bear rule in that kind. They blame him for pulling down cathedrals,
and so forth, as if he were a seditious, rioting demagogue: precisely
the reverse is seen to be the fact, in regard to cathedrals and the rest
of it, if we examine! Knox wanted no pulling-down of stone edifices; he
wanted leprosy and darkness to be thrown out of the lives of men. Tumult
was not his element; it was the tragic feature of his life that he
was forced to dwell so much in that. Every such man is the born enemy
of Disorder; hates to be in it: but what then? Smooth Falsehood is
not Order; it is the general sum total of _Dis_order. Order is
_Truth_--each thing standing on the basis that belongs to it: Order
and Falsehood cannot subsist together.

Withal, unexpectedly enough, this Knox has a vein of drollery in him;
which I like much, in combination with his other qualities. He has a
true eye for the ridiculous. His _History_, with its rough earnestness,
is curiously enlivened with this. When the two Prelates, entering
Glasgow Cathedral, quarrel about precedence; march rapidly up, take to
hustling one another, twitching one another's rochets, and at last
flourishing their crosiers like quarter-staves, it is a great sight for
him everywhere! Not mockery, scorn, bitterness alone; though there is
enough of that too. But a true, loving, illuminating laugh mounts up
over the earnest visage; not a loud laugh; you would say, a laugh in
the _eyes_ most of all. An honest-hearted, brotherly man; brother to
the high, brother also to the low; sincere in his sympathy with both.
He had his pipe of Bourdeaux too, we find, in that old Edinburgh house
of his; a cheery social man, with faces that loved him! They go far
wrong who think that this Knox was a gloomy, spasmodic, shrieking
fanatic. Not at all: he is one of the solidest of men. Practical,
cautious-hopeful, patient; a most shrewd, observing, quietly discerning
man. In fact, he has very much the type of character we assign to the
Scotch at present: a certain sardonic taciturnity is in him; insight
enough; and a stouter heart than he himself knows of. He has the power
of holding his peace over many things which do not vitally concern
him--"They? what are they?" But the thing which does vitally concern
him, that thing he will speak of; and in a tone the whole world shall
be made to hear: all the more emphatic for his long silence.

This Prophet of the Scotch is to me no hateful man! He had a sore fight
of a