old liquor, so this virtue is silently engendered by the lapse of years. Youth enjoys such innumerable, immeasurable advantages over middle and old age that it must not grudge maturity of days being claimed as almost essential to detachment.

Mr. Gladstone, and in how few minds | ple; for, as the acid of strong, new is there any perceptible frontier be- wine mellows into fragrant ethers, tween fear and hate! Smith was in contributing the exquisite bouquet of genius so greatly inferior to Burke that it may appear almost grotesque to name the two men in the same sentence, yet Smith bore himself in a loftier attitude to his adversary than it was possible for Burke to maintain towards Fox. In virtue of his faculty of detachment, Smith was able to And here, at last, we arrive at somemaintain relations with two Gladstones thing likely to serve as a distinguishing Gladstone the accomplished scholar, token between sympathy and detachthe repository of half a century of Par- ment separate qualities often reliamentary lore, the facile, versatile, garded as one. Youth abounds in genial acquaintance, and Gladstone the sympathy; mordant jealousy, sour susreckless opportunist, the unstable dem- picion, chill disapproval are the paraagogue, the torch of political war. sitic growth of after years. The heir That Smith possessed a large share of of the many-acred earl will go bird'sthis faculty of mind goes to prove that nesting or trout fishing with a gardenit is to a great extent inherent in cer- er's apprentice without a thought of tain natures, although to some extent the gulf interposed by social system; it may be imparted or acquired. That warmly emulous, absorbed in common which he had coveted so earnestly in interest, each contributes to, underyouth, a classical education, had been stands, and shares the other's pleasdenied to him, and whatever may be ure; they are like two voices singing urged against that particular scheme of in unison, in perfect tune and time, education, it has always been recog-each contributing to the volume of nized as quickening the sense of his- sound though without enhancing its toric proportion and conferring a large quality. But as the lads grow to manand lofty view of human affairs. "Ihood, the music must cease unless a would have you learn Latin," wrote more complex power can be developed. Hazlitt to his son, "because I learned The strain too often ends in a dying it myself, and I would not have you fall; a way must be found for harmony without any of the advantages or to take the place of unison; the two sources of knowledge that I possessed; lives lie on different levels with widely it would be a bar of separation between different aims, and if the peer is to us, and, secondly, because there is an have accord with the peasant it must atmosphere round this kind of classical be by means of a sense even subtler ground to which that of actual life is than sympathy. Sympathy — not comgross and vulgar. . . . We feel the passion such as the strong may feel for presence of that power which gives the weak, the rich for the poor, the immortality to human thoughts and man who succeeds for him who goes actions, and catch the flame of enthu- under, but sympathy of thought, of siasm from all nations and ages." desire, or of sentiment depends for nourishment on community of habits, association, education, age, and a variety of other conditions which enable minds to act in unison; but detachment renders a man superior to all these accidents. The well-fed man of business, stepping down from his front door of a morning on the way to the city, may, let us hope he does, feel compassion for the crossing-sweeper at

I have dwelt, as some may think, at undue length on the lesson of this letter, because it affords evidence contrary to very common experience. Energy concentrated on one pursuit or profession, association maintained too exclusively with one set or class of acquaintance, often hinders the development of this delicate essence. Nor is it commonly recognized in young peo

the corner of the square, but there is you such a gracious aspect, and your hardly foothold for sympathy between thoughts find the most felicitous exmen so differently situated. Compas-pression which your vocabulary is sion may move the banker to feel some capable of affording. Masters of interinterest in the amount of the sweeper's course, men who obtain sway over earnings, and self-interest will spur the many minds, have the gift thus to desquire of the broom to make the cross-tach themselves not only from their ing pleasant for the soles of his patron; own individuality in tête-à-tête, but from but it is the far rarer and loftier gift of hundreds of others who may happen to detachment that can alone give either be assembled in crowded rooms, and, of them insight into the other's mode in doing so, throw away their own of life, and dispose him to be interested selves, but gain the whole world. in his success or patient of his shortcomings.

