CHAPTER IX.

LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE-NOVEMBER 1838-SEP

TEMBER 1841.

It is impossible to mistake the change which once more passed over his state of mind during these last years of his life—the return, though in a more chastened form, of the youthful energy and serenity of the earlier part of his career at Rugby-the martinmas summer succeeding to the dreary storms with which he had been so long encompassed; and recalling the more genial season, which had preceded them, yet mellowed and refined by the experience of the intervening period.

His whole constitution seemed to have received a new spring; "The interest of life," to use his own description of middle age", "which had begun to fade for himself, revived with vigour in behalf of his children." The education of his own sons in the school, his firmer hold of the reins of government, his greater familiarity with the whole machinery of the place, the increasing circle of pupils at the Universities, who looked upon him as their second father;-even the additional bodily health which he gained by resuming in 1838 his summer tours on the continent, -removed that sense of weariness by which he had been at times Sermons, vol. iv. p. 115.

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oppressed amidst his heavy occupations, and bound him to his work at Rugby with a closer tie than

ever.

But it was not only in his ordinary work that a new influence seemed to act upon him in the determination which he formed to dwell on those positive truths on which he agreed with others, rather than to be always acting on the defensive or offensive.

To this various causes had contributed,—the weariness of the contests of the last four years,-the isolation in which he found himself placed after his failure in the London University,—the personal intercourse, now, after an interval of eleven years, renewed with his friend the Chevalier Bunsen, the recoil, which he felt from the sceptical tone of mind which struck him as being at once the cause and effect of the new school of Oxford Theology. It was in this spirit that he struck out all the political allusions of his notes on Thucydides, which were now passing through a second edition, "not as abhorring the evils against which they were directed, less now than I did formerly, but because we have been all of us taught by the lessons of the last nine years, that, in political matters more especially, moderation and comprehensiveness of views are the greatest wisdom." So, again, in the hope of giving a safer and more sober direction to the excitement then prevailing in the country on the subject of National Education, he

a The whole passage in which this occurs in the notice of a severe attack upon him, introduced into an article in the Quarterly Review by "a writer for whom he entertained a very sincere respect," well illustrates his feeling at this time. (Note on Thucyd. ii. 40, 2nd ed.)

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published a Lecture delivered in 1838 before the Mechanics' Institute at Rugby, on the Divisions of Knowledge; "feeling that while it was desirable on the one hand to encourage Mechanics' Institutes, on account of the good which they can do, it was no less important to call attention to their necessary imperfections, and to notice that great good which they cannot do." His "Two Sermons on Prophecy, with Notes," which were published in the same year, and which form the most complete and systematic of any of his fragments on Exegetical Theology, he regarded as a kind of peace-offering, "in which it was his earnest desire to avoid as much as possible all such questions as might engender strife,—that is to say, such as are connected with the peculiar opinions of any of the various parties existing within the Church." And it must have been a pleasure to him to witness the gradual softening of public feeling towards himself, not the least perhaps in that peaceful visit of one day to Oxford, to see his friends the Chevalier Bunsen and the aged poet Wordsworth receive their degrees at the Commemoration of 1839, when he also had the opportunity of renewing friendly connexions, which the late unhappy divisions had interrupted.

His wish for a closer sympathy and union of efforts amongst all good men was further increased, when, in 1839-40, his attention was again called to the social evils of the country, as betraying themselves in the disturbances of Chartism, and the alarm which had possessed him in 1831-32 returned, though in a more chastened form, never to leave him. "It haunts me," he said, "I may almost say night and

day. It fills me with astonishment to see antislavery and missionary societies so busy with the ends of the earth, and yet all the worst evils of slavery and of heathenism are existing amongst ourselves. But no man seems so gifted, or to speak more properly, so endowed by God with the spirit of wisdom, as to read this fearful riddle truly; which, most Sphinx-like, if not read truly, will most surely be the destruction of us all." To awaken the higher orders to the full extent of the evil, was accordingly his chief practical aim, whether in the Letters which he addressed to the "Hertford Reformer," or in his attempts to organize a Society for that purpose, as described in the ensuing correspondence. "My fear with regard to every remedy that involves any sacrifices to the upper classes, is, that the public mind is not yet enough aware of the magnitude of the evil to submit to them. Knowest thou not yet that Egypt is destroyed,' was the question put to Pharaoh by his counsellors; for unless he did know it, they were aware that he would not let Israel go from serving him."

Most of all were these feelings exemplified in his desire, now more strong than ever, for the revival of what he believed to be the true idea of the Church. "I am continually vexed," he writes in 1840, "at being supposed to be a maintainer of negatives-an enemy to other systems or theories, with no positive end of my own. I have told you how it wearies me to be merely opposing Newmanism, or this thing or that thing; we want an actual truth, and an actual good. I wish to deliver myself, if I can, of my positive notions,-to state that for which

I long so eagerly; that glorious Church which Antichrists of all sorts hate and are destroying. If any one would join me in this, I should rejoice; many more, I feel sure, would agree with me, if they saw that the truth was not destructive nor negative, but most constructive, most positive." His desire for removing any particular grievances in the ecclesiastical system, was proportionably diminished. The evil to be abated, the good to be accomplished, appeared to him beyond the reach of any single measure; and, though in 1840 he signed a Petition for alteration in the subscription to the Liturgy and Articles, yet it had so little bearing on his general views as not to be worth mention here, except for the purpose of explaining any misapprehension of his doing so. It was planned and drawn up entirely without his participation, and was only brought to his notice by the accident of two of the principal movers being personal friends of his own. Whatever scruples he had once had on the subject, had been long

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a In connexion with this subject, it may be as well to recur to a previous passage in his life, which only came to my knowledge within the last year, and which this and other accidental hindrances prevented from appearing in its proper place. The graver difficulties, which Mr. Justice Coleridge has noticed as attending his first Ordination, never returned after the year 1820, when he seems to have arrived at a complete conviction both of his conscience and understanding, that there was no real ground for entertaining them. But, during the inquiries which he prosecuted at Laleham, there arose in his mind scruples on one or two minor questions, which appeared to him for a long time to present insuperable obstacles to his taking any office which should involve a second subscription to the Articles. "I attach," he said, "no importance to my own difference, except that, however trifling be the point, and however gladly I would waive it altogether, still, when I am