent from the Articles; though he
speaks of responsibility imposed by the solemn profession required upon
ordination. His real reason is explained in a long comparison between
the 'simple-minded' or 'sympathetic' and the 'casuistical' man. They may
both be good men; but one of them possesses what the other does not, a
power of at once placing himself in close relations to others, and
uttering his own thoughts eloquently and effectively without being
troubled by reserves and perplexed considerations of the precise meaning
of words. He thinks that every clergyman ought to be ready to undertake
the 'cure of souls,' and to be a capable spiritual guide. He has no
right to take up the profession merely with a view to intellectual
researches. In fact, he felt that he was without the qualifications
which make a man a popular preacher, if the word may be used without an
offensive connotation. He could argue vigorously, but was not good