There is a well-known and nefarious device sometimes resorted to by the disturbers of public meetings which never fails in its disastrous effect upon oratory, and owes its efficacy entirely to the chilling effect of distracted attention. Live sparrows are secretly brought into the room, and when the chief speaker is well on his legs the wretched birds are released. Immediately the attention of the audience is distracted from the business in hand; the speaker may be at the most impressive point in his argument, or addressing the most heart-stirring appeal to a thoroughly sympathetic audience. In a moment all is confusion; the fiercest and most disorderly interruption could not so thoroughly discomfit the speaker; his hearers' eyes follow the birds flitting from side to side of the room, and the most practised orator will find it impossible to proceed until the counter-attraction is withdrawn.

To return to the problem referred to at the outset of this paper-whether this property is a native gift, the product of culture, or a combination of the two there can be little doubt that it is susceptible of development by cultivation. In the whole art of intercourse there is no more fascinating trait than that whereby man or woman has the habit of giving, or appearing to give, the whole attention to the other partner in conversation. Let physicists dogmatize as they will, eyes are more than mere lenses delicately connected with the sensorium. There is far more foundation for the lover's fond faith that they are the windows of the soul. What difference does it make to you whether, when you enter your elderly friend's house, he greets you with his spectacles on the top of his head, in his pocket, or on the bridge of his nose? But if his eyes wander, if they look beyond you through the open door when he takes your hand, or if he stares out in the street while you are telling him something of interest to yourself, you have a chilling sense that you have not possessed yourself of his attention. How your heart goes out to one whose earnest, kindly gaze assures Women, be it said with all the tenyou that for the moment, at least, his derness such cold criticism will brook, thoughts are concentrated on your con- are perhaps more frequent offenders cerns, and your presence is the most against their own sex in this respect important fact to his intelligence than men are towards either men or Granted that perhaps it is only or partly women. It is such a poor thing to find the outcome of good breeding, even so fault, that one is almost ashamed to it fails not of effect, for at worst it is a point the finger to one flaw among graceful form of that most potent of many graces; nevertheless it is such all lubricants - flattery. Your whole a common one, and, one would say, nature expands to one who presents to so easily avoided-one, moreover, of

As in public, so in private; we cannot be at our best we cannot even spread out our middling wares - unless the person we are conversing with lets us feel that, for the moment at least, he is so far detached from other distractions as to place his attention willingly at our disposal.

It is no fault of his if he is not the one of the sable-coated throng upon whom his fair partner would have laid her choice, and she must know that as well as he. He feels no misgiving as to his ability to find conversation enough to fill up the intervals that will occur in mastication during the next hour and a half, and all goes according to his modest expectation, till soup and fish have been disposed of. By that time articulate speech round the table has begun

which the absence insures such a nota- | of civilized society, to matron, maid, or ble charm that absolution may be widow, at the bidding of his hostess. hoped for by the male creature who has the hardihood to comment on it. Two women pass each other in the street of a provincial town; they are not acquainted, yet it is long odds that one of them turns round to look after the other very short odds against both doing so. It is not the gait, or the figure, or the hair of the stranger that has attracted attention, it is the dress, and not the person within it. The gentle anarchists who are busy organizing the debrutalization of man to acquire the usual poultry-yard clatwill, of course, attribute this little failing to the vacuity of the feminine mind by reason of man's tyranny in excluding women from boards of directors and other intellectual arenas. It may be conceded that psychology and betterment are more recondite fields than millinery; but this would be but a dull world, and far uglier than it is, if every woman had a soul above chiffons. Odds grenadine and tarlatan! that were a consummation by no means desirable. No, let all men who have eyes to see withal, or hearts to lose, set great store by the pains bestowed on pretty dressing; but if one may speak and live, the art should be studied with subtler tact than is sometimes seen. It should be better concealed; it is distressing to see a young woman's eyes wandering over the dress of her with whom she is talking, for if the mind be engaged in taking note of external detail, conversation ceases to be intercourse, and becomes the crackling of thorns under the pot.

