PREFACE

THE papers in the present volume are not intended as contributions to critical literature. They are of a pioneer character, and are concerned rather with the "personal equation" of the writers discussed than with the purely literary aspects of their work. Originally delivered in the form of lectures, they retain the more colloquial form of "the thing spoken." My excuse for publishing them is that in the form of lectures they served to kindle interest in the personalities of the writers and lead to a study of the originals.

The authors dealt with cover many fields of thought-philosophy, science, poetry, fiction, criticism --but the guiding principle in the selection of names has been to exhibit as great a diversity of temperament as possible. The "moralist" leads the way, as the one who exhibits his temperament as much by what he suppresses as by what he expresses of himself. And the series closes with the "vagabond," who flings himself unreservedly at the reader, whims, peculiarities and all. Thus an attempt at sequence is made, not on literary but on psychological grounds. From the moralist to the vagabond, self-revelation

becomes gradually more intimate in its nature, until the words spoken by Whitman of his Leaves of Grass can be applied to the writings of the later types:-"This is no book; who touches this touches a man."

Too much has been said in elementary essays such as these of the "messages of this or that great man; so even when dealing with the moralists the "human note" has been emphasised in preference to what may be called the "pulpit note" in literature.

Literature, indeed, has been regarded in these fugitive papers as temperament expressed in terms of

art.

After all, the compelling power of the great organ tones of literature depends largely upon the sweetness of the "vox humana."

THE PREACHER

"Your business is to paint the souls of men."

BROWNING.

CARDINAL NEWMAN

ONE cannot tabulate religious genius.

It were

like picking up that sealed bottle of Arabian fame, remarking to an onlooker, "There is a genie inside here," and then dismissing the subject as if one had measured the genie's dimensions and characteristics by pointing to the bottle. Every genius has to creep inside the narrow compass of some creed or formula: but if you would wish to estimate him, do not do so by looking at him through the formula, the dogma, the creed; try to detach him from his creed, and if he is not so terrifying as the genie in the Arabian story, he may equally amaze you as a student of character and a seeker after truth.

Let us examine certain aspects of Newman's influence. At the outset we are met by the extraordinary way in which Newman evades a characteristic label. He has been called, and rightly so, a "mystic," a "brilliant controversialist," a "scholar-recluse," and yet the general impression concerning him that he was a sensitive and kindly ascetic, with a certain aloofness from the world of affairs, is not quite a correct one.

So much has been written upon him from the theological and philosophical point of view, that the human