that there must be more to be said for the other side than is there
set forth. Some of the Essays are tinged also, no doubt, by his own
political and religious limitations. The best are those which get
right away into the broad fields of literature and philosophy.
Johnson, Walpole, Madame D'Arblay, Addison, and the two great Indian
ones, Clive and Warren Hastings, are my own favourites. Frederick
the Great, too, must surely stand in the first rank. Only one would
I wish to eliminate. It is the diabolically clever criticism upon
Montgomery. One would have wished to think that Macaulay's heart was
too kind, and his soul too gentle, to pen so bitter an attack. Bad
work will sink of its own weight. It is not necessary to souse the
author as well. One would think more highly of the man if he had not
done that savage bit of work.

I don't know why talking of Macaulay always makes me think of Scott,
whose books in a faded, olive-backed line, have a shelf, you see, of
their own. Perhaps it is that they both had so great an influence,
and woke such admiration in me. Or perhaps it is the real similarity
in the minds and characters of the two men. You don't see it, you
say? Well, just think of Scott's "Border Ballads," and then of
Macaulay's "Lays." The machines must be alike, when the products are
so similar. Each was the only man who could possibly have written
the poems of the other. What swing and dash in both of them! What
a love of all that is and noble and martial! So simple, and yet so
strong. But there are minds on which strength and simplicity are
thrown away. They think that unless a thing is obscure it must be
superficial, whereas it is often the shallow stream which is turbid,
and the deep which is clear. Do you remember the fatuous criticism
of Matthew Arnold upon the glorious "Lays," where he calls out "is
this poetry?" after quoting--