ter. Our friend is well disposed to bear his part in it, but he becomes aware of some degree of failure in securing his neighbor's attention. Her eyes move continually towards a certain point near the other end of the table, and it is clear that, if she had a dog's power of pricking its ears, hers would be turned in the same direction. Of course, if this were a bride or a very young married woman, not a word need be said about it; time may be trusted to work the cure. It happens, however, that this dame has been married for more years than there are fingers on the hand she gave in wedlock; her lord, who exerts such magnetic influence upon her, has never given her the slightest occasion for jealousy; it is clearly unreasonable, then, that she should be unable to detach her attention from what he is doing or saying, and lend it to the man who is doing his best for her entertainment. He has just tried a fresh subject, on which he happens to be in It does not do to speak with enco- possession of something original to mium of semi-detached couples, yet are say, but it has not elicited any immethere moments when frail humanity is diate response. Her eyes, ears, and driven to sigh for less substance in the thoughts are at the other side of the bonds that rivet a wife's attention upon table, and he begins to wish her body her husband. As a rule, a man has as was there too; only, as he justly oblittle influence on the lot that assigns serves, in grumbling over his experihim a lady to take to dinner as he has ence to a friend, after the ladies have had in the choice of his own parents. left the dining-room, "she could hardly There are exceptions of course, but to go in to dinner with her own husband, allow them to become anything else you know." After a pause she does would be fraught with peril of another respond, showing that while listening sort. He offers his arm, bent at the to what was going on down the table, inelegant angle prescribed by the rules her tympana had received the impres

sion of what had been said beside her. | impression that all the leaders in the The defect arises neither from jeal- Times are written by the same hand ousy nor curiosity, nor because the by an august individual in a closely man at her side is boring her, but buttoned blue frock-coat, rather high solely because she cannot detach her- in the collar, and tightly strapped self from proprietary rights in her hus- trousers, wielding a long plumed goose band. quill. Shirt-sleeves, wooden brûleThe lack of this power of detachment gueules, and fountain pens form no has become vastly oppressive in some part of the picture. But the perpetual of the literature of the day, especially “ I, I, I" of society papers conveys in the periodicals. The quarterlies, for the mental picture of a pair of trousers the most part, maintain a dignified bagged at the knees, a dirty lounge standard of impersonality, but the coat very shiny on back and cuffs, common run of magazine articles is everything of the writer revealed as far too often grievously tinged with the as the chin, only the features are impertinent suggestion of the quill-masked.

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driver himself. How different the It is quite true that many excellent method of the immortals! Whether it narratives have been penned in the was unconsciously or scrupulously, Shakespeare in effect kept himself and his affairs so completely out of sight in his writings, that there actually exists, one hears, a considerable number of grown, educated, and therefore responsible persons who profess disbelief in his authorship.

The

first person singular, but very few carry the weight of Boswell's "Life of Johnson." The amazing frankness of Boswell in regard to himself is hardly excelled by Samuel Pepys, who is the only man that ever succeeded in writing a perfectly honest and, at the same time, readable personal journal. Walter Scott's is quite as readable and far more elevating, but there is less in it about Walter Scott than any other subject. Boswell and Pepys have succeeded in diverting us, though they were both incapable of detachment, Boswell never letting us forget that he was the best friend and historian of his hero, and Pepys that he was the best friend and historian of himself; but our diversion in their perusal arises from sources which would never have been suspected by the writers. Scott's journal, begun late in life, was far more a commonplace book than anything else, into which random impressions on a many-sided intellect were piled without any design of showing

The most obvious way of suppressing all suggestion of the writer's self or self-consciousness is to avoid the use of the first personal pronoun. He can lay about him just as boldly cut, thrust, stab, tickle, soothe with as much certainty as if he were unmasked, and indeed with far greater effect on the reader's nerves. modern journalism of personal paragraphs began in England - did it not? with the World newspaper, about the year 1870. Even as a novelty it had a most distressing effect on the sensibilities of people accustomed to a more stately style; it was quickly taken up by imitators in other journals, until now the ridiculous affectation has become intolerable. Far from suggest-off what a coarser touch would have ing the writer's easy familiarity with the scenes he depicts and the personages he slaps on the back, it seems, on the contrary, to let in a draught from the back stairs, with whiffs of dripping from the kitchen, and paraffin from the lamp room. Readers always invest the personality of a writer with imaginary attributes; to this day there lingers in some respectable country houses the

made the principal figure.

He

Mirabeau's letters written to Sophie from his prison at Vincennes, if the profuse amatory passages are omitted, form a somewhat similar running commentary on men and manners. certainly possessed the power of sinking self and surroundings in contemplation of human life and passions. Montaigne, on the other hand, delight

66

"I."

ful gossip as he is, impresses one as | detachment will be seen to be essential being constantly, though gracefully, to the right discharge of the historian's posed. He certainly owes some of his task. Cold impartiality will not do; charm to archaic orthography. The that, wedded with acumen, may serve first personal pronoun singular, written the turn of a judge, but an historian by him ie, has none of the arrogant has need of far more penetrating self-sufficiency of the English capital powers. It would never do, for example, for a judge (let us suppose his Although it really has little to do name to be Mr. Justice William Smith) with securing the quality of detach- to be swayed by the echo of Baxter's ment in literature, it is not a bad prin- pious sentiment, and, with his eye on a ciple for a young writer to set out with convicted criminal awaiting sentence, the resolution to turn every sentence murmur to himself, "There, but for so as to avoid the use of "I." It will the grace of God, goes Bill Smith." be found equally remarkable how diffi- His sentence, if it is to be righteous, cult it is to succeed in the attempt at must be purged of speculative psycholfirst, and how direct is the gain in dig-ogy.

nity when the trick has been acquired. It is otherwise with the historian. The time-honored device of the pro- Being human, he cannot be without noun in the first person plural, how- predilection, nor, probably, without ever effective in what is uttered from prejudice; the presence of these emothe monarch's council or an editor's tions will redeem his work from the office, is inseparable from ludicrous insipidity of the "Annual Register; pomposity in a private scribbler. It is but unless he has detachment, which really worth considering whether the will enable him to probe and diagnose time has not arrived when we might the motives of individuals with whose dispense with the capital letter in the principles he happens to be out of symnominative singular of the pronoun, pathy, and apply the evidence furand render it "i," after the manner nished to him without regard to his affected by conscientious agnostics who own creed or training, then his history inscribe the name of God with a small will never be more than a partisan g, although it is not known that they record. pursue the same plan when occasion arises to mention the heathen deities. To do so would impart rather a mesquin air to some sonorous passages.

For instance:

See what a grace was seated on this brow!
Hyperion's curls, the front of jove himself,
An eye like mars to threaten and com-
mand,

This detachment is, after all, but the pure spirit of philosophy, and it is rare indeed that the philosopher will be at the pains to write history. He is generally content to deliver his message or remain a silent spectator of events. Thomas Carlyle attempted the parts of both philosopher and historian, but though the wreaths on his urn have lost no freshness of verdure, few would

A station like the herald mercury
New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill; etc., incline to number detachment among

etc.

This would be to give Hyperion a distinctly unfair advantage over the cloud-compeller, through the accidental position of his name at the beginning of a line.

his attainments. Of a truth, though historians are indispensable, we hold them in but scurvy repute. When Sir Robert Walpole retired into private life, time hung heavy on his hands, and Horace exerted himself to amuse So far the subject has been examined his father. One day he offered to read chiefly from the point of view of what to him. "What will you read, child ?” will best insure the objective grace of asked Sir Robert wearily. Horace speakers and writers, and the subjec- suggested history. "No, no," replied tive edification of their audience. But the veteran statesman, 66 not history, followed a little further, the virtue of Horace; that can't be true